New Heights with Jason and Travis Kelce - Jason and Travis discuss the Damar Hamlin incident and how it impacts the entire NFL

Episode Date: January 4, 2023

Not our usual episode this week, right now with only one topic on everyone’s mind it felt right to dedicate our entire video to discussing the incident that happened during Monday Night Football involving Bills Safety Damar Hamlin. The thoughts and prayers from everyone here at New Heights are with Damar, his family, and everyone from the Bills and Bengals organizations. Watch and listen to new episodes of New Heights with Jason and Travis Kelce every Wednesday during the NFL season & check us out on Instagram, Twitter and Tiktok for all the best moments from the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How's it going guys? Everyone tuning in. Not our usual episode this week. Usually we bring us some stuff across the league and everything, but one of the purposes we decided to come up with this show and bring it to all of you was to give you a glimpse into the lives of NFL players and and what goes on especially during a season. And right now there's one topic on the forefront of everybody's mind and it's seemed right to kind of designate an entire episode. What's happening is a result of last night's incident at the Bill's Bengals game involving the Mar Hamlin. So it is Tuesday at 515 on the dot PM Eastern time and I guess we're gonna offer

Kind of our thoughts on last night's incident everything evolved with it and how that is affecting the rest of the NFL I don't even know if we want to call it an episode. This is kind of a reaction video that we thought we'd bring to you guys so definitely does not feel right to Comment on anything else that happened throughout this week or anything that's going to happen next week right now a lot of focus had just I don't know energy is all devoted towards what a debar in the Buffalo Bills and the NFL is going through with what happened last night so yeah need needless to say but we're going to do it anyways I thought some

prayers are with obviously DeMar Hamlin his entire family and both the bills and bangles organization. So I guess let's talk right away Monday night halfway through the first quarter just about actually 558 remaining exactly. This takes place. What are your initial thoughts? Are you first of all are you watching the game? Me and Dad, Dad and Tony, we were watching the game and decided we're gonna go to a restaurant and watch the remaining of it. So on the way to the restaurant was when we found out about the incident, immediately turned on the game on like my phone just to hear what was going on

as I was driving and you wanna talk about terrifying. You see all the videos of the reactions of guys on the field and immediately you think of putting yourself in their shoes and in DeMar's family shoes, the things that they're going through emotionally, it was demoralizing and it's scary. It's scary to see anybody go through that, let alone somebody that's doing the same thing that you are that is playing football, you know, a game. But we're watching it and hearing hearing the commentators be very unsure initially about what was going on and then hearing how serious of an incident it was. It was like I said it was terrifying

and immediately I think if I would have seen the reactions of players live on the field I would have probably lost it. In terms of my emotions for him and his family but it was obviously nothing that was taken easy by anybody. Yeah, we were not watching the game in the Kelsey household and I was just sitting on the couch. I don't even remember what I was watching, be honest with you, because this kind of took center stage the moment we found out about it. And Kylie, another wife from another player on the Eagles texture and aster. She was watching the game and whether she was witnessing what was taking place.

And that's when we kind of started following it. You know, I watched all the replays of the incident. You turn the channel to the game and you're watching everything taking place. And, you know, I think the, you know, the video, when I first watched the video, and this is before we had to turn the TV on, just the pure replay of it, it was very, it didn't look crazy until, the Mar fell down afterwards,

and it looked very odd, like you know, as you can cuss what's going on, and then when you turn the TV on and you had the game there, they really became evident that it was something very serious when you started seeing the reaction of the teammates, the players on the field, you know, grown men, brought the tears. The teams were across the field with each other, you know what I mean? It became something much bigger than a game of football at that point and that's when you knew something very serious was happening down in the field.

It's hard to even describe, you know, the feeling on the field. You know, I can't imagine what those guys were going through. The level of uncertainty, you're seeing somebody perform CPR to a teammate. Like, you know, I think multiple players talked about that being a point of shocked to them because, you know, we've all seen, you know, guys lying unconscious on the field. We've seen guys with neck injuries, but there aren't too many times you've seen CPR administered and that's when you know it's something, hey, this is something way different.

I don't know what's going on right now, but this is not happened This is not normal. This isn't something that you see in a football field so You know, that's one of the all those guys Really start to realize this is something way different not that this is at all similar but very coincidentally We had a teammate with the Eagles this week go down Josh sweat Down with like a neck injury. Yeah, and I remember being on the sideline. You know, it messed us up

I was I remember taking a knee and just looking and waiting for his legs to move Waiting for his hands to move there's few things that have brought me greater joy Than seeing Josh sweat today this morning and knowing that he's gonna be all right knowing that he's gonna be good That he's not devastated from some injury that's going to affect him for the rest of his life. In the moment, we got to know that on the field. So we were able to get back out there and go about playing football,

even though it probably still affected us. So for these guys not to have that, you know what I mean? To really not know what was going on? Yeah, to still really not have the clarity of what's going to be the future for tomorrow. I can't imagine what that feels like for these guys on the field, for his parents. It clearly has gripped the entire NFL community. Yeah.

I, um, there's, uh, there's not much we can really say. What did you think of when it first happened, I guess? What was your immediate thoughts? Meeting thoughts are you goes, at least for me is, you know, his family. What is family is going through. I'm terrified to ever be laying on the field and having you or mom or dad, you know, in question of everything that's going on, you know, that's probably the sickest feeling you can have as a player in my mind. That's why I always, even if I'm

that's why I always, even if I'm banged up, if I can get up and off that field and show that, anything, I'd rather do that than to be laying on the turf. Yeah, that doesn't even sound right. I don't even know. No, I mean, well, I mean, unfortunately, football is a very violent sport and injuries like that can happen. I mean, I'll never forget.

And I feel ashamed that I don't remember the game. I'm pretty sure it was the Tennessee Titans game when you had the concussion and were lying down on the field. Even then, I tried to get up as fast as possible as the wrong thing to do. Yeah, exactly. That made it even more scary. As a family member, man, I can't tell you, there's absolutely nothing crazier than witnessing somebody

you love and not knowing whether they're going to be OK. It's absolutely the worst feeling in the world. That's why I don't remember who you guys are playing half the time, because immediately, everybody, you'll forget about that. I forgot about it. I'm just thinking about it. You know, it's, it's, and I'm trying to text guys, you all right. Um, I mean, that was insane. Immediately whenever something like that happens, you, you think about the family members and the friends and the teammates and seeing all the guys reaction.

People closest to them. Yeah, the people that know them, you know, what's going on? How are they, how are they reacting? We play this game To give those people specifically happiness you know, yeah, and To strike fear in their minds to strike worry That ain't it man, and that's that's unfortunate. It's it's a scary feeling to even try and put yourself in his shoes Or their shoes. Yeah, just a lot of love for his family and friends and everyone close to him. Yeah, that's terrifying.

So you guys had work today. You guys had meetings? How did the Kansas City Chiefs, how was the reaction in the building today for you guys? Yeah, the first thing we had was a team meeting. Coach Reed brought up our head athletic trainer, who's well respected around the league and has a very clear understanding of what goes on during the NFL game day in terms of what's on the sideline at every single NFL game

because of the possibility of something like this happening in terms of someone getting injured. And there's anywhere from 35 to 40 medical professionals that have their eyes on the game at all time that are working specifically for situations like this or if somebody were to get injured on the field anyway. Yeah. And it was a little reassuring to hear, you know,

that, you know, how safe of an environment it is and that because of that, Demar has a chance to be all right, but at the same time, it's still very, I don't know, there's not much I can really, I'm not good at describing these feelings, man. This is a tough one to even go through Yeah, I mean listen, it's never going into cardiac arrest is a bad

Bad situation, but the NFL field with how many medical professionals are on the field? ambulances are nearby they have the oh my gosh, I forget what they're called Yeah, AED basically shocks your heart back into beating. All these things are there and on scene. So it's, you know, one of the safest places that that can happen outside of being physically in a hospital, you know, there is everything in place possible to try and assist as as as quickly and efficiently as human beings have the technology to do pretty much.

And, you know, hopefully that was enough. You know, we didn't have meetings today. We were back in the building for treatment or people that wanted to go in to kind of get a jumpstart on the week. And it was all anybody who was talking about, I'm sure we'll have a meeting on it tomorrow as a team, people have been texting nonstop.

Coaches asking how you feel. What's what's going on? Have you reached out to anybody? You know, pretty much the only person that I really know that well to reach out in the bills organizations. One of the coaches, so I reached out to him today. But I think everybody's processing it differently. One of the craziest things about like an injury on a sporting field is sports is like supposed to be the place you go to get away from problems.

It's supposed to be an area of a different domain. Whenever anything's going on outside of your life, it's one of the things that you can go to that's always there To man just get away from whatever else is going on You know whenever whenever I've had problems outside of football, you know family members friends Whatever it is, you know football is like its own Area that you can just go out and play a game, you know, that's what makes this incident Particularly troublesome is that this is how all of us get away from these types of things that are going on that you,

you, you, you want to step away and just get lost in the game, get lost in, you know, having a good time with your teammates and, you know, to see this happen on a field, primetime television around a lot of, you know, our brothers in the NFL, yeah. It's shocking and it's certainly, everybody's gonna process it differently.

And, you know, for me, you know, I went into the building today, tried to get a fresh start on this week's opponent, but man, it's all around. It's being talked about all over the place. I don't think I've ever heard the word commotio-cortus used as much as I have in the last 24 hours. And I hope I never have to hear this much ever again.

Yeah, this is, I mean, that's a terrifying thing to even know is possible. Yeah, I remember the cross player years ago, unfortunately, being struck in his hard stopping. I remember Chris Pronger having commercial cordists from a slap shot. He was able to make a full recovery. But yeah, I mean, you see the hit to the chest,

you see a lot of the signs, you know, we'll find out more as things progress, but you know, it's still so fresh. I'll be interested to see what our team meetings like tomorrow. Well, we know one thing, and that is that everyone, everyone's very sensitive of the subject. Everyone wants to support Demar, his family, as much as possible.

Yeah, the outreach by the NFL community has been unbelievable. I mean, I think his toy drive foundation is over $4 million raised. Pretty amazing support from the NFL. You've seen multiple, you know, people reach out. I thought Mike Tomlin's video in particular was outstanding. I mean, shocker that coach Tomlin hits the nail on the head again and speaks to the Mars as a human being, as a fellow Pittsburgher,

as a guy who he was able to watch mature grow and to realize his dream and how much that's affecting him. And it's truly been incredible seeing the amount of people that have been able to come together off of this tragedy. Yeah. And I would say hats off to Zach Taylor and Sean McDermott being the first ones to realize

the entirety of the situation and that even how much this game means to a lot of what happens in the AFC, they realize that this game is exactly that and it doesn't hold any place in this time. Taking their teams off the field, realizing that until we find out that he's okay this game doesn't mean a damn thing. And it's, uh, and that's, and that's what it felt like. I, I couldn't imagine having to go back out there and play and trying to play this game after something like that. And I couldn't. I don't think I could. So I just want to say I appreciate the, uh, both teams,

head coaches being able to realize the circumstances. For sure. I mean, I think, you know, we've all played games when guys have had traumatic injuries or, you know, terrible things happen. But this was different. There was some level of there's like no finality to it. But when a guy has a good cushion, he's motionless. You find out what's going on, whether he's going to be okay, you know, even when a guy has like a neck issue and has to be taken off in a cart or like an ambulance, you know, right away what's going on.

And again, I think playing the game allows you to kind of get away from what just happened, but this one it was really evident with not just the circumstances involving tomorrow and not knowing what was going to happen, but also just, I mean, the players, you could tell on their faces on the field that they had no business going back out there. The level of the straw, the level of, you know, the amount of guys that were emotionally just completely detached was evident on the TV and you know it's good on Zach and Sean for both being able to realize you know a none of these guys are in the headspace to come out here and and do this right now let's let's all step away and let's and I'm sure there are a lot more people involved in just you know Zach and Sean but it definitely appears that those two guys in particular, you know, knew that this was not something that was going to be able to take place. Yeah,

how do you get ready to play week 18? I'm not going to lie. I don't see, yeah, I don't even want to get into it. Today it was a it was a very, I want to want to say awkward day but it definitely started like that. Sure. Um, awkward might not be the right word. It was a different day that that presented a lot a lot of different emotion. It wasn't your typical Wednesday install. Yeah. You know, yeah, base install day. It was, um, it was just a lot of unfortunately sad emotion going around. And I feel like what happened really sobered everybody up into realizing yet again just how serious of a game it is that we play. I guess you know for

week 18 you know for me I think just getting back in the building and going back to playing football, you know, I kind of talked about this a little bit earlier, but that's one of the ways I process, you know, things going on in my life. And it's my process. I mean, I know everybody's not going to be this way, but for me, a way to kind of, you know, get clarity to move forward, is to do something that I've done my whole life and to do something that I love with a lot of people that I love. And, you know, the NFL is an incredible community

and we found that out within the last 24 hours. We found that out last night with the support that all the fans and media and everybody had for the bills and bangles players, not Justin Marhamlin and his family, but for the entire situation going on. We found that out over the last 24 hours with the amount of support. Everyone's got, I mean, former teammates that have reached out to me to ask, you know, how I'm doing. Who I've reached out to, you know, the game has been brought back to what it is. The NFL has been brought back to what it is, and that is something that unites a large

amount of people. There are a lot of people having common, and you know, getting back out there and back with my teammates is for me, you know, one of the greatest joys that I get to partake. I think that that's how I'm getting ready for next week. We'll all be following, you know, the situation with the mar and how it progresses. But man, it's's it has been encouraging. I don't know. It's been encouraging to see the humanity and everybody regarding this entire incident.

Is it such a privilege to be in this this league? And to have the amount of support that we have from all of these fans. I mean, tomorrow, Hamas charity, the Chase and Hams Foundation toy drive. As of the time of this, is already at $4 million. And that's all pretty much happened within the last 24 hours. You were mentioning getting back out there and playing and, um,

as scary as it as of an incident that it is, um, the honor that you can have to go out there and play for him, play for you know, the people that are dealing with what they're dealing with, to give them, try and give them excitement, trying to give them something to get away from what's going on in their daily lives. The honor that I get from that is it's priceless man, you can't put a a dollar amount on that you can't put a ticket on that I willingly will go out there and And honor just like I honored Brian Shazier. Yeah, it's like I honored Alex Smith

Yeah, guys that I have a tremendous amount of respect for absolutely Well said, Travis. Yeah, so coming together is the best way that I think we all can deal with it and that's what we're doing. And yeah, as for week 18, whatever ends up happening, whatever the NFL ends up deciding, just just know if we end up going back out there to play, I'm sure every stadium will have two teams playing their tail off for for tomorrow. Yeah. The entire league right now is the is behind the mar as family. Yeah, I don't know. I can't say any better than

you said. So I'm not going to. And you know, again, our thoughts and prayers are with the mar as entire family. Yeah, I mean, I think that wraps it up for this week. You know, felt like this was really the only news we wanted to really touch on. It's the only thing that felt like it was right to really talk about because it's pretty much the main thing that's on all of our minds as NFL players. We'll be back next week with hopefully more normal episode and hopefully good news.

Great news. Yeah, from from tomorrow and obviously again nothing but love and support to him and his family and both the bills and bangles organizations. And to everybody that's dealing with this on their own, man. Yeah. It's not fun. And we appreciate everybody that's reached out to us.

It's definitely been helpful and it's definitely, yeah. Put things in perspective. See you guys next week. See you guys. helpful and it's definitely yeah. Put things in perspective. See you guys next week. See you guys.