Jesse Kelly Lights It Up to Close Out the Show

CLAY: Sitting alongside of me now in the Houston studio — gonna be sharing a mic, it’s almost like boy band-esque — is Jesse Kelly. Buck, can see us from back in New York City. Jesse, what’d you think last night of the big World Series game? Have you ever been to a World Series game before?

JESSE: I have been to a World Series game before, and honestly (sigh) — Clay is just gonna choke me right here in the studio when I say this — I thought it sucked. And it wasn’t just because the Astros lost, but I’m six-eight, and so my knees are jacked into the seats in front of me. I’m so tall that… I had this tiny little lady behind me, so I felt bad anytime I stood up. So whenever anyone else stood up, I’m this monster hunched over in the chair drinking a $19 beer. I just… Watching from my home would have been so much better. I’m out. I’m out.

BUCK: I gotta tell you, Jesse, I’m a big believer in the home-viewing experience is basically always better because other people often ruin things. And I gotta say you’re a very nice guy. We’ve been friends for many years. If I had to sit behind you at Les Miz or any Broadway shows here?

JESSE: (laughing)

BUCK: Not that that’s playing right now. You’re the nightmare guy to sit behind because it’s not like you’ve got a big hat on something. We can’t actually saw you in half and make you smaller. I went out to a range yesterday in Vegas. You’re down there in Houston where guns are actually allowed. You and my man Clay Travis should get out there and do a little shooting together.

JESSE: We should get out and do shooting together because you can’t walk more than 15 steps in this town without some kind of indoor shooting range. Fully automatic. You know it. They have it here. But the problem is right now Clay is in World Series mode and I’m never going back, I’m never going back, I would rather stop at a sports bar across the street and eat cheese sticks and drink with the bartender than go back to a stadium.

BUCK: Let me tell you real quick. When you get the Clay experience, I went to Alabama, and I had to sort of remind myself, it’s a little bit like going to the movie set with Clooney or something. Like, it’s a little bit of a different vibe. Clay says, “Well, we’re going to the nicest owners box, but we can also hang out on the side of the field and everyone’s walking around, “Yeah, OutKick!” So it was a rarified experience Mr. Travis gave me at the Alabama game. You should roll with him.

CLAY: Well, we got a fan base. I know Jesse does too. And this is a great station that we’re on in Houston. But a lot of people were coming up to me, you know, ’cause my son’s a huge Atlanta Braves fan, and they were saying, “Man, you know, I’m a big fan of the show, but you got some balls rolling into the stadium with your son.” My son had eight different Atlanta Brave paraphernalia on.

Late in the game he was saying, “Hey, Dad, can we make sure we do we the tomahawk chop?” There’s nobody who’s an Atlanta Braves fan around us, and when you’re a dad in a visiting stadium, they ain’t gonna be mad at your son, right? It’s a little bit like if you’re out with your wife or your girlfriend and she starts yelling at somebody. They’re not yelling really back at her.

You’re the target. You ever drive…? I know this probably happened to you, Jesse, where every now and then my wife will drive, and she’ll cut somebody off, and that person will come roaring up beside us angry. You’re kind of thinking, “I don’t know what to say. I saw what happened.”

But you get blamed because you’re the guy and it’s another guy who’s mad. I was saying, “No, no, we’re not gonna do the tomahawk chop. We’re gonna win with a little bit of class here.” But he was ready to go all out, stand up, be chanting and everything else. And I said, “No, we don’t need to do that.

BUCK: You know, Jesse, we talked to Michael Berry before, and he said you guys are thinking about doing some kind of a big event with some of the people from our world here, the truth-based media world. I don’t even know how we would describe it. You, me, Berry, and some others that would obviously come to mind. You gotta a plan? Are we just gonna take over a barbecue joint for the night? What’s gonna happen?

JESSE: Oh, yeah. Yeah, I do have a plan. My plan is to let people who are much better at details handle the planning. I am so bad at things like this. When I have to try to plan an event, I will screw the whole thing up. So my plan is to go home tonight and tell the wife, “Hey, I know you have a bunch of extra free time on your hands.”

They love it when you say that. “You’re not very busy at all. I need you to go ahead and plan this massive event with Clay and Buck and Michael. So thanks, Princess.” So I’m gonna go for that sale tonight. I’m probably gonna come home with flowers. You gotta try to butter up, grease the skids, if you will. But that’s my plan, Buck.

BUCK: Sounds like a plan to me.

CLAY: What’s the maddest your wife has been at you, Jesse, in the last couple of years? Is there something where you thought, “Oh, I’m in so much trouble over this?” Do you remember? There’s a lot of married guys out there listening. And I know you talk about… You just checked your watch. Oh, man, we got a bunch of different stories here you could tell. But is there one where you were thinking, “I’m in so much trouble over this”?

JESSE: Yes, absolutely, there’s one. She had a scar on her ear from earrings when she was a kid. I won’t go into the details of it. She called it a butt ear. It was really weird. But for years and years and years after she had kids — she’s a gymnast; so she’s just this athletic freak and used to being an athletic freak. And she looked perfect after she had kids.

She’s one of those women all other women hate, went right back to looking good. She thought she didn’t look good. And she always said she wanted to get plastic surgery on her ear and get her stomach fixed. She has washboard abs. She doesn’t need to get her stomach fixed. You know how women are. So finally, she drives by a plastic surgeon one day and says, “Oh, I wonder if he could do my ear.” And without thinking — ’cause she had been bringing up the stomach — I said, “Why don’t you get your stomach done first?”

CLAY: (groans) I’m cringing just think about this.

BUCK: I’m amazed you’re still alive.

JESSE: I’ve never hated myself so much in my life, and it didn’t matter how many times I pointed to her washboard abs. That was the moment. I thought I was just gonna die.

CLAY: She’s probably forgotten about that, though. One thing about women is they don’t remember things for very long.

JESSE: (laughing)

BUCK: Two of my favorite things about Jesse Kelly which I’ll tell this audience is that, one, I have actually gotten formally reprimanded by a previous employer for liking a Jesse Kelly tweet, just so you know.

CLAY: Oh, that’s amazing.

BUCK: I’ve actually been told, “You cannot like a Jesse Kelly tweet.” And also when there’s a headline that you say, “Oh, my God. There’s 10 different jokes I could make about this that are inappropriate,” sometimes I’ll just text it to Jesse, saying, “Hey, you run with this one. You run with this one,” because the rules are different for him for some reason. I have not figured out why. He can say things that I would get put in the penalty box for.

CLAY: That’s what happened in the world of sports with me, Buck, is that I was able to say so many things in sports that nobody else could say. People would send it to me and say, “Hey, I could never say this, but just an idea for you here,” and sometimes that’s good. You got an excuse to be able to set somebody else up, let ’em have the line.

BUCK: Jesse’s gotta lay off the Italians. We got a lot of wonderful, conservative Italians listening here in New York City, Jesse. We see those tweets.

JESSE: No, no. I would never say anything bad. I’m done ripping on Italians completely. As soon as those mustaches get trimmed off the ladies, I’m good to go.

BUCK: Oh, my gosh!

CLAY: (laughing)

BUCK: Look what he’s done. Causing problems.

CLAY: We’ll be live tomorrow. I’ll back in Nashville. You’ll hopefully have gotten some sleep after the cross-country trip, and I hope the Braves are gonna be up 2-0 ready to head back to ATL to win the World Series. Gonna be a fun night. Can’t wait.