Wulf: In retiring, Jason Kelce keeps making dreams come true

Jason Kelce and I are a year apart in age.

Chronologically, our careers have overlapped. I was there at Lehigh in 2011, young and dumb, when he was installed as the starting center as a rookie sixth-round pick, young and dumb. Thirteen years later, when he was wiping away tears during an unforgettable retirement speech, so was I.

If I’d been asked yesterday to come up with a list of my most vivid memories from those years, the answers would have echoed Kelce’s. Seeing a superstar move on the field in person for the first time. Finding the perfect watering hole with your co-workers. Learning that Garrett Reid had passed away. Chip Kelly’s debut. The snow game. Carson Wentz’s torn ACL and the magic that followed. The parade, the flower speech, the second Super Bowl.

His memories are my memories, just from a different perspective.

But I did not identify with Kelce Monday. Instead, I was struck by the scene 15 or 20 minutes before Kelce ambled up to the podium, tears already in his eyes. Other than Kelce’s agent Jason Bernstein, the first person to arrive at the section reserved for friends and family was his dad, Ed, looking sharp as I’ve ever seen him with a dapper suit jacket and slicked-back hair. Shortly thereafter, Jeff Stoutland walked in surrounded by his own family of four.

Kelce’s two proud fathers.

Through that prism, it was easy to recognize that Kelce’s dreams were not the only ones that all came true.

“I think one of the best things a person can be in this world is a father,” Kelce said. “A father who is present, loving, devoted just may be the greatest gift a child could ask for in our society.”

As a father, you want your child to find a passion. Kelce’s love letter to the sport, tracing back to his first practice as a 12-year-old, and the spirit with which he carried himself for 13 seasons made it very clear he did that.

You want your child to work hard and make the most of their natural abilities. From walk-on linebacker to sixth-round pick to washed-up 29-year-old all the way to presumptive Hall of Famer, Kelce has definitely done that, even if Philadelphia and his growing audience has fallen for the con that he’s an everyman. To think any of us could have been just like him does a disservice to his talent. Thirteen years later, he still holds the record for fastest short shuttle for an offensive lineman at the combine, to say nothing of the way he saw the game on the field.

You want them to treat people with respect. It would be hard to find anyone, from the non-football staff in the building to the devoted fans who stop him everywhere he goes, including the McDonald’s drive-thru, who would say Kelce has ever been anything other than generous in his interactions with them. Willingness to engage with the media is often misused as a proxy for character, but the degree to which Kelce has always been available, honest and curious is worth recognizing.

You want your children to be gracious, to appreciate the people who have helped them along the way. From his youth football coaches to his high school band teacher to the strength coach at Cincinnati who first suggested he move to center to Stoutland, Kelce made sure to name-drop them all with the football world watching Monday. What a thrill that must have been for them.

“I am lucky my whole life I have been surrounded by people that have believed in me,” Kelce said.

You don’t want your children to struggle, but you know adversity is inevitable. You want them to believe in themselves as much as you do. To press on. Check there, including during his final act as a professional, when Kelce overcame his swelling emotions with the patience to steady himself.

“‘More often than not,'” Kelce said, parroting a quote Stoutland passed along from his own father, “‘the easy way is the wrong way.'”

You want your kids to be themselves, to have fun, even if that means dressing up like an idiot in front of their friends or cracking a dick joke on stage like the class clown they are.

Most of all, you want the world to see your children the way you do. You want everyone to see the big things that make them amazing and the little things that make them special. You want them to be loved.

Philadelphia has taken care of that.

And then, far enough down the line, maybe you want your children to feel the gift of having the same pride you do in them for children of their own.

As he closed the book on his playing career, having defeated the game by retiring of his own accord amid a streak of 156 consecutive games played, the father of three young girls referred to what comes next. As has been the case for 13 years, he said it best.

“A life,” Kelce said, “that increasingly brings me more fulfillment off the field than it does on.”