This won’t be “new news” for some NFL fans, but you might be pronouncing Travis and Jason Kelce’s last name all wrong.
The pronunciation of “Kelce” made headlines again this week, after the NFL shared a clip on Instagram of Kansas City Chiefs player, Chris Jones, talking about his teammate’s last name.
“Y’all know it’s not even Travis ‘Kel-see’?” Chris tells his teammate in the video clip below, shared on Wednesday. “It’s Travis ‘Kels’. Fucking crazy, right?”
Both Travis and his brother, Philadelphia Eagles player Jason Kelce, have spoken about the pronunciation of their last name on their hit podcast, New Heights.
The siblings brought on their father, Ed Kelce, to discuss their name confusion back in February 2023, as their father was the culprit in changing the way their name is said.
“Why in the world did you change your name outta nowhere and now we are Kel-see?” Jason asked as his father denied ever doing so.
“I never changed my name outta nowhere,” Ed insisted.
“Well, let’s talk about it. Why did we think that our name was ‘Kel-see’ ... for the first 24, 25 years of our life? 25 for me, 27 for Trav,” Jason asked.
“I got tired of correcting people,” Ed answered.
“That’s a good [reason] to stop. That’s as good as I’ve heard,” Jason answered, before jokingly grilling his father: “So you changed your entire family’s name over generations, because you were tired of correcting people?”
Ed said that he didn’t tell the boys the “real” way to pronounce their last name, because even their mother thought it was “Kel-see,” as that was the way he pronounced his name at work.
When Jason asked his dad how they should pronounce the name going forward, Ed simply replied: “Do whatever you want. I did!”
Travis has spoken about the correct pronunciation of his name before, most notably during an interview with Barstool Sports’ Bussin’ With The Boys show back in 2021.
“I got ‘Kel-see’ and ‘Kels.’ My real name is ‘Kels,’” Travis said at the time. “I just kinda roll with the punches.”
The revelation was shocking at the time for Travis’ teammate, quarterback Patrick Mahomes, who replied on Twitter: “You learn something new everyday,” with a few laughing emojis.