I hate to ask such a depressing question but the more I think about Kelce’s retirement the more I think about what it would mean for Jalen as well but then I also think about how important Lane is as well.
Most of us feel like Kelce’s retirement is on the way soon, but let’s play Devil’s Advocate for a second and pretend neither of them were going to retire yet.
If one of them were to leave, which one would be the bigger loss for the team?
I remember the last time Kelce actually missed a game our line suffered greatly because they had to run whatever protection was called in the huddle. His back up didn’t have the IQ to change protection schemes based on that the D lined up in.
Yeah, a lot of people just completely miss this when talking about how important Kelce is vs. Lane. He’s arguably the smartest player on the field on any given snap, and his intelligence is one of the reasons that our entire OL always looks so good. Not taking anything away from Lane, he’s a true shutdown tackle, which is as rare as a true shutdown CB these days, but without Kelce shifting protections at the line and giving him the opportunity to get his initial kick-step so perfectly timed to the snap, he likely wouldn’t be as dominant.