The story about Kansas City Chiefs superstar tight end Travis Kelce getting suspended for a year while playing in college for the Cincinnati Bearcats has been told numerous times at this point.
Kelce missed the 2010 season while serving a one-year suspension for a failed drug test (marijuana). He was suspended by then head coach Butch Jones, who had just taken over as the head coach at Cincinnati (after previous head coach Brian Kelly left to take the Notre Dame job).
Jones appeared at the Little Rock Touchdown Club this week and he was asked about Kelce and the now-famous suspension.
"Long story short, he had failed multiple drug tests," said Jones this week. "Just made bad decisions. And I was at a basketball game with my wife and my kids and I didn't like who he was hanging with and what was going on. So I called him in and I called Jason (Kelce) and told him he was done. Suspended. He was done with our football program and he needed to move on."
According to Jones, Jason Kelce convinced Jones to let Travis come back after the year suspension.
According to Travis, he failed the drug test because he smoked marijuana while in New Orleans for the Sugar Bowl at the end of the 2009 season (Jones was hired in December of 2009, but Cincinnati had an interim coach for the Sugar Bowl).
From Vanity Fair: After an undefeated regular season in 2009, Cincinnati was invited to play in the Sugar Bowl, and Kelce hit Bourbon Street hard. “I was down in New Orleans, listening to Lil Wayne, and I wanted to smoke what he was smoking,” he recalls. But on New Year’s Eve, the night before the game and after days of cutting loose, he and his teammates were summoned for a drug test by the NCAA. “I’m just sitting there, dead in the water,” he recalled.
Ultimately, Kelce seems grateful for the way things turned out at Cincinnati and he credits the situation for getting his career on the right track.
Kelce's dad, however, thought the suspension was silly, as he detailed to Vanity Fair this past summer, though he didn't tell Travis that at the time.
“I told him it’s a great learning opportunity," said Ed Kelce. "Live with it. Grow from it. Learn from it. It is what it is, and you just have to deal with it now. All the while, I’m biting my tongue about how stupid it is that they’re going to suspend a college kid for smoking pot. Give me a f--ing break.”
It all worked out in the end for Kelce -- he's one of the most recognizable athletes on the planet, he's paid extremely well, he's seemingly found love (maybe) with Taylor Swift, and he has a couple of Super Bowl rings.
Maybe that suspension worked out for the best after all -- even if it was for something that's becoming increasingly legal in the United States.
More must-reads: