Passion propelled Laiatu Latu from medical retirement to NFL first-round pick

Pate Tuilevuka could hardly believe what he was seeing. He was only at this tryout as a favor to an old friend, but it didn’t take long to realize he was watching someone special.

A person that big and that strong shouldn’t be that fast. That smooth. The possibilities felt infinite. The heights limitless.

Tuilevuka, the general manager of Major League Rugby’s Seattle Seawolves, thought that with a little training, Laiatu Latu could dominate. He reminded Tuilevuka of New Zealand rugby union legend Jonah Lomu. “Jonah was a huge, massive individual who had incredible speed and power,” Tuilevuka said. “So, as soon as I saw (Latu) … I just knew, ‘Aw shoot, this kid has all of that.’”

It was scheduled to be a three-day tryout, but Tuilevuka had seen enough after only a few drills. He was ready to sign Latu on the spot. But the 20-year-old couldn’t commit.

Latu liked rugby, and he was great at it, leading Jesuit High in the Sacramento suburb of Carmichael, Calif., to two national championships. His coach, Lou Stanfill, who helped set up the Seawolves tryout, described Latu as “clinically merciless.” If an opponent got between him and a scoring opportunity, Latu ran straight through their chest. If a player tried to score on him, Latu caved their chest in.

Of course we dug up Laiatu’s high school rugby highlights. 💥

(via @Hudl) pic.twitter.com/QsfJYla7nW

— Indianapolis Colts (@Colts) April 26, 2024

“He was a man among boys, especially in his senior year,” Stanfill said. “He was 6-foot-4, 250-260 pounds, could run, could hit, could jump. He could do everything and he was coachable in everything.”

But even though Latu could do it all on a rugby pitch, his heart belonged elsewhere. A neck injury he suffered at the University of Washington just months prior was supposed to keep him off the football field forever. But Latu wasn’t ready to accept that, so he turned down Tuilevuka and the Seawolves — and a potentially fabulous life.

“If Laiatu wanted to go play rugby, he would play overseas, and he would be a big name,” Stanfill said. “Everyone around the world would end up finding out who Laiatu Latu is.

“He would play here in the States for MLR. He’d get on the U.S. National Team, and then someone in France, England, New Zealand (would sign him). … He’d be making good money, living in France and playing great ruby.”

Instead, Latu defiantly rededicated himself to a sport that was supposed to be in his rearview mirror. “I told them that my passion is football,” Latu said of the Seawolves tryout. And three years after being told he’d never play football again, he became the first defensive player selected in the 2024 NFL Draft, his passion having become his livelihood.

After teams selected 14 straight offense players to open up the 2024 NFL Draft, the Indianapolis Colts made Laiatu Latu the first defender chosen. (Gregory Shamus / Getty Images)

The text sent shivers down Kerry Latu’s spine.

“Mom.”

None of her four children ever sent cliffhanger texts, so this one-word message from her oldest son gave her an ominous feeling. Soon, she was talking to Laiatu and Washington’s medical staff, trying to piece together exactly what had happened during an awkward practice collision with a teammate in November 2020.

Laiatu remembers it vividly.

“I tackled the running back, and right after that play everyone was still playing and running around because I did it pretty quick,” he said. “So when I turned around, my middle linebacker was running full speed and hit me in my face.”

Latu experienced numbness in his neck and extremities “for like 10 seconds” and initially thought he’d suffered a stinger. Trainers decided to keep him sidelined for the rest of practice out of an abundance of caution. It would be his last rep at Washington.

An MRI later revealed Latu had suffered a significant neck injury, the extent of which he has declined to specify publicly. He planned to sit out the remainder of a 2020 season already in disarray amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The family and university hoped his neck would heal on its own. But as the days, weeks and months went by, nothing improved.

“Eventually, the doctors were like, ‘I think we need to do surgery,’” Kerry said. “And from that point, the conversation started about medically retiring, and that was just gut-wrenching. … I thought maybe Laiatu was gonna have some say in it. But once they started talking about medically retiring him there was no looking back.”

Laiatu underwent neck fusion surgery in March 2021. Washington medically retired him in April.

“We would never want to put anybody in danger of possibly not being able to use his extremities the rest of his life,” then-Washington head coach Jimmy Lake said at the time. “We would never want that to happen to anybody.”

Lake added that the university consulted “five of the best specialists in the country, guys who have worked with different NFL clubs,” before choosing to end Latu’s career.

He was only 20, and he was devastated.

“I can’t imagine what he went through, because even I struggled with it,” Kerry said. “I kept thinking, ‘Not only is he a phenomenal football player, but he’s one of the most humble kids. I didn’t understand. Like, why is this happening to him?’”

It didn’t matter that Latu was weightlifting right up until the day before his procedure, even hang-cleaning a personal best 345 pounds. It didn’t matter that just two months into what was supposed to be a six-to-nine-month recovery, he picked rugby back up and was running and tackling with no issues. It didn’t matter that he was teaching himself pass-rush moves from YouTube videos while trying to flip his nightmare back into his lifelong dream.

“This one time he came to my office trying to explain to me how badly he wanted this,” said Ikaika Malloe, then Washington’s defensive line coach. “My doors are closed and I’m watching this kid break down in front of me. You cannot help but cry as well.”

Malloe remembers looking out his office window at Husky Stadium and often seeing Latu on the field training by himself. He wasn’t allowed to practice or work out with the team, but he prepared as if he was going to play every snap in Washington’s next game.

Malloe said he’s never seen someone as determined as Latu. But when Latu was fighting his way back to football, he wasn’t fighting alone. His coach and his family rallied around him because they knew how desperate he was for another chance.

When Laiatui’s then-8-year-old sister, Aulani, was assigned a school project that was supposed to be all about her. She was asked to fill in the blank: “If I had one wish, I would wish for …”

Her response? ” … my brother to play football again.”

My baby girl’s school project. ❤️😇 pic.twitter.com/FIimi8flWO

— Kerry Latu (@kerry_latu) August 26, 2021

When Laiatu resumed playing rugby in hopes of eventually returning to football, Kerry was a bit startled. All she wanted was for her son to heed the doctors’ orders and take it easy in his recovery, but there he was tearing through people on the pitch.

Each time Laiatu told her he was tackling with his surgically repaired neck, she tried to convince him to dial it back. Instead, he stepped on the gas. And when he wasn’t terrorizing opponents on the rugby pitch, he was ripping through imaginary foes on the football field.

Laiatu joked that his stubbornness was “the good kind,” and after a while, his unwavering self-belief pushed Kerry to do something that hardly anyone in Laiatu’s life was willing to do at the time: She listened. The two began having serious conversations about the possibility of reversing Laiatu’s medical retirement, and when he called Kerry in the spring of 2021 saying, “I’m not done,” she told him she wasn’t either.

Kerry never promised her son he would play football again. She just promised she would try to help.

She knew the outlook was bleak, “but as a mom, I don’t know, you just have this adrenaline in you,” Kerry said. “You want to make things better. You want your kid to be happy, and this is his passion. This is something he was good at. I didn’t think about it after that I just kind of went into go mode, and I just started searching.”

She sought out other football players who had significant neck injuries or conditions that threatened medical retirement but were able to continue their careers. Georgia linebacker Jarvis Jones bounced back and became a first-round pick of the Steelers in 2017. Clemson wide receiver Justyn Ross is a member of the two-time defending champion Chiefs.

As Kerry researched and networked, one name kept popping up: Dr. Robert Watkins, who performed the neck fusion surgery that allowed Peyton Manning to continue his Hall of Fame career. Kerry gave Watkins a call in August 2021, and two weeks later, she and Laiatu were sitting in Watkins’ Los Angeles office. Kerry remembers spending three hours there as Watkins and his staff reviewed all of Laiatu’s medical records and had him undergo several tests before eventually coming to a decision.

When Watkins walked into the room, Kerry and Laiatu held their breath.

“I’m comfortable clearing you,” Watkins said.

Laiatu immediately broke down.

“I had that moment in my brain every day, and I just wanted to work at being the best at football,” he said. “The fact that it got taken away from me and I got to come back; I really got to prove to people that you can do anything you set your mind to.”

Latu wanted to resume his career at Washington after he was officially cleared in September 2021, but the university chose not to reverse its decision to medically retire him, so he entered the transfer portal. A few schools showed interest, including Cal and Oregon State, but Latu wound up transferring to UCLA. Malloe had been hired by Chip Kelly in December 2021 and advocated for giving Laiatu a shot.

And if the Bruins had any questions about Laiatu’s neck surgery, one of their consultants just so happened to be Dr. Watkins.

Laiatu Latu racked up 23.5 sacks over his final two years of college at UCLA. (Ric Tapia / Getty Images)

Latu was finally able to resume his football career with the Bruins in 2022. He recorded a sack in a win over Washington he had circled on the calendar. But even that moment of redemption couldn’t compare to when Laiatu faced his little brother, Keleki, in UCLA’s regular-season finale.

Keleki, a tight end at Cal, saw Laiatu on his darkest days. Their matchup – the first time they’d ever played against each other – was one of the brightest.

“We were laughing,” Laiatu said. “But it felt really good, too, because as the older brother, I always wanted to show him what success looks like and I wasn’t able to do that for a time. So, when I got back on the field it was like, ‘Damn, he can really look up to me.’”

Keleki said he’s always admired his older brother, even when he was medically retired, because Laiatu embodied dedication and perseverance. Now playing at Washington, where Laiatu started his college career, Keleki knows the odds of earning another snap against his brother in the NFL are slim. But if there is one thing he’s learned from Laiatu’s journey, it’s that the odds don’t matter.

“When he was playing rugby and continuing to work out, it just made me think, ‘It’s not his time (for football to end),’” Keleki said. “So knowing that, I just prayed to God to see if he could give him another chance to play. Because now that he has it, I know he can be one of the greats.”

It didn’t hit him on draft night. It didn’t hit him when he first tried on his Colts helmet. It didn’t even hit him after he bought his mom a new house.

The moment Latu’s status as an NFL player finally sank in came after an OTA practice. The gratitude bubbled to the surface, and he could feel his eyes welling up. “I was just walking back to the locker room and I just started bawling,” he said. “That’s when it really hit me, when I seen that Colts sign on the facility.”

Back-to-back stellar seasons at UCLA convinced Indianapolis’ front office to select him with the No. 15 pick. The expectations are high, but early on, Latu has thrived under their weight.

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Since the pads came out during training camp, Latu has often doubled as starting quarterback Anthony Richardson’s shadow. The rookie has wrecked enough drives to make Richardson admit he’s tired of seeing him in the backfield.

“Just getting around the edge, it’s like, ‘Man, I’m trying to hit the receivers in stride,’ but he’s there in my face trying to make a play,’” Richardson said through a wry smile. “I’m glad we got him in practice so I can get used to stuff like that.”

Colts West Coast area scout Chris McGaha first saw Latu’s dominance on film. Then, during the pre-draft process, he saw the heart that drives it.

“Sometimes you have to dig a little deeper to try to find, ‘Do they really love it?’” McGaha said after the draft. “But his (desire) was pretty easy to see, right? The things he had to go through, the things he had to overcome, it’s a unique story and a unique journey for him. It’s just a testament to him as a person, the kind of special makeup he has.”

The Latu family (from left: Keleki, Kerry, Aulani, Laiatu and Naite) pose on the field after UCLA and Cal met in the teams’ regular-season finale in 2022. (Courtesy of Kerry Latu)

Every now and then, Latu thinks about how different his life would be had he closed the door on football and opened it to rugby. He may be in France right now, fresh off an Olympic appearance. But while peering around the field after a recent Colts training camp practice, Latu took a deep breath and came to a simple conclusion about that life: “It just can’t beat this.”

The 23-year-old has a tattoo on his left hand: “Like your last,” his personal mantra since returning to football. He writes the phrase at the top of every page in his notebook during team meetings, always reminding himself of where he was and where he’s headed.

“I made it,” Latu said. “Through all of the trials and tribulations that I’ve been through in my life, I get to say that I’ve made it.”

(Illustration: Dan Goldfarb / The Athletic; photos: Ryan Kang, Christopher Mast, Todd Rosenberg / Getty Images)

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