In the end, the Wednesdays are pushing Jason Kelce toward retirement.

On a Wednesday afternoon about two months ago, as he sat at his locker, stripping tape off his fingers and cutting tape off his cleats, Kelce answered a question I’d only casually asked.

“Is this going to be your last year?” I said.

“I don’t know. I do know — I mean, Wednesdays,” he said. “The Wednesdays are getting harder. Really, that’s the only thing.”

The only thing?

“Yeah,” he replied. “You’re sore Monday, you’re off Tuesday, but Wednesday ... I’m just having a hard time getting going again on Wednesdays. Getting the juice, you know?”

I know. You know, too.

For NFL players, Wednesdays are like our Mondays. NFL players usually meet on Mondays, get Tuesdays off, then begin preparing for the next week on Wednesdays, the first of two long days of rigorous practices and planning. So, on Wednesdays, their bodies have to be ready for two days of action. Their minds have to be clear and focused, prepared to absorb a new plan of attack against a new foe.

Kelce told me that, this season, for the first time, his body was still tired and sore on Wednesdays. He seemed mentally fatigued, too; after all, he’s been playing nursemaid to two young, insecure quarterbacks for the past nine years. Nine years. Think about that.

After more than 12½ seasons, after 160 consecutive starts at center, after seven Pro Bowls and six All-Pro selections and two trips to the Super Bowl, the Wednesdays caught up with him.

In the same conversation, Kelce had trouble remembering the precise date of a teammate’s injury, and he dropped his trademark line about “the CTE creeping in.” Kelce often addresses the specter of long-term brain damage from chronic traumatic encephalopathy that we now know to be common in former football players, especially in NFL veterans who play deep into their 30s.

Why did I not reveal Kelce’s concerns sooner? Well, we were chatting casually. It wasn’t off the record, but it wasn’t a hard-core interview, either. It was background, in case a day like today should come.

At any rate, these were not morose musings of an old man mired in the bowels of a losing streak. This was back when the team was 10-1 and stood atop the NFL. This was when the Eagles were favored to win the NFC for the second straight year and return to the Super Bowl.

» READ MORE: Blame Nick Sirianni? James Bradberry? Jalen Hurts? Howie Roseman? OK. It was a group effort, Eagles.

This was before the teammate tantrums and the defense’s collapse and the offense’s stagnation and the coordinator switch and all those damned losses — six in the last seven games, the last two disorganized, blowout embarrassments at the lowly Giants in the finale and at the mediocre Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the wild-card game Monday.

Since Malcolm Jenkins left four years ago, and maybe even before that, Kelce has been the only adult in the room, and that has often included his head coaches. It is an exhausting responsibility.

Kelce wouldn’t talk after the Monday night massacre, a 32-9 loss. He hugged his position coach, then left the field tearful. He took a long time to shower, quickly dressed in a sweat suit, then walked past sympathetic reporters, respectfully declining interviews. On Monday morning, teammates told ESPN (and sources confirmed to The Inquirer) that Kelce told some of them he planned to retire.

All of that is what I know to be true.

The rest is what I think to be true.

Imagine what Jason Kelce was thinking on Wednesday mornings when he parked his car and looked at the NovaCare practice facility. What he was thinking about the defense’s decline, the inevitable roster overhaul, and the likely coaching changes. One former NFL executive told me last month that, between coach Nick Sirianni’s act and the team’s faltering performances, the franchise was being perceived as a “clown show.”

Kelce might occasionally dress up in funny clothes and make us laugh, but he’s no clown.

» READ MORE: The Eagles’ arrogance caught up with them

He was the best player on an elite offensive line that has been the best in the league for the last 11 years, mainly because it’s coached by the best position coach in the history of the franchise, Jeff Stoutland.

Otherwise ...

Kelce now plays for a wildly unprofessional head coach who taunted another team’s fans in their stadium. After winning at Kansas City on Nov. 20, Sirianni looked into a camera in the tunnel leading to the locker room and profanely clapped back at Chiefs fans who harangued him from their seats during the game. The Chiefs’ coach is Andy Reid, who drafted Kelce and who loves him. The Chiefs’ second-best player is Travis Kelce, Jason’s kid brother. And, in their house, Sirianni acted like a jabroni. Maybe that mattered to Kelce.

» READ MORE: The Eagles shouldn’t fire Nick Sirianni. But if they do, these are the best candidates to replace him.

There are other issues.

Kelce knows that the Eagles should commit to the run more.

He knows that the team’s answers to blitzes are both ill-conceived by Sirianni and offensive coordinator Brian Johnson and poorly executed by Jalen Hurts.

He knows that the Eagles look foolish at how they administered their defensive coaching staff after losing coordinator Jonathan Gannon, now Arizona’s head coach. To review: Sirianni fired popular defensive backs coach Dennard Wilson, after he declined to hire him as Gannon’s replacement. He then hired Sean Desai, who was overmatched. After 13 games, Sirianni stripped Desai of his play-calling duties in favor of senior defensive assistant Matt Patricia, who most recently had failed as a head coach and an offensive coordinator.

Yes, offensive coordinator.

At any rate, the defense got worse under Patricia.

Star receiver A.J. Brown devolved into a diva. After a report confirmed that his on-field and sideline antics and subsequent media boycott were rooted in his displeasure with coaching decisions and had teammates concerned that the displays were affecting the team, Brown apologized to the entire locker room.

And, finally, Hurts, clearly has regressed. He cannot seem to decipher opposing defenses. He cannot seem to recognize blitzes, especially from his right side. He cannot seem to bring himself to throw the ball over the middle or to outlet receivers in the flat. He is reluctant to throw the ball away, convinced he can escape any and all pressures; that’s why he gave up a safety Monday night, the worst play in a game that featured James Bradberry.

» READ MORE: Jalen Hurts’ lukewarm endorsement of Nick Sirianni may be the final nail in the Eagles coach’s coffin

Kelce has tutored Hurts for four years now.

Kelce grew up in the game quickly. He won a starting job as a sixth-round rookie. He has been an inclusive, approachable leader since Day 1. After what happened with Carson Wentz, who was a raw quarterback who seemed distant from the team, you wonder how much Kelce thinks about helping develop another raw quarterback who seems distant from the team.

Coincidentally, and perhaps ironically, Kelce likely will announce his retirement on a Wednesday. He’ll say all the right things. He’ll talk about spending more time with his wife and kids, and he’ll embrace what is sure to be a brilliant and lucrative career in broadcasting and podcasting, and he might even tease the possibility of coaching at some point.

But, aches and pains and family and future aside, Kelce remains the best center in football. He’s at the top of his profession. This is like Barry Sanders and Calvin Johnson retiring, except they were younger and, fatalistically, they played for the Lions.

So, you wonder.

You wonder how much Kelce thinks about Sirianni’s chronic unprofessionalism after three full seasons.

You wonder how much Kelce thinks about the impending upheaval in the locker room, which is aged and thin, and the coaches’ suite, where heads will roll, even if Sirianni stays attached.

You wonder how much Kelce thinks about how far the Eagles have to go to be a legitimate threat again, and whether, at 36, he wants to be a part of that, in any capacity. He’s human. All of these issues merit consideration.

Then again, it might just be about the Wednesdays.