About an hour into Jason Kelce’s interview with Howie Roseman on the Kelce Brothers' New Heights podcast, Kelce looked at Roseman and asked about draft day.
Draft day 2011.
That's when the Eagles, with Roseman in his second year as general manager but Andy Reid still holding personnel control, selected Kelce in the sixth round of the draft. He was the 191st player taken overall, the 30th offensive lineman.
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Nobody in Philly cared. Or noticed. Bottom of the roster guy. Probably get cut after training camp and we’d never hear about him again.
A fireman from Canada was the big story that weekend. And a safety from Temple. The Eagles drafted seven players before Kelce in 2011, including two offensive linemen.
Kelce to Roseman: “What was my scouting report? What made you guys draft me? How many draft boards was I taken off of the moment I weighed 280 pounds (at the Combine)?”
Howie: “I think it was that plus the combination of intense anger that you wanted to beat the bleep out of everyone within five miles from you at the time. (That) was at least the reputation.”
NFL
Kelce sheepishly: “Yeah.”
Kelce did have a bad reputation coming out of Cincinnati, and although he wouldn't have been a super high draft pick either way, that did hurt his draft stock.
“I do remember in the draft room, (scouts) were going, “I’m just telling you, he might fight half the team,’” Roseman recalled. “’And he really likes to party.’”
Kelce: “I had a bad reputation coming out of Cincinnati. You guys do your research. All of this is accurate.”
Howie: “You know, we had you in the fourth round.”
Kelce: “Fourth round? So why did I go in the sixth round? Why didn’t you guys draft me in the fourth round?”
Fair question.
Howie: “Honestly, I’m embarrassed we had you in the fourth round because you’re thinking, ‘1st-ballot Hall of Famer, and we had you in the fourth round?' So we were wrong about that. But at that time nobody really looked like you. Nobody. You were a converted linebacker, right? As I remember, you played linebacker your freshman year?"
Kelce: “Yep! Defensive scout team Player of the Year! They used to call me Dick Butkus because I wore 60.”
Howie: “So we liked you and at the same time we knew you were kind of off half the boards in the league so we were totally excited to get you and draft you there.”
Coaching legend Howard Mudd, a lineman on the NFL’s 1960 All-Decade team, had become Eagles offensive line coach two months earlier, when Reid promoted Juan Castillo to defensive coordinator. And it was Mudd who really pushed for the Eagles to draft Kelce.
“We can’t tell the story (of drafting you) without really telling the story of Howard Mudd,” Roseman said on the podcast. “Great coach and for me personally a great man, somebody who really helped me with evaluating offensive linemen.
“We had Juan Castillo and then Howard came in and it was totally different. With Juan, we were looking for size and length and power, and Howard came in and he said, ‘I don’t want any of that.’ And so what we really had to do was we had to watch guys together and for us it changed from that to explosiveness, athleticism, instincts, vision on the field. You have elite vision. I had never thought of offensive linemen like that.”
Without Castillo becoming defensive coordinator, Mudd never coaches offensive linemen here. And the Eagles never draft Kelce.
The Eagles had an established center when Kelce got drafted. Jamaal Jackson had started 63 of 64 games from 2006 through 2009 before suffering a season-ending triceps injury in the 2010 opener.
Jackson and Kelce competed for the starting job during 2011 training camp at Lehigh, and as solid as Jackson was, it was no contest.
“We were two weeks into practice, and I’m on the side of the cafeteria, where the line wraps around, I can picture it now, where you pick up your food, and (Mudd) grabs me, and he says, ‘He’s starting,’” Roseman recalled.
“I was like, ‘Yeah, it would probably be hard to start a rookie center the first two games in domes when we haven’t had an offseason program,’ and he’s like, “Don’t even start with me. He’s starting Week 1. ... I'm freaking telling you, Howie.’ I remember it so clearly.
“He’s like, ‘This guy is going to be the captain of your team and your best player.’ That’s awesome, but does he have to start in a dome the first two games?”
Kelce did indeed start the 2011 opener and he’s been the Eagles’ starting center for 188 games since – all but 14 games in 2012 and four games in 2014.
He’s a five-time All-Pro, and only four centers in NFL history have made more All-Pro teams. Only two Eagles have made more All-Pro teams. Only one 6th-round pick has made more All-Pro teams.
“You really were a good player right away,” Roseman said. “It didn’t take you long. There was no transition. And I give Coach Reid a lot of credit, too, because Coach Reid was like, ‘Yeah, we’re freaking playing him.’ Total trust in Howard.”
Mudd was only with the Eagles through 2012, and he died two years ago, but the impact he made on the Eagles’ offensive line and organization was massive.
He really changed the way Roseman and his staff scout linemen and what they look for. And it all began with Kelce.
“That really started how we drafted offensive linemen, because really it went into the explosive athleticism,” Roseman said. “The short shuttle. Having guys on offense who were elite athletes to match up with our skill position guys, and really when you see what’s gone on in the league, Howard was ahead of it.
“I’d like to say me and coach Reid were, but really you have to give him credit. Because the league wasn’t really there. They just wanted size.”
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