Jason Kelce and Lil Dicky discuss the ‘flagrant mistakes’ of the Sixers’ Process

“I wanted them to draft Markelle Fultz!” the rapper told Jason and Travis Kelce on Wednesday's podcast.

Jason Kelce and Travis Kelce, shown at a Sixers playoff game last year, had rapper and actor Lil Dicky on their "New Heights" podcast.Read moreYong Kim / Staff Photographer

Published April 10, 2024, 5:58 p.m. ET

A lot of celebrities are Philadelphia sports fans — Bradley Cooper, Rob McElhenney, and even President Joe Biden, to name a few. But being a sports fan as a public figure provides a new perspective on fandom. Just ask rapper Lil Dicky, who talked with Jason and Travis Kelce on New Heights about the successes and failures of “The Process.”

The Sixers’ infamous teardown ultimately led to drafting Joel Embiid, the reigning MVP, but “flagrant mistakes along the way” threw roadblocks at the innovative plan — most notably trading the pick that would end up being Jayson Tatum in order to draft Markelle Fultz, according to Lil Dicky. But those mistakes are easier to identify in retrospect.

“I wanted them to draft Markelle Fultz!” Lil Dicky said on New Heights. “I wasn’t like, ‘What are you doing, you have to get Tatum!’ In retrospect, that’s what The Process was trying to do, to get you Jayson Tatum and Joel Embiid, and we just never quite got that other guy.”

A lot of Sixers fans can empathize with that feeling. Fultz, for whom the Sixers traded up to select first overall, played just 33 games for the team. He was traded to Orlando and the Sixers used one of the draft picks in that deal to select Tyrese Maxey, who is growing into a star alongside Embiid. But he’s still not Tatum, now a star for the Boston Celtics.

“Markelle Fultz is a good player, I have trouble even disrespecting — when I was a kid, I’d talk [obscenity] about athletes, but becoming, I guess a celebrity, I now have a different perspective on the pressures that you guys deal with,” Lil Dicky added.

Unlike those in music or television, like Lil Dicky, athletes have one chance each game to perform. In sports, fans often cross the line into dehumanizing athletes, but Jason Kelce said over a full career, players who put effort in every day will be admired once they’re done.

“If you can’t catch a ball, people are going to say you [stink], but they’re not going to call you soft, usually,” Jason said. “There are some outlandish things, and people say all sorts of things when they’re mad, but the overall narrative at the end of the day once you’re done playing, once the emotionality of the moment of the game is done — this is what I try to remind players, players tend to get wrapped up in what’s being said now, and it’s like, ‘Dude, take out of the equation what’s being said now. This is what fans are going to say in the moment because they’re [ticked]. Just … do the best you can and show that you care, and if you don’t win, they’re still going to probably hate you and think that you [stunk], but they’ll respect you.’”