NFL locker rooms are full of elite athletes. Apparently, they're also full of conspiracy theorists. As a result, the Kelce brothers called in an expert to clear up some misunderstandings.
During the most recent episode of their podcast, renowned astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson joined the two brothers, where he had a message for the flat-earthers and Moon mission deniers in the league.
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'Football is the best example of a round earth'
Tyson joined Jason and Travis Kelce on the latest episode of
New Heights
, where the brothers asked for help debunking some of the conspiracy theories they hear in locker rooms.
"The two biggest ones for some reason in NFL locker rooms that are kind of crazy are we didn't go to the moon and then flat earth," Jason Kelce said. "I'm sure you have heard, unfortunately, of people that somehow believe that the earth is flat and not round."
Tyson said he isn't going to chase anyone down over it.
"I don't hit people over the head. We live in a free country, or we tell ourselves we do," Tyson said. "So in a free country, you think whatever you want. Okay? I'm not going to chase you down. But if you think Earth is flat, I just don't want you to become head of NASA. That's all."
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He then offered an easy way to prove the Earth is round to anyone who watches the NFL.
"You guys play football. Here it is. I live on the East Coast. It's Sunday. Everybody's playing their games. Okay, you guys play in the winter where the sun sets early," Tyson said. "I am in the dark in New York City watching the 49ers at home and the sun is up. That can only happen in this round."
"Football is the best example of a round earth. That's all I'm saying," Tyson continued. "Because just you can't have sunshine in San Francisco and darkness in New York unless Earth is round."
He added that players "don't watch your own games," but fans can see multiple games at once. "Some are in sunshine while others are in darkness," Tyson said.
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'Everything is a conspiracy if you don't know anything about anything'
Earlier in the episode, Travis said that conspiracy theories about the moon landing come up constantly around the league.
"You can't go an entire week without hearing somebody say, 'We didn't go to the moon,'" Travis Kelce said.
In response to this, Tyson pointed out that the conspiracy theory would mean that NASA actually faked the moon missions many times, as NASA sent nine missions to the moon, from Apollo 8 through Apollo 17.
"You would have to say that we faked the moon landing nine times. Who does that?" Tyson said.
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He also shared a joke about NASA supposedly asking Hollywood to fake it.
"A week later, they come back to NASA and say, 'We studied the problem, and what we've concluded is to make the most convincing fakery, we should do this on location,'" Tyson said.
"Everything is a conspiracy if you don't know anything about anything," he added.
The topic has come up in sports before. Kyrie Irving famously claimed in 2017 that the Earth is flat before later apologizing, and Stephen Curry was invited to visit NASA in 2018 after joking that the moon landing was fake.
Hopefully, Tyson's football explanation finally settles the debate in a few locker rooms.
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