ESPN Monday Night Countdown recently completed its 18th season on the air and attained an average of 1.34 million viewers per show, representative of a 5% year-over-year increase. Former Philadelphia Eagles center Jason Kelce was behind the desk as an analyst alongside Ryan Clark, Marcus Spears and Scott Van Pelt, making his debut as a full-time member of the team upon his retirement from professional football.
In addition to his work with ESPN, which also included a five-episode late-night talk show, Kelce has continued to host the New Heights podcast with his brother, Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce. In fact, the duo signed an advertising sales and representation deal with Amazon’s Wondery, reportedly a three-year pact worth more than $100 million.
During a recent episode of the podcast, the Kelce brothers welcomed Van Pelt on the program where they discussed a variety of topics centering around sports and media. Travis Kelce asked Van Pelt what it was like working with Jason Kelce on television for the first time this past NFL season. In response, Van Pelt explained that he was interested in hearing his perspective since it had been almost a year since he had made the official decision and recalled reaching out to Kelce as he was reportedly being pursued by a variety of media companies.
“There’s a million things about your brother that make him perfect for [TV], but you still, there’s a process of learning the mechanics of TV that it’s not innate,” Van Pelt said. “He’s innately entertaining and engaging and people love him, but learning how to, ‘Okay, when’s it my turn?,’ and what I always try to tell him is, ‘Look man, your mic’s always on. You don’t need me to ask you to go. When you’re ready to go, go.’”
Van Pelt remarked that he had fostered chemistry with Spears and Clark working with them regularly last year and acknowledged that it can be a challenge to have four people trying to figure out where to talk. Nonetheless, he reflected on this past season of the studio program as having been a blast and highlighted the authenticity and consistent improvement of the group. By the end of the year, he could tell that Kelce was more comfortable behind the microphone.
“It was a lot to learn and take in,” said Jason Kelce. “I think it’s so much different – obviously, we have this podcast, Trav – but live TV is so much different. We cut so much of this stuff out and have so much leeway to just say whatever we want. When you’re on live TV, you got to be concise, to the point. You got to make space for people to talk and have a conversation, and part of it is getting to know everybody.”
Kelce expressed that he reached out to Van Pelt early on and went golfing with him as he tried to discern what to expect and how to best prepare. Despite playing in the NFL for 13 years, he professed that he watched more football around the league this past season than ever before. It was a sentiment that Travis Kelce substantiated by communicating how there is a focus on your own team when being in the building.
“It’s like your team and the team you’re playing,” Jason Kelce replied, “and you’re getting really hyper-focused on those, and I still like watching the game in that hyper-focused gameplan-oriented focus. It’s not feasible to do that really in the same way in the same depth when you’re trying to watch all 17 games that happen.”
Van Pelt conveyed that the show had Kelce break things down beyond the tackles and that he was able to help people understand why things work. As the host of the show, his job is to put everyone in the best position to succeed and render the program even better, and he recognized how Monday Night Football feels like a thing unto itself. Kelce surmised that it was the “pinnacle of football” when he was growing up and still a prime time slot that players in the league value.
“It’s really fun looking back and seeing how everything evolved over the course of the year, how much closer everything got, and looking forward to this next year for sure,” Kelce said. “I think it’s going to be awesome.”
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