Green Light with Chris Long - The Kili Tapes with Jason Kelce.

Episode Date: February 22, 2020

Jason Kelce went to Band Camp. Two dudes on a rock at 11,400ft on Episode 3 of the Kili Tapes, Chris Long sits down on a rock with Philadelphia Eagles' Jason Kelce. About Chalk Media: Following the unfiltered voice and vision of Chris Long, Chalk Media is the interactive online community for you, the intelligent and humorous sports fan. Driven by access, Chalk delivers a unique perspective that cuts through the canned talking points and provides a variety of content from your favorite sports and entertainment celebrities. Here at Chalk, we don’t take ourselves too seriously, but we are rooted in challenging the perception of professional athletes. We embrace the “real” with a unique combination of humor and intelligence. Chalk is a community with a voice beyond 240 characters that brings a perspective and vibe to a traditionally brash and boastful sports media space. Subscribe and enjoy weekly content including podcasts, documentaries, live chats, celebrity interviews and more. Nothing is off-limits at Chalk - hot news items, trending discussions from the NFL, MLB, NHL, NBA, NCAA are just a small part of what we will be sharing with you. 🌍🏀🏈SUBSCRIBE NOW ⚾🏒⛰️ http://bit.ly/chalknetwork Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Next up in the Killie tapes, this is week three, and I have a very special guest here, one that I know Eagles fans and NFL fans alike will love. And Jason Kelsey, funny thing about Jason Kelsey is not only is the Super Bowl champion, teammate of mine, a brilliant guy. You know, you don't see him with his helmet off a lot. I know he looks like a caveman,

a regular Neanderthal with the face mask on. But behind that beard, behind that persona, he's a very interesting guy. and he's also patient zero for chalk because he was the first interview we did on the mountain. Two dudes on a rock, you know, the Killy Tapes. It was born. This is my first interview I think I ever did was Jason Kelsey at about, I don't know, 12,000 feet, something like that.

It was high up, wherever it was. And we had a lot of fun. So check this one out. You're not going to want to miss it. Jason Kelsey, one of my favorite teammates of all time. Obviously gives great speeches. He's a great interview as well. I'm here with Philly legend and icon Jason Kelsey at 11,400 feet, and we're two dudes on a rock.

Yes, we are. How you feeling? The rock's pretty hard. It is. My first question for you would be, what kind of drugs were you on at the parade and how far I find them? Gary ain't got it. Oh, hell, I can't fit the ski. The only drug I was on was alcohol.

In copious amounts. Where did you get the outfit? Have you talked about that before? A little bit, but so you know Libby. Yeah. So Libby's husband, Bobby, is a barber. Yeah. Libby's husband Bobby has been a mummer for like 30 years.

Right. And I'm sitting down, I said to Kylie, my wife, I think if I'm gonna do the parade, I'm gonna do a Philadelphia style. That's, she get like a mummer suit. It's pretty much. Yeah. As Philly as it gets, because people don't know mummer

I mean I remember a lot of my buddies was like like they hit me up like what the fuck was Jason dressed as looks like a genie yeah yeah yeah he looked like a laden yeah yeah but you found it from liby's husband and yeah so Kylie reminded me that bobby's been a mummer for 30 years so i shot liby attacks she got the bobby and like within 15 and they found a mummer your size yeah he's actually bigger than me six four uh three 10 have you met him yeah he's a big dude one thing they caught me up right about you and the cool thing is like i learned should about you all the time. And we eat a lot of breakfast at work and we have some great conversations, but you know, one thing that I thought was really cool and you blew me away with was your

musical talent that you keep, again, a secret. Sure. Yeah, like the Mummer thing, like talk about where that started and where it's gone. Yeah. So I started playing saxophone in fourth grade. Like the area that we, and my brother, me and my brother grew up in, you like had the option in fourth grade to like play music. Right. And I don't know why, but I just, love the saxophone. Yeah. And I kept playing through high school. I actually was on the jazz ensemble.

It was a big deal at the time. I'm not even messing with you. Like we would tour every spring break. Did you wear a uniform? Oh yeah. What it looked like? Like, it was like a school uniform tuxedo type. The girls like the uniform?

Yeah, it wasn't really for the girls. You know, it was more just for the, for the, for the, the prideful, you know, teams aspect of it. But we would tour every spring break. Like we went to New York. Like we literally battle other schools in those areas. Not being the bands. Battled the jazz ensembles, yeah.

No shit. And you still play. I still play. I put down the saxophone for a while in college because I didn't think in college people wanted to hear me play saxophone. Like in a dorm. You would be wrong. You'd probably right.

But so I picked up the guitar and learned the guitar when I was like a freshman in college. Yeah. And I kind of just, I just toy around with music. It's like a kind of like a nice hobby just to take my mind on it. What's harder, sax or guitar? I think that, I think guitar is a lot easier to like become average at everything. Gotcha. I think saxophone, but people who are really, really good at guitar,

there's like a, in my opinion, there's a whole nother love. Maybe it's just because I'm better with saxophone. People that can play a flamingo, like just finger picking, going all over the place and whatnot. You can do so much more with a guitar that you can't with a saxophone. You're limited with a saxophone. Yeah, do you have more artistic liberty? Yeah. Like I feel like, you know, you see all the, I don't know what I'm talking about, but like with the guitar you see all like the add-ons and like, you know, you can put certain things on and make it sound different and whatnot.

Yeah, it's a more versatile instrument. Right. And also on the guitar, you can play, you have the freedom to play chords. That's why you can, I mean, anybody can pick up a guitar and learn. you know, you know, seven, eight chords and you can play 80% of the music and just sing along, right? Right. But the saxophone, all you can do is a melody, you can't do a chord.

You can just do straight notes. And you played sax in front of a bunch of people recently? Yeah, well, I marched down, so after the parade, kind of, obviously, publicity went up. And I decided to return the favor for them, let me borrow the mumbershoot by marching with that string band. Gotcha. now Manny Young. It was my first time ever marching and playing because I never did marching band in high school So it was a new experience. It was a lot harder than sitting in a chair and play in Saxville

And then I also got to play with my high school band that I used to tour with they just so happened to have their spring break tour scheduled for Philly last year Oh nice so I was able to go they went to Central high school which is a big time high school in Philadelphia and I was able to sit in and play with and play with the two jazz bands. To me, it seems petrifying. Like, a musician, a great musician. All athletes want to be musicians, right? Yeah, yeah.

And, like, for me, I always wished that I had the skill to be a musician. Like, I saw, like, guitar especially. I just feel like if you're a great guitarist, like, you're just badass level 11 on a scale of 1 to 10. And, like, when I saw the chili peppers, the one thing I took away from it was, like, flees a god, man. Yeah. Like, this guy, he's superhuman.

So, I mean, just the ability to get in front of people and not give a fuck. And not give a fuck. And so to me, like, what's harder? You fuck up a note playing guitar in front of a room full of people or the sacks or you give up a sack. Like, what's more petrifying? I'm not talking about, like, a covered sack. I'm talking about you got run over. Yeah, I would say this.

I think if you miss one note, if you're a good enough musician and you just go with the flow, chances are most people aren't going to notice it unless it's like a big note of the song right so you can kind of play that off it's hard to play off a sack on like third down like it's right there but you kind of mentioned you know you you would be like nervous to play in front of that many people right yeah but they would probably be nervous to play football in front of a million people yeah i think the reason that we kind of feel that way about musicians these dudes practice non-stop so to them they're just doing what they've done like a million times.

So I think maybe they're nervous for probably the first few big concerts or first concerts they do, but after that I think they just get into a rhythm. Not that it's any less impressive. But National Anthem people still find a way to screw it up. Yeah, you're right, you're right.

But maybe that's like an artistic liberty that they're taken. But that's also not most people haven't practiced the National Anthem as much as they've practiced the material they're performing in a concert. Right. Unfortunately.

Right, like I remember at the All-Star game, the Fergie thing, and she became like a meme immediately because the Fergie thing, and she took an artistic liberty. Yeah. She's a great musician. Yeah. There's just some songs you got to stay more true to the course with. Right. It's like some techniques on the field. You've got to run the technique.

Yeah. I'm going to try this here. That's when I get in the most trouble on the football field is when I'm like, I'm going to do something different this time, and I'm going to make a play. Yeah. And I can tell you, like, distinctly, that there's plays. I'm not going to mention because then people look them up. that like, you know, where the back of my head hits the ground, because I do something stupid.

And luckily people don't watch linemen very much. That's the one saving grace of being a lineman. Our most embarrassing plays, most times, for y'all it's worse. You know, if I get pancake, people might not see it. Now, of course, when you fuck up on the field, my first thought at least is like, I'm in the broadcast in my head. And I'm like, man, people are tweeting about me. Like, I'm a meme right now.

And then I go watch the TV copy. be after they didn't even notice. Yeah, I guess that wasn't that bad. But like for y'all, it's kind of, I mean, when you could beat for a sack, it's hard to recover. Yeah, when you could beat for a sack or you, you know, have a high snap as a center. Oh.

Everybody kind of knows what just happened. It's hard to do it, bro. But I'll say this, like for an O. Lyman, when you get beat, the best guys, like we were just saying, don't have the thought of, I'm going to do this thing over here to completely fix this problem and do something drastically different than I've ever done.

And I think that might be different, the difference between O-Line and D-Line. It is, for sure. You guys aren't measured statistically. Now the lows of being O-Lignment are lower than the lows of being a D-Lyman, but when, you know, you're having a game where, you know, as a D-Liaman, you haven't made a play yet. And you're like, man, I got pressure to make a play. I gotta do too much. For sure.

And that's where guys get in trouble. And it's, as a D-Lignment, like, as a D-Liamen, chaos is almost your friend, right? So sometimes doing something out of the ordinary that the offense alignment isn't expecting can like completely change again. As an offense alignment, if you do something that's different from the guy next to you and like you guys aren't all in sync doing the proper technique, like it could. Right. Bad stuff could happen. Bad. And we call it going into the matrix.

Oh, do you go. Yeah. We've called people that. You've called that like when your arms are flailing in the air. Yeah. Well, you get. And Jason Peters has a DM like, you know, he's got one. He's got one foot on the ground and one foot off the ground and two, you know, but...

Yeah, you get beat for a sack and then all of a sudden you're in your head and you've taken the wrong, you've taken the red pill, you should have taken the blue. And all of a sudden, you don't know which, what's real anymore? You don't know, should I go with this technique or should I try something? And then all of a sudden, those plays start adding up and it just turns into a game. It's like, hey, the coach, you know, you come to sign and stout's like, you know, what's wrong with the, what's wrong with such and such? He's in the matrix. And like, and you can tell when you're playing an O-Lyman, when you beat him once, if he doesn't have the wherewithal to stick to his shit. Oh, yeah.

He's going to have a long day. And then he starts, you know, you know, jump-setting, but out of his technique or over-setting or, and that's how we make money. So. Absolutely. And you know, like if you legitimately bullrush a guy. Yeah. And then you go to the second time to go get him and you feel him lean. Close his eyes and lean.

I mean, the next side. Yeah, exactly. So I guess the million dollar question is climbing Kilimanjaro blocking Aaron Donald one-on-one, what's scary? Oh my gosh. Blocking Aaron Donald. He's a bad motherfucker. Yeah. I don't know that anybody in the league can block Aaron Donald one-on-one.

He's pretty dang good. Him and Fletch to me, and you play Fletch in practically, he's not in a zero much. I mean, he's not in a shade much. Yeah, I don't play either of those guys, thankfully, too much. You're not going to deal with Aaron much, but like I see. Fletch and AD abuse people just on a regular basis but they do it in such different ways which is what's so cool I mean in different body types completely but but but they're they're different players I think Fletch might be more of a

throwback where he's he's gonna be you know run stuff for all the time and he's gonna take more gambles yep but they're both two of my favorites to watch do you have a favorite guy to watch it doesn't have to be a three tech it could be any D lineman or is there a guy that you played that you were like I wasn't expecting him to be this good. There's been a lot of guys. There's a lot of guys that. There's more DeLiam and I like watching but like for you you could watch both sides because I don't understand that in the heart form. Like I like one guy I like watching is J.R. Sweezy. Yeah. Just because he throws everything he has in every single play. And it's like a relentless

type of effort and he might completely whiff on a play. He's going to try to burp people. Yeah. He's going to finish every block and he's that guy that you know if you're a DeLine man because I played them in Seattle and Brenno Jocomini as well. Yeah. I mean, those guys on the same line. Yeah. If you have the right mindset, they can elevate your game, but if you're not ready to play, they can get in your head.

For sure. You know, they're going to piss you off, and if you're ready to fight, I'm going to fight too, and I'm going to play my best game. Yep. But those guys are going to get you. Yeah, it's relentless. Yeah. And I think those are the type of guys, and that's why I think AD and Fletchball stand out,

because that's exactly what they are. With great tools. Great tools. I mean, Aaron Donald beats so many. double teams. I've never seen a guy beat the center slide, guard and center as much as that guy does. Fletch, just the pure power he has in his hands, I've only noticed like two guys whose hands when they grab you, you physically feel their grip string. You know what I mean? It's like a very emasculating feeling. Yeah, it's an absolute. Fletch does one thing a day in practice every day that

everybody in pass rush looks at each other and it's like, how that. And you don't even want to say it too much fles is my guy but i don't want to pump his head up but we just look at each other and we're like damn um but for me i would put those two guys you mentioned up with uh in the yeah i'd say this endearingly dirtback hall of fame with harvey doll who i played with you remember harvey doll the name is yeah he was in Atlanta i'm dating myself now yeah but he lost a ton of weight now he was like 280 he was a guard maybe 300 pounds he's about 200 now i know the name and i've a play. Yeah.

So switching gears, I would, I want to know, like, because a lot of people don't talk about, you understand your athleticism well. You understand your strengths, your weaknesses, and you're a mental athlete. And, like, for me, I read about how you started out. You played lacrosse, played hockey, play football, all those different sports. You get to CINSI. You're a running back. You're a linebacker.

You're a linebacker and a guard. And, or how quickly did it go from skill guy to guard? and how much did that help you in your transition? Yeah. I mean, did it make you better? Absolutely. I think me and my brother both played a lot of sports growing up. Like, I played, like you just said, lacrosse, hockey, and football in high school.

But even before that, you know, I played soccer growing up. We both took karate classes. I wrestled for a little bit. I only made it to yellow belt. It was a very small. Hey, there we go. Dude. Okay.

But I do think that, like, um, I do think that, like, um, playing like baseball and playing all these different sports you start to develop like different techniques and different things that are good for those sports and then you start to understand how to like correlate them to other sports like like my cross coach in high school used to be furious because I used to do this like move with my stick where I'd go like that and I'll be like it's a swim move. Were you an attackman? I was midi attack yeah so like if I was setting a guy up they would just want me to come here to dodge but I would come here and literally swim move because I felt like I was playing defense. And it worked a lot. Yeah. Even though it piss off my grass coach.

Yeah, but coaches don't always know what they're talking. No, not all the time. So you're at Cincinnati. You're forced to change positions within a year, right? Yep. And, you know, you weren't exactly like a highly touted recruit, right? He doesn't walk on. Yeah, you were a walk on.

And you're changing positions. How do you turn that negative and go positive? And, you know, how do you make a lot of, that work? Well I think it was good that I had already been humbled. So like being a, so in high school I was a really good athlete and I thought of myself as like very highly, you know, and then obviously I go the whole recruiting process and don't get a scholarship offer from any Division 1A schools. And, you know, I think when I made that decision to walk on a Cincinnati, I didn't really have a lot of preconceived expectations.

My really my expectation was just to find out if I can play at that level. I realized as a freshman that I could like you know actually once defensive scout team player of the year as a linebacker. You got that plaque? Yeah, I got that. Do you have it next to the ring? I got the plaque and then they gave us like dog tags at the time. Oh, nice. Yeah, I still have that.

And um. But they don't know what they, they know, they don't know what they're talking about evaluating high school talent. For one. They're, a lot of times they're talking about the pros. Yeah. But I think it's better to go under the radar coming out of high school it's coming out of the pros. For sure. There's money involved.

There's a hierarchy. Absolutely. And part of it was because what we just talked about with the multi-sports, I never really focused on football. I didn't lift weights. I didn't have like an offseason that I dedicated to getting better at football. So I was very much like a raw. When I got to Cincinnati, obviously that changed. I became a one-sport athlete.

I trained a year-round for it. I started lifting weights. I got a lot stronger. And you have no bad habits at your position. Yeah. I mean, you learn from scratch. Yeah. And one thing I think about the Cincinnati thing is, I mean, it was kind of like a quiet hotbed for a lot of talent.

I mean, you know, you had Connor, Gildyard, Seleck. Yep. Derek Wolf, who's a great player. Your bro. So, I mean, like, you look at that list. That's a lot of great pros at Cincinnati. And they had to be doing something right. But I wouldn't say, I never, like, I'm not going to be one to say, like, they did shit right intentionally because they didn't offer you a scholarship.

So, like, you know, it's, it's a hit or miss game in college recruit. You come out of Cincinnati, you end up in Philly. And, you know, again, you're under the radar a little bit, in my opinion. But one thing you had that a lot of players don't have right off the bat is great coaches, right? You know, you had Howard Mudd. And then you go to Jeff Stoutland. And as we talk about often, it's like, it's not a given that your NFL coach is a great coach. No.

There's a lot of bad coaches, I think. And that's not disrespectful to the profession. I just think there's a shortage of great coaches. So what does that mean to have, you know, to hit the lotto twice, really is what I think he did. Yeah, I mean, yeah, I've been very lucky. I mean, you know, obviously being an undersized guy coming out of Cincinnati, I'm already limited on the number of teams that are, like, interested. Yeah. You know, certain styles of offense have already not even interested at all.

Right. So, you know, obviously Howard, we're just Saturday in Indianapolis. He likes athletic offensive line. He likes, especially at that position, a guy that can get out and move. So he took a shot on me. Yeah. And the Eagles, Howard Roseman, they took a shot on me. So I'm forever in debt to those guys for just giving me an opportunity, really.

And again, it's a six-round pick. I didn't really have expectations. My expectations were to play in the league and make the team. Gifting a curse too, right? Yeah. And for me, right away in training camp, Howard, his techniques started making me a better player. He had a lot of techniques that were very conducive for smaller guys. A lot of plays are really conducive for smaller guys.

So I started to stand out. And there was another guy there at Jamal Jackson that helped me along as well. He was a veteran player. Having a vet that helps, because like my thing, the biggest dick move to me is a vet that doesn't help younger players. No doubt. I mean, like, you're not, you're, like, I understand, like, it's a business. But if you're secure and, you know, you're a good dude, I think you're going to help the younger players. So you got that and, and Mud.

And I just remember, like, when Mud came to visit, and you love Stout. I mean, that's well documented. Like, it'd be impossible to pick between the two. They're so awesome. Yeah, for sure. But I remember Mud came to our hotel one night. maybe in Seattle. Late Seattle.

Yeah. And I just remember, I saw you guys hug and I'm like, that's a deep bond, man. That's, that's real. And you got it with him and you got it with Stout. What'd you learn from each one? Do you have one technique that stands out? So Howard, one of the first things he taught me was the hop technique, which, as you know, like when you're getting bullrushers, one or two things you can do.

Awesome. You hop a lot. Yeah. So I'm not, it's hard for smaller guys to walk guys back leg by leg. But I have good hips and I can bend. So, like, if I'm getting bull rushed, I can kind of hop back and readjust and get up underneath. That was a game that really helped me in a game, my probably biggest weakness on the field, which is anchoring against a bull rush. But you do it without leaning.

Yeah. And that's the key. You know, if a guy's hopping and he sets. Yeah. And then he drops his head, he's going to get tossed. But I don't see you get tossed a lot. It's hard. Yeah.

You know, you do it enough times. And there's a drill where you let a guy kind of grab you by the chest, push you to pull you in every direction. You have to really try and maintain balance. It's hard to do for sure. But that was probably the biggest thing that Howard gave me in terms of a technique. The other thing that a lot of people don't know about Howard is he's a very psychological coach. And I still call him, you know, once a year to kind of pick his brain, ask advice, you know, from anything. And he's, obviously he's been coaching in the NFL for a very long time.

He's been through every scenario as a player and as a coach. So, and one of the things he did is we were talking about this a little bit earlier, being in the Matrix. Howard wanted everybody to have a, like, I called it like a mechanism, right, where if you're ever in a game, you're getting beat and you're in this mode of like, okay, I'm going to start doing this, I'm going to start doing this and there are things that you'd never do. Let's snap out of that and just get back to the little basic.

This one thing, just focus on that. And it completely enabled me to snap out of having a bad game because it's rough when that's happening. What's your mechanism? My mechanism at the time was hop. Now I've since switched it over. Because I feel like for me, as long as I can set in front of the, guy and get my hands underneath, I'm going to be good against the bull. And I'm a pretty good

athlete. So if he tries to work an edge, I can just kind of go from there. I've seen you do the arm under thing, which is cool. Now it sets some light for me. Yeah. On like your techniques. What about stout? So stout's a big arm under guy. Yeah, that's a big reason why that mechanism changed because once there was a couple years ago, after my sporenia, where I started struggling with bulls again, right? And we preach religiously for an entire. year an entire off season to work on getting my hands underneath, getting both hands underneath, not just one. Right.

And it really rebounded my career. Right. There was a rebound. For sure, yeah. Three years ago, I think I had, especially the start of the season, I had two years ever since then really. And part of that's too because I get to play next to Brandon Brooks is Isaac or Chance all. I've been playing around really good players and then having Lane and Jason Peters out there.

You guys are the best, in my opinion. objectively. When you have two tackles, especially in pass pro, that can block one-on-one religiously, it makes it so much easier because then you can stay firm inside, you can give a chance for the quarterback to step up. Teams are not that lucky to have that. No, they're not. And I want to go back to one thing, as you talked about you had a bad year, or you had

a bad start to your year. Yeah, I had a bad... Which you're an all-pro player. You're somebody I think of as cream of the crop player. And to me, from a distance, I think even in the NFL, a lot of guys silently have bad years. You know, you might read something and somebody picks up on it, but you know better than anybody.

Yeah. Like what's that kind of rock bottom feeling where you're like, is this going, you know, like, is this it? Am I like trending down or can I get back up off the mat? Like, you know, what was that like and how did you snap out of it? Besides technique? Well, like you're just saying, so there was a legit point in first year where you start, I started to wonder, you know,

Am I good enough to still play? What's going is, can I still play at that level I used to play at? Is this something that's just going to continue to go downhill as I get older? And then you watch the tape a lot, and you try and figure out what's going on and why is this issue occurring. And lucky for me, not only was I watching the tape, but I had Jeff looking at the tape as well. Yeah.

And we both made it a point to do extra work, to really work on where I was putting my hands. to really work on the techniques, whether it's run blocking or pass blocking. And I started to play much better. And then do another off-season where we continue to work that. It's really used to be really. Yeah, because the hardest thing to do is to adjust mid-flight. Like in the middle of the season, you do need that off-season.

Okay, I saved it. I salvaged it, but I need to hit the reset button. And another thing is like as you get older, you know, like, is a funny thing in the NFL. Like nothing makes you feel older in being an NFL player. Because as you're near in 30, it starts creeping in your head. Like you see the end. Even if it's not imminent, you know what it takes and everything you have to dump into it, every year. And you've not made it a secret that sometimes after a season, especially on the north side of 30, like you have to reevaluate. And I agree with that. I've done it too. What goes in and taking that inventory? What's it like?

being what 30 now 31 31 and there's a big difference for people that don't know what's that like what's what's the inventory process and what's something that maybe fans or young players don't know about what hurts like during the week what gets old yeah like what hurts is probably you know specific to each guy right but i think that as you play longer you're going to start hurting more you pass you know, really 20, 29, you're not going to recover the same way. Right. So the week becomes harder.

And then as injuries add up, you really start to wonder, you start to do those checks and balances, right? Where you're like, man, I still love me a lot. I still love to try and beat somebody. Basically, every day of the week sucks, excepts pretty much. I feel that way. Yeah. And you start to weigh out, you know. is this still something worth doing?

And, you know, obviously coming back for at least one more year. And that hasn't outweighed yet. But at some point it's going to. And I think that that's what the reevaluation is. And that's why I think it's good to do after the season. Because in season, there's some days you're like, I'm done. Yeah, there's some weeks where you are just, your knees don't want to work. You know, you're mentally, you're exhausted.

you know and whether you're winning or losing can have a big impact on that huge and I think that that's why you have to wait for the year to be over wait a couple weeks for you to completely just detach from the season wait for the season to be over league wide and just have an honest conversation with yourself with loved ones my wife she's and this is my learning question. I have a printer phobia and a scanner phobia. Was that because you're afraid of technology or you, you know, you sign your contract at a UPS store? Yeah. Your extension is that because you're afraid or you just didn't have one? Certainly not afraid and I don't know why anybody would have a phobia of those things. I walk into the room. I see a printer. I just start sweating. Why? None of them fucking work. But what is that, why is that a fear of yours? Is that a bird? That was a raven or a lion? It's a bird.

Okay. Maybe a vulture. Speak of that. I hope it wasn't a fish because... Oh my gosh. You're very afraid of fish and maybe people at home don't know. What is it about fish that you're so afraid of? Everything.

Like is it they're slimy or is they unpredictable? So I'll preface it with a story. Yeah, it's a traumatic experience. Okay, tell me. I was about four or five years old maybe. And I'm on my cousin's farm. farm in West Virginia and my dad and some of the other guys are fishing in the creek right and they're bringing you were in West Virginia as a creek yeah sorry creek I was in the creek so they're

catching fish and they're throwing them into this tall grass behind them yeah and I'm just a kid over there with them and I just start running through the tall grass and all of a sudden I'm stepping on fish they're flopping all over the place and I freak out did you fall down Fell down, I cut my feet on a couple of the fish. And there was like flapping on your chest. It was, it was bad. But you say you want to get into fishing? I do, I want to, I'm trying to get fly fishing, yeah.

So what's the scariest type of fish? The bigger the fish, the scarier, yeah. Okay. The scariest being a shark. Right, but you wouldn't have to hold one, but if when you fish, like, I mean, you couldn't hold a shark? You could. Is there one, like, mid-range fish that you're like, fuck this fish?

Anything that I can't hold, like, by the mouth, like this. You don't want to hold the gills. No, I'm absolutely, like, I went striper fishing one time in the Chesapeake Bay, and they pulled in this huge striper, and guys are putting their hands all the way in thing and up the mouth and got it. You felt so emascy. Yeah, no, man, I'm not doing that. Not interested in that.

So what other, do you have any other irrational fears? That's certainly the biggest one. And it's not even, like, if I'm in the wall, water like when we were in the Grand Cayman we were snorkeling we were snorkeling like it didn't matter right but the fish when they started coming at us I don't know if you noticed this but I left you know what if you didn't say why I thought you wanted to get another beer no no you were just afraid of the fish I'm afraid of sharks I'm deathly afraid of sharks but you didn't I get a

afraid of sharks too I get a couple beers in me yeah fear goes away yeah I'm swimming 30 feet deep snorkeling barracudas, tarpins, fuck them. Yeah, I'm, at all times when I'm snorkeling, I'm absolutely terrified. I'm always, I'm always circling, like, because my fear is, like, the ones behind me. Yeah. You know? I think the only reason that I even snorgle in the first place is because the, the, the, the, the fomo fear outweighs the shark fear.

Yeah, I know, because it looks fun. Yeah. So I don't want to be that guy that, you know, oh, I didn't go snorkeling because I'm afraid of fish. Right. Yeah. Yeah, they'd be laying. That'd be like not holding a striper. It'd be a pretty bad story.

So one of the most serious questions, I know we have fun with the fish question, but I wanted to check on that trash can from last year. Have you stopped in? Is it well? Um. I don't know what to answer this. One of my favorite memories of last year was like seeing this trash can fly. impressive 18 feet you know I think what happened what did it do to you chance

cleated me chance cleated you it wasn't the trash can and you're not gonna kick chance because chance is huge yeah I can't kick chance is like a bear and I like chance yeah so you don't want to kick chance you find the trash can yep and you like jet lee it well yeah it was a Wednesday it was Thursday it's the worst day yeah and I'm just like why did this happen this did not need to happen it hurts but you know it's the little shit that bothers you more than the big shit like the little unnecessary shit like jamming your toe in the door getting cleated like you know just dumb shit like that so i feel you but i just wanted to check on it yeah i don't okay i think that one

is in the trash okay how's the climb going how do you feel what are you taking away from this whole whole thing uh climb's going great um you know obviously you're you're walking for a long time i don't I've ever walked this long. I'm not a big hiker, although maybe I'll get two after this. You look the part. Patagonia is out, bro. Sign us up. Hands. You're feeling good though? I am. We're at like 11.5 and a half, we're going to have 19 and a half. Yeah, right now I'm doing good. I'm curious to see at the next stop where I'm going to be at. But yeah, 114, no headache. The altitude hasn't really started to affect me too much, I don't think. My O2 levels are good.

Every time. My heart rate's at a good pace. The guy monitoring us tells me super duper every time. Well, he's lying. Yeah, I know. I know. I know. I'm like, hey, man, what are my levels?

I just want to know from my record. Oh, super duper. Excellent. Super duper. Super duper. You got any new friends. Do you like here? Everybody.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, obviously a lot of the football guys I know. I mean, this is my first time meeting Minko. He's a treat. He's a very, very interesting guy. you know or i mean there's a lot of uh but even just you know the military personnel the porters everybody um porters are amazing yeah and then seeing q going up and down the trail is like man i

better be able to do this yeah and um it's it's just awesome seeing all these guys so right man we're glad to have you man thanks for appreciate you dog be in here brother appreciate you man thanks for watching hope you enjoyed it i sure enjoyed uh you know way back here actually it's been almost a year interviewing my buddy Jason Kelsey obviously an interesting guy next week we have halodi nada coming up and that was the biggest man on the trip only by a couple pounds because we also had bow Allen but tipping the scales is about 340 pretty damn impressive to summit kilimanjaro and halodi did that so tune in for halodi great teammate again world champion all pro, all everything with the Baltimore Ravens,

and then finished his career with Philly and retired on Kilimanjaro. This is an interview right after he retired, actually. So check that out. Also, we're closing in on 10,000 subscribers as we speak, which is a nice little milestone for the channel. So be sure to hit subscribe, like, spread the word, if you like what we got. And as always, leave your comments and suggestions

on how we can improve our little operation here, a little startup. So thank you very much.