While Jason Kelce will always be intimately linked to Philadelphia, where he is essentially worshiped and where he spent his entire NFL career, the athlete is not originally from there. Given his relationship with younger brother Travis, we can’t help but wish Kelces hailed from “The City of Brotherly Love,” but the NFLer’s roots are in Ohio. The elder of the two Kelce brothers was born in Greenville, North Carolina but his family moved to Ohio when he was a baby, and he spent nearly all of his life in Cleveland Heights before heading off to college (also in Ohio). In fact, the Kelce brothers named their podcast (more on that later) “New Heights” partially as an homage to the city in which they were raised.
Kelce was born in 1987, two years before his younger brother and only sibling. His father Don was a steel sales representative, while his mother Donna worked in banking, providing him with a comfortable middle-class upbringing. He attended Cleveland Heights High School, where he played both hockey and football. Though he was a good football player in high school, Kelce played a different position back then (linebacker) and failed to get an initial athletic scholarship offer to attend college (he later asked for, and got, a scholarship partway through his time at the University of Cincinnati, around the time he changed positions). In addition to football, Kelce played saxophone in his high school’s jazz band, which is simply adorable to imagine.
