Travis Kelce’s comment on drinking with Mahomes short-sighted
Hot takes not always the right take in social media universe
PHOENIX >> We live in a world where unfiltered sells, ridiculous or hurtful as it may be, and social media encourages people to present and weigh in on hot takes and be compensated for it.
Which is fine. A lot of those hard core, arrogant you-know-what holes have hate agendas and never will know the meaning of decency. Hashtag “some are sicker than others.”
If you’re thinking of going down that path, which is your right no matter what anyone says, and you want to throw something stupid out there just try to put yourself in the shoes of the victims.
Which brings me to Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, the younger brother of Eagles center Jason Kelce and by all accounts a guy you’d probably be proud to call your brother.
At the Chiefs team media availability Tuesday, Kelce was asked how he had built the chemistry he has with Patrick Mahomes. If I’m voting, both of those players are headed for the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and deservedly so. You know they’re coming and like Joe Montana and Jerry Rice you can’t do anything about it.
Anyway Kelce, fresh off a lot of likes for ripping the trashtalking mayor of Cincinnati and full of Super Bowl testosterone this week delivered a response that might be funny at the bar or among his close friends but incredibly short-sighted in the big picture.
“I tell everybody what makes me and Pat so special is the countless and endless amount of beers that we drink off the field,” Kelce said. “We like to have a good time everywhere we go, and I think you see that out there on the field. There’s a lot of chemistry, a lot of reps and a lot of football that goes into that. But getting to know somebody you’re working with, getting to know them in a different personal level, it makes you want to fight that much more for them.”
It was totally unfair to Chiefs head coach Andy Reid, his son, Britt Reid and most of all to Ariel Miller, the 5-year-old old seriously injured when Britt’s truck crashed into the back of the automobile she was in near Arrowhead Stadium on Feb. 4, 2021.
Kelce clearly didn’t mean to be offensive gauging by the deep bond and love he feels for Andy Reid. But come on now, Britt
Reid admitted to drinking before the crash. He’s doing three years in prison for that entire event much to the dismay of the Miller family that thinks he got off easy.
How the hell can anybody who follows football forget all that?
Britt Reid was working for the Chiefs when that horrific event occurred three days before Super Bowl LV. A second child was hurt in the crash, and both are back in school. But several families were and continue to be impacted by the matter including the Reids and the
Chiefs.
What an awful Super Bowl week that was in 2021 for all of those families. Kelce said the Chiefs’ 31-9 loss to Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in that game was because of what happened on the field but let’s be honest. Who among us can compartmentalize a lifechanging event such as that in a few days?
“I learned how strong of a guy he is, how strong his family is, how tight knit this entire locker room is and how much we love that guy, man,” Kelce said. “It wasn’t an easy time for him and we’re definitely trying to make this year that much better. We’ve got to get another for Big Red, man. I love that guy too much.”
God only knows how difficult it’s been for Andy Reid, who had to bury his oldest son, Garrett, gone from a heroin overdose in a Lehigh University dormitory during the Eagles’ 2012 training camp. There were plenty of off-the-field issues with Garrett and Britt, none of them preventable. You can’t blame Reid for any of those messes. Rest assured, he blamed himself.
During Big Red’s tour with the Eagles, both of his sons were seen doing errands at the NovaCare Complex. Critics privately wanted to crucify the Eagles for letting guys with rap sheets into the building. If nothing else, the coach knew where his kids were, as he does now, heart-wrenching as that must be.
Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a rip Travis Kelce column. This is the ridiculous social media universe we live in that encourages users to be outrageous and in too many cases, uncaring. It’s legal but shortsighted, and not right, at least if you have a working moral compass.
Let’s all borrow this line from Kelce, who after the AFC title game win over the Bengals very publicly slammed Cincy Mayor Aftab Pureval, who irreverently called Arrowhead Stadium “Burrowhead Stadium” after quarterback Joe Burrow.
“Know your role and shut your mouth, you jabroni!”
Amen to that.