Tyrann Mathieu looked up, past the red-and-gold confetti falling from the sky, and saw just stars, like the entire galaxy had been lit. He might hardly speak. He couldnt move. The yelling fans, the euphoric colleagues, the thuds of bass coming from the speakers– all of it faded into a dreamlike silence. Mathieu asked himself a question he currently knew the answer to: How worldwide did I wind up here?
On the night the Chiefs protected their very first Super Bowl berth in half a century last January, he climbed up atop a stage that had been wheeled onto the Arrowhead Stadium grass. He watched the household of late group creator Lamar Hunt accept the trophy that bears his name. The packed crowd remained through the freezing temperatures, the die-hards dancing and weeping.
Jeffery A. Salter/Sports Illustrated
Mathieu identified Brett Veach. The GM had actually signed him prior to the season and guaranteed that the free-agent safety would raise Kansas City after years of bad moves and heartbreak (for both franchise and gamer) back to the peak. Then Mathieu flashed back to absolute bottom. The funerals, the failed drug tests, the injuries. Had he really considered retirement? He wandered back, keeping in mind how eventually he found himself, and after that his chi, and after that his voice, with help from a spiritual advisor, a naturopathic physician and a mindfulness coach.
Two teammates broke the hypnotic trance. Tight end Travis Kelce grabbed Mathieu by the shoulders. Quarterback Patrick Mahomes jumped on his back. Both told the safety just how much they valued him, how much he had implied to their playoff run, continuing in that nights accomplishment over the Titans. Grips tightened up. Tears welled. “Its never a power struggle, never an ego thing,” Mathieu states. “Were simply some men who desire to play ball, and at that minute we realized, in a sense, that were best for each other.”
Mahomes relied on some teammates, pulling them close. “Remember what I told you when you signed?” he asked Mathieu, who nodded.
” Lets start a dynasty.”
The stars had actually lined up around the security, however Mathieu did not feel bliss, nerves or perhaps achievement. Rather, he felt balance, peace. Through discomfort, he had found something unexpected: his own brand of Zen.
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Todays Tyrann Mathieu can hardly acknowledge previous versions of himself. However to show up here, as a cornerstone of a Super Bowl champ and a prominent voice for social justice, he had to first analyze everything that went wrong. Only then could he make whatever right.
He had to look back at his well-chroncled childhood in New Orleans– the dad who went to prison for second-degree murder … the mom who dropped him on his grandparents doorstep … friend after good friend after friend shot and eliminated. “I saw a flickering of function,” states Del Lee-Collins, his high school coach and mentor.
Sure, Mathieu could run, jump, defend and take on. And he did all that, mostly by funneling latest thing that surged like electrical energy inside him. He could drop into an LSU football camp, overlook the chaos that spun his life in every direction, and show coach Les Miles that he deserved a scholarship, even at 5 9″. Miles might tell, however, that the boy looked upon himself through a funhouse mirror, his understanding distorted. Mathieu saw a singularly focused athlete who didnt deserve to be delighted, and who didnt like himself, making it hard for him to like anybody else.
In Baton Rouge, Miles saw those very same flickers as Collins once had, only they were happening regularly and more intensely, as Mathieu turned in between who he was and what he wished to end up being. Mathieu was among the most flexible players Miles ever coached. On the field, he returned punts, obstructed passes, leapt over blockers, patrolled the secondary, sacked quarterbacks and required fumbles. He claimed the Chuck Bednarik Award as the nations leading protector in 2011 which fall earned an uncommon invitation for a defender to the Heisman ceremony. With his unique blonde hair and extraordinary Honey Badger nickname, Mathieu– a defensive back– became the most identifiable gamer in college football.
The following August, though, Miles kicked Mathieu off the group. He d stopped working too lots of drug tests– a minimum of 10, according to media reports– damaged a lot of guidelines. “It was the hardest thing I ever needed to do,” the coach says. Mathieu was never ever late, never lazy, never a diversion on the field– he just could not avoid of problem off of it. He stayed quiet when Miles booted him. He understood.
In the 2013 NFL draft, Mathieu dropped all the method to the third round. He tore his left ACL that rookie season, busted a thumb in Year 2, tore his other ACL in Year 3 and separated his ideal shoulder in Year 4. Four seasons, four injuries, 16 games missed (including playoffs).
When the Cardinals prepared his replacement and then cut Mathieu following the 2017 season, he began to question himself more deeply; the feeling strengthened. The Texans signed him for cheap and discarded him after one year. At times he questioned whether football was truly for him; he considered what a different life may appear like. He questioned whether any person truly enjoyed him and, he admits, sabotaged much of the support he got.
” Most people would state Im too great to be on my third team,” he says. Thats real. And yet, there he was.
For several years, Mathieu questioned why he constantly had to take– or had constantly taken– the hardest path. Breaks never appeared to fall his way. Why did he hold onto (or pick at) a lot of wounds?
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Mathieu can not identify his exact low point. The nadir didnt arise from looking into rehabilitation for marijuana use in 2012. Or when he spent a night in prison on a marijuana charge and had his cellmates inform him to take a look around, that he didnt belong there. Or when he appeared at McNeese State later on that year, wanting to move, dressed to show disengagement: a stained tank top and shorts.
Each time, he informed himself the exact same thing. Somethings got ta change. I cant live like this any longer. Im losing my capacity. Even then, he never might sustain progress. There were constantly begins and fits.
Looking back, Mathieu states no one had actually ever taught him how to process his emotions. Upon his arrival in Arizona, in 2013, he looked for guidance, trying to take control of his life away from football, hoping that may remedy his path. He saved the contact in his phone as Donny the Yogi.
Early in their discussions, he and Mathieu dove deep into a essential but evasive idea for the security: self-love. Donny the Yogi motivated Mathieu to discover his center, initially by understanding all the luggage he carried with him, and then through yoga and meditation, which would help him to let go. He tried to disabuse Mathieu of the notion that football alone made him worthwhile and helped him to focus, eliminate distractions, breathe.
Progress wasnt direct. Mathieu made first-team All Pro with the Cardinals in 2015. He dropped the Honey Badger nickname and started most early mornings with meditation sessions outside in the desert sun. The injuries exacted a new mental toll. Lee-Collins went to after the 2nd ACL tear and says: “I saw how it was weighing on him. He was doing everything right, and after that– Bam!”.
Mathieu plunged deeply inward, holding a magnifying glass to his battered soul. He went to treatment and drew appreciation from Cardinals coaches for his leadership.
Mathieu starred at LSU before a stint in rehab. He invested five seasons with the Cardinals and one in Houston before joining the Chiefs.
Andrew Hancock/Sports Illustrated (cover); Christian Petersen/Getty Images (Cardinals); Bob Levey/Getty Images (Texans).
After the 2nd knee tear he began going to Suneil Jain, a naturopath who believes in treating the body as a whole. Jain studied what he calls Mathieus metabolic deficiencies and changed the securitys diet. He released Western and Eastern and holistic approaches and dissuaded medicine except in severe instances, instead concentrating on acupuncture and non-traditional treatments to, as Jain says, “re-align the body and make him as flexible as possible.”.
And Mathieu, in his progressively urgent pursuit of significance and affection, responded to the complete stranger. He was going through something– Mathieus granny, Marie Spellman Mathieu, constantly the most steady force in his life, fell ill and passed in the spring of 2016. One day Mathieu pulled up his left trousers leg and exposed the names of 20 of his closest good friends, all dead prior to Mathieu himself had left for college– the abuse tattooed across his lower half.
Mathieu was still processing all of that, however now he had the assistance of his own Three Wise Men– the pastor, the naturopath and the yogi. He still screwed up–” all the time,” he says– however the tools he was learning kept his feelings mostly in check, consisting of when he was launched or passed over. After the Texans selected not to re-sign him, following the 2018 season, he thanked coach Bill OBrien for what he d discovered, for the methods OBrien had pushed him to lead.
That spring, Mathieu weighed his alternatives. The Chiefs defensive organizer, Steve Spagnuolo, connected to OBrien, who told him, “This person changed the culture here the day he walked through the door.” When Kansas City signed the security to a three-year, $42 million offer, Veach named Mathieu– the very same man who d been kicked off his group and left school, gone to rehab and jail, and fought injury after injury–” the driver.”.
Each morning, Mathieu would meditate and inform himself: Stay in balance.
* * *.
In K.C., Mathieu and Spags bonded instantly. He said, “Youre the man I constantly desired to coach,” and guaranteed he would not move Mathieu all over the field, like others had.
His planners belief meant whatever to Mathieu. His belief in himself suggested much more. He fit well in Kansas City– a homebody who enjoyed football and barbecue and brought an ethos of everyman toughness, having lived a full life over 28 years and yet continuing to move forward. City, team and fanbase liked him back; they d seen elite protectors in recent seasons, but never one like Mathieu, who claims, “I do things no other security does.” He would tip the Chiefs over the edge, one way or another.
For a while, though, the franchises 2019 season took a turn towards mediocrity. Injuries piled up, with Mahomes playing through a bottom ankle early and later missing out on 2 games after dislocating his kneecap. When slot corner Kendall Fuller signed up with the QB in the training space, with a busted thumb in Week 6, Spags needed to undo his promise, moving Mathieu all over the field, like the queen on a protective chessboard.
Mathieu can pinpoint the specific weekend the season was saved. The Chiefs were 6-4 in mid-November, headed to Mexico City to play the Chargers. The security thought his colleagues were making a lot of excuses, beginning with Mahomess injuries, however they were also banking on the ultimate coalescence of a revamped defensive system. Finally, he and Spags dealt with the group. The time had actually come, they stated, to get rid of all the descriptions and validations. Simply play ball.
Mahomes, Mathieu and Kelce had a minute on stage after winning the AFC title video game.
David E. Klutho/Sports Illustrated.
Mahomes rounded back into MVP type, and the defense, led by Mathieu (75 takes on, two sacks, four choices and 12 pass break-ups), protective take on Chris Jones and edge rusher Frank Clark, sparked a late-season surge. “A lot of our wins werent quite,” concedes Mathieu. “But if you took our logo off the helmet and put another groups on, you would have said we were dominant.”.
For the first time considering that 2015, Mathieu was called All Pro, however his effect stretched beyond anything determined by stats or awards. Down 24-0 to the Texans in the divisional round, he ran up and down the Kansas City sideline, imploring teammates to look across the field. “You need tove seen them,” he states of his old Houston colleagues. “Pom-poms, popcorn … They thought the game was over, man. I desired my teammates to smell that blood.” Of course, he had actually been up when the group was down, flourishing in discomfort yet once again.
The Chiefs came back, toppled the Titans and Mathieu zoned out later onstage.
” You have to see the moment,” he says months later, echoing his mindfulness coach, “in order to actually seize it.”.
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The newly-spiritual safety carried that Zen with him to Miami for Super Bowl LIV, and he brought his Three Wise Men along too. Jain carried out day-to-day acupuncture and option treatment sessions. Savage lent psychological support. And in addition to yoga and mindfulness sessions Donny the Yogi shared a 13-minute-long frame of mind visualization audio file, informing Mathieu things like “tune in to the quality of your breath” and “enter that version of you thats 100% devoted to appearing Super Bowl Sunday” and “make an image, if you will, of a future you: focused, grounded and ready for all 4 quarters.” Mathieu listened to this “mental wedding rehearsal” the night prior to the video game, and once again before he sprinted onto the field.
Versus the 49ers, with their unlimited choices, Mathieu figured the offense would throw and run away from him, however still he imagined making plays, as he constantly had. … You can see with more clearness. … Youve never seen more plainly.
At Hard Rock Stadium in Miami, as Mathieu trotted out onto the field for warm-ups, Del Lee-Collins held onto his old gamers one-month-old daughter, Mila, and allowed himself to reflect on the path to the pinnacle, on the love-hate turned pure love.
The 49ers did steer their offense away from Mathieu, however three of the tackles he made perhaps saved goals. In truth, Mathieu was pleading with his colleagues to remain calm.
Elsa/Getty Images.
After the triumph and the resurgence, the same gamer who was shaken off his college group for drug use– who went to rehab– steered clear of the championship celebration. Mathieu hung out with family and friends and a yogi and a naturopathic doctor at his hotel instead. Viewing that all unfold, Lee-Collins states, “All I saw was growth.”.
Asked what that moment represented to him, Mathieu stops briefly for 5 seconds. He states, “I dont know, guy.
* * *.
On the night Mathieu first ended up being conscious of the video footage that revealed a Minneapolis law enforcement officer killing George Floyd, he could not bring himself to see the entire 8 minutes and 46 seconds. He looked at his 3 kids, each under the age of nine, and worried about the harmful culture of the world he d brought them into. “Being a black man in America, [what happened to George Floyd] is something that we always knew was possible,” he says. “I feel for kids who need to mature because sort of world.”.
Could he impact it? This summer, while sports were paused and demonstrations forced America to once again reconsider its dreadful racial history, Mathieu, now 28, took a call from Michael Thomas. The Saints wideout desired to make a video including a few of the most prominent gamers in the league, and he wanted them to push the NFL toward recognizing the Black Lives Matter motion, to acknowledge that players have a voice and to encourage them to speak.
” Im all in,” Mathieu replied.
Jeffrey A. Salter/Sports Illustrated.
Neither player felt that the league had adequately reacted to Floyds killing. And Mathieu, particularly, thinks the NFL did wrong by Colin Kaepernick. He states the former 49ers quarterback was “blackballed” for his social conscience, for wanting to deal with organized racism and widespread inequality– concerns that continue today. With that in mind, he sent out text, hopped on FaceTime calls and became a salesperson for Thomas, assisting to hire for the video Cardinals receiver DeAndre Hopkins and cornerback Patrick Peterson; Texans quarterback Deshaun Watson; and Mahomes, the emerging face of the league. “Pat was very important,” Mathieu states. “Huge.”.
The video came out, spreading rapidly all over the world. Commissioner Roger Goodell reacted on Twitter, utilizing the phrase “Black Lives Matter” and acknowledging that gamers had the right to object apparent wrongs– a complete pivot from the leagues stance when Kaepernick started kneeling in 2016.
In Kansas City, the events following Floyds death inspired conversations amongst colleagues, and Mathieu, having actually discovered a focus outside of football, was at the forefront. Owner Clark Hunt called up him and the other captains, and Mathieu dove right in, hammering the lack of minority coaches throughout the league and stressing the importance of Black citizen registration.
” A great deal of times when theyre paying you millions of dollars, its like, All right, get to work,” Mathieu states. “Here, it appeared like football took a rear seat. You could feel the intensity, the passion. [Individuals] wished to comprehend.”.
Mathieu was not brand-new to activism– he d began a foundation to help disadvantaged kids, submitted himself to being locked in a hot cars and truck for a PETA project, and contributed 30,000 meals to Kansas City families after COVID-19 spread. As the world protested, in the wake of Floyds death, he contributed cash and helped protect speakers for a company that coaches at-risk youth around New Orleans and Baton Rouge. “Thats how you make the world much better.
As Savage, the pastor, enjoyed Mathieu act upon their conversations, he informed anybody who d listen that they required to understand 2 features of the safety previously called Honey Badger. One: He d endured more discomfort than anyone Savage had ever fulfilled. And 2: He was the most generous individual Savage knew.
” In essence, he produced what he had actually always required,” Savage states. “Stability. Empowerment. Favorable impacts. And now hes offering to other individuals what nobody ever offered to him.”.
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Savage says that Mathieu hardly celebrated after the Super Bowl since he no longer required to. He no longer defined himself by football alone.
On the Super Bowl stage Mathieu again discovered himself beside Kelce and Mahomes. Only this time, amid another confetti shower, nobody mentioned a dynasty. They didnt need to.
Earlier this summer season, Mathieu bothered Veach, informing him to keep the Chiefs intact. He tapped out a few text messages when he saw Mahomes sign a contract in July that could earn him half a billion dollars. To the GM: “Yo, brother, you actually simply did that.” To the QB: “I dont believe you know how unique you really are.” He exchanged a couple of notes with Reid, who tapped back, “Man, if I have you and Patrick, I can coach until Im 90.”.
The security stayed at home in Kansas City these previous couple of months, like he would have even without a pandemic. He even set up a yoga area in the basement where he can work and practice meditation out. If the season begins on time, he plans to play. Its not his task, he states, to evaluate the danger. (He likewise keeps in mind that, in his profession, he has actually currently missed out on a complete seasons worth of games.) “Its everything about keeping the balance,” he says, “remaining positive, not feeling overwhelmed.”.
Often Mathieu will probe his coaches for ideas on how to keep last seasons success. Now, the world is anything however settled, and Tyrann Mathieu, of course, feels grounded, stable and at peace.
Mathieu was one of the most versatile players Miles ever coached. Mathieu can not identify his precise low point. He was going through something– Mathieus granny, Marie Spellman Mathieu, always the most stable force in his life, fell ill and passed in the spring of 2016. One day Mathieu pulled up his left trousers leg and revealed the names of 20 of his closest buddies, all dead prior to Mathieu himself had left for college– the abuse tattooed throughout his lower half.
He stated, “Youre the guy I always desired to coach,” and promised he would not move Mathieu all over the field, like others had.
