Podbit · New Heights with Jason & Travis Kelce
The tight end room is creeping up in NFL pay, but number-three wide receivers catching 30 balls a season are still getting over $20 million while blocking tight ends playing 50 snaps a game earn a fraction of that. Kittle says the gap makes no sense.
Where this was said
At 29:16 · chapter starts 28:50
The conversation turns to something both Kittle and Travis feel strongly about: tight ends are getting more recognition, but the pay still doesn't match the workload — especially for the blocking specialists. [1] — George Kittle "The tight end room is creeping up in NFL pay, but number-three wide receivers catching 30 balls a season are still getting over $20 million…" 29:16 Kittle cites the absurdity directly: number-three wide receivers catching 30 passes a year are earning north of $20 million while a tight end playing 50 snaps per game and throwing his body into edge defenders might earn half that. Charlie Kohler getting paid by the Chargers as a blocking tight end is a sign of progress, Kittle notes, but there's still a gap. Jason then takes the conversation into the tactical dimension, comparing how the Shanahan-McVay offensive tree uses multi-role tight ends to how Bill Belichick used Dont'a Hightower and Jamie Collins as chess pieces in 3-4 sub-packages — the idea being that the more positions a player can credibly align in, the less any defense can prepare for a single personnel grouping.
Kittle and Jason Kelce dive into the tactical evolution behind tight-end heavy offenses. When you have a tight end who can split wide, align in-line, and work out of the backfield, defenses can't prepare for any single personnel package — it's the same multiplicity that made 3-4 linebackers so hard to stop.
Thomas's wife deferred her CrossFit career — she's in the global top 1% of athletes — to put him through law school debt-free. He wants her to chase the dream now; she wants the emergency fund and house down payment first. On a $200K lawyer income with no debt, the opportunity cost is just a few months of slower saving.
Underground calisthenics battles are exactly like UFC meets a rap battle — 150 people crowded around a circle, fighters walking out with masks and chains, nicknames like 'Extra Money' vs 'Calisthenics the Prince,' and people throwing money and betting. The battle set: 100 burpees, 50 muscle-ups, 75 dips, 75 squats with a 65-pound dumbbell. This is the next big spectator sport.
Rico Verhoeven controlled the undisputed heavyweight boxing champion for approximately 10 rounds — and had his appeal upheld when officials admitted the fight was stopped after the bell. The result was never overturned. Rogan calls it either incompetence or corruption, and argues the money behind Usyk made an upset politically inconvenient.
Rogan lays out a blunt case: boxing's 3-judge system is structurally broken, and the judges know who the promoter wants to win. Glory's 5-judge format is the right model. Corruption doesn't have to be conscious — just knowing Usyk is the cash cow is enough to tilt the scales.
With the Usyk-Wilder fight stalling and Fury-Joshua coming too late, the real fight the world wants is the rematch. Rico is a free agent. Usyk vacated his belts. The story is unfinished and both Rogan and Rico know it. His Excellency Turki Alasheikh already called for it ringside — the question is money.
Rico texted Jason Statham during the Canelo-Crawford fight. Statham showed Rico's highlight videos to promoters. Two days later, Rico was on a call about fighting Anthony Joshua. When Joshua pulled out, Rico pitched Usyk himself — Undisputed vs. Undisputed. Usyk said yes in two weeks. The whole thing started with one text.
Every heavyweight who faced Usyk tried to move to the right — straight into his power hand. Rico and Peter Fury identified the obvious solution: move left, away from the left hand, and smother him with size. It sounds simple. Nobody had done it. That one adjustment was the foundation of 10 dominant rounds.
MMA fans boo when fights go to the ground. They love stand-up. Kickboxing is pure stand-up. Yet it barely exists in America while boxing and MMA are enormous. Rogan's diagnosis: no promotion machine. If the UFC got behind kickboxing the way they've built MMA, it would explode. The talent is there — the storytelling machine is not.
A nation of 17 million people gave the world Ramon Deckers, Peter Aerts, Badr Hari, Melvin Manhoef, Rob Kamen, Ernesto Hoost, and Rico Verhoeven. Rico's theory: the country is so small that every gym shares knowledge freely. In the US, you need a flight. In Holland, you drive 40 minutes and spar the national champion.
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