{"id":166469,"date":"2025-06-29T00:11:11","date_gmt":"2025-06-29T00:11:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/166469\/"},"modified":"2025-06-29T00:11:11","modified_gmt":"2025-06-29T00:11:11","slug":"jason-kelce-has-lofty-comparison-for-chiefs-rookie-ot-josh-simmons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/166469\/","title":{"rendered":"Jason Kelce has lofty comparison for Chiefs rookie OT Josh Simmons"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" style=\"position:absolute;top:0;left:0;right:0;bottom:0;width:100%;height:100%;z-index:2\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/84359222007-julius-screen-shot-1.jpg\"\/><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"vidplayicon\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/icon-play-alt-white.svg.svg+xml\" alt=\"play\" style=\"height:40px;margin:auto 18px auto 27px;width:40px\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Julius Thomas on finding career in clinical psychology after football<\/p>\n<p>USA TODAY Sports spoke with Julius Thomas about finding a unique second career after playing seven seasons in the NFL<\/p>\n<p>Sports Seriously<\/p>\n<p>The <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/teams\/kansas-city-chiefs\/339\" data-autotag=\"e91367c2-d7b8-4bec-9359-95947acd6b0e\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Kansas City Chiefs<\/a> spent their first-round selection in the 2025 NFL Draft on Ohio State offensive tackle <a href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/players\/josh-simmons\/1327885\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Josh Simmons<\/a> in the hopes of shoring up the left side of their offensive line.<\/p>\n<p>Jason Kelce acknowledged he is a big fan of the pick during a discussion with his brother, Travis, and Chiefs guard <a href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/players\/trey-smith\/975332\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Trey Smith<\/a> in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=ZdRxzxNuEWM\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">a recent episode of the &#8220;New Heights&#8221; podcast<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The elder Kelce brother referred to Simmons&#8217; tape from his lone season at Ohio State as &#8220;absurd&#8221; and had a lofty comparison for the 22-year-old rookie.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I\u2019ve watched a lot of these linemen coming out the last few years,&#8221; Kelce said. &#8220;This kid, I mean, he is the closest thing I\u2019ve seen to like a <a href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/players\/trent-williams\/333274\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Trent Williams<\/a> \u2013 like that next level strength and athleticism. The only reason he fell to you guys is because of that (patellar tendon) injury.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Williams has long been one of the NFL&#8217;s top offensive tackles. The 37-year-old was the fourth overall pick in the 2010 NFL Draft and has made 11 Pro Bowls and earned three All-Pro first team nods during his 14-year career. Williams graded as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pff.com\/nfl\/grades\/position\/t\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Pro Football Focus<\/a>&#8216; 7th-best tackle among 81 qualified players at the position in 2024, ending a run of four consecutive seasons as a top-two tackle.<\/p>\n<p>With that comparison in mind, Kelce is excited to see if Simmons can win Kansas City&#8217;s left tackle job, which the former Philadelphia Eagles center classified as &#8220;a revolving door&#8221; in 2024. The rookie&#8217;s main competition for the job will be <a href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/players\/jaylon-moore\/926289\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Jaylon Moore<\/a>, who signed a two-year, $30 million deal with the Chiefs in free agency.<\/p>\n<p class=\"related-link\">OPINION: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/columnist\/mike-freeman\/2025\/06\/28\/tua-tagovailoa-miami-dolphins-pressure-2025\/83965405007\/\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Dolphins QB Tua Tagovailoa faces massive pressure in 2025<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The younger Kelce and Smith are also excited about Simmons&#8217; potential. Smith \u2013 who made his first Pro Bowl in 2024 in his fourth year as a starting guard for the Chiefs \u2013 hasn&#8217;t seen Simmons in action yet but has heard the 6-5, 310-pounder is &#8220;unbelievably strong.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Kelce came away with a similar takeaway after going head-to-head with Simmons when the rookie took some scout-team reps at defensive end.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I felt that man&#8217;s hands grab me, and I was like, &#8216;All right, I gotta come with it,'&#8221; Kelce said, laughing. &#8220;Even when he&#8217;s just giving the looks, I gotta make sure I got my feet planted.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Julius Thomas on finding career in clinical psychology after football USA TODAY Sports spoke with Julius Thomas about&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":166470,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[247,265,346,739,7,20842,8484,4202,4886,3503,805,110,2016,3564,248,267,88,6,35196,245,537,530,2383,9,266,2015,500,3347,2983,2340,1216,607],"class_list":{"0":"post-166469","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nfl","8":"tag-american","9":"tag-american-football","10":"tag-chiefs","11":"tag-city","12":"tag-football","13":"tag-hub","14":"tag-jason","15":"tag-jason-kelce","16":"tag-jaylon","17":"tag-jaylon-moore","18":"tag-kansas","19":"tag-kansas-city-chiefs","20":"tag-kelce","21":"tag-moore","22":"tag-national","23":"tag-national-sports","24":"tag-news","25":"tag-nfl","26":"tag-nfl-hub","27":"tag-overall","28":"tag-overall-positive","29":"tag-positive","30":"tag-smith","31":"tag-sports","32":"tag-sports-news","33":"tag-travis","34":"tag-travis-kelce","35":"tag-trent","36":"tag-trent-williams","37":"tag-trey","38":"tag-trey-smith","39":"tag-williams"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114763758755185098","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166469","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166469"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166469\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/166470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166469"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166469"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166469"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}