 I'm grateful to be here, to be a Titan. Obviously, linebacker right now is a position to need, so I'm grateful to be able to come in here and show everybody what I'm about and what I'm going to bring to the table. This was a good pick up by the Titan. I'm good at Z. Say congrats to Z, boys. Congrats, man. I appreciate you, man. And I wouldn't change anything that's happened for me up until this point because I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be. And honestly, I couldn't write it any better, so... That which is for you should not pass you by, and that which passes you by is not for you. I told you that because I didn't want to crush your dreams. I knew you wanted to play football. You always told me, oh, we don't come from Kings and Queens. Because what's the odds of my child being the one that makes it? We come from warrior and survivor. I think I just started to, you know, turn cold a little bit. Literally seeing people shooting. I opened my eyes, and I just saw it rad. And once we became homeless. That was literally like the ice on the camp. Being on that field, it was the equalizer for me. That was the one place where nobody judged you for anything other than what you did. It was like the whole world stopped. It's over, like, it's over. This is my dream. This is my life. And nobody's gonna come save me. My biggest goal is to make as much money as I can to help as much people as I can. Right here. As you know, I did not see myself as being a mother of eight children. When you got here, you were just this chubby, cheeky, little chipmunk, adorable, sweet. As you grew up, you were always smiling and happy. My mom called me Smiley O'Reilly. And literally, like, that was just kind of how I was. The first 10 years of my life, almost, where I was like the little jokester. Like, I remember every year I got the class cloud award at school. Like, I'm always happy, always smiling, always laughing. I would get all the awards that I thought didn't mean anything, but truly, when I look at it, like, the citizenship award was for being a good student, being a good classmate. Like, those are things that I value more truthfully as an adult. Like, to say because I know you're a good person, you know? Growing up here in Tampa, the way it looks, doesn't look as bad until you actually start living there or around it. You know, I was right in the middle of all of it and I had a lot of decisions to make for myself as a kid. You know, what I was going to do, whatever I was going to take. And, you know, even before football, it was hard because, you know, I would get myself in a lot of trouble. You know, by the grace of God, I just never got caught. So I think it's, you know, I bought myself enough time to change my life. This project's right here that we're about to outturn into it. And I literally stayed at this first one right here. I was on the one way in, one way out. I didn't see so much crazy crap through there. Like, there's so many fights. I remember literally seeing people shooting. I lived in a new place every year for as long as I can remember. Going to a new school every single year, I think I just started to, you know, turn cold a little bit. You don't understand that your parents make a lot of sacrifices. Things don't work out. As a child, you don't see that because you're not. You're not taught the reality of life. Because I shouldn't have ever been dealing with some of the things I had to go through. But that was my life and that's what it was. Probably like 20 of us living in this house at the time. Me and my cousin, we'd be right in between these two houses. All the kids from the neighborhood would get together and we'd play right in this little opening right here. And that was the first time you played football? That was like my first, like, me playing football, like with older groups of kids and like competing. And I remember that I was around the same time and I'm like, I can really play. You know, I can really try to play football. I remember that's when I signed up. My grandfather signed me up. But I think, again, like, I kind of had a new burst of life and new burst of energy when I first started playing football. It just kind of gave me, like, an outlet. I didn't want him to play football at all. But he begged me and, you know, he was just so cute with his little chubby cheeks. I was already nervous because, you know, Grandpa had total totes, all these lies, telling him I was super fast, had hands like Jerry Rice, all these things. We'd go out there and we'd do the drill and I'd get ran over. I literally was sitting there with my stomach. I already knew in my mind I wasn't coming back. And now I got to go home after my mom finally let me play. And I got to tell you that... I suck. You know, like, it was one of the hardest things I had did at that time. And I told you that which is for you shall not pass you by. And that which passes you by is not for you. At the time, I told you that because I didn't want to crush your dreams or I knew you wanted to play football. Because what's the odds of my child being the one that makes it? When I talk in general, speak in general, the trials of life or just wisdom throughout life, I always bring up that quote, I always bring you up. My eighth grade is when I first signed up and I asked when I had quit. But I kind of just made a commitment to myself at that point that I would just train as hard as I can, look up all these little videos, work out stuff that I can do. I remember like putting all my books from school, putting them in my book bag, running around the block, drawing little ladder drills in the dirt, doing ladder drills, like sprints, everything. I would make my two little brothers do the same stuff with me for that whole next year and name my 10th grade year. I play football in here. Remember Abdullah had decided he wanted to go live with grandma and I remember asking you like, you know, do you want to go live with grandma too? Because it would be a lot easier. You wouldn't have to worry about, you know, there's always a bunch of food at grandma's house and you know, I would, it would be, it would be a relief for me because it's one less mouth to feed and worry about, you know. And you're like, no, I'm going to stay with you and I'm going to look after my brothers. I know even people ask me about that. Like, how was it taking care of your little brother? Da, da, da, da. And it's like, I kind of always had to take care of them. You know, my mom, I remember telling me like, you didn't have to do this. You can go. Like, why would you stay? It's a better life for you there. And that's what I thought. I said, well, if I leave, who's going to help them? You know, it's just like, don't worry about that. It's not your job. And I was like, you know, it's not my job and who isn't going to do it? Wow. Like, I don't want them to go through the same cycle that I just went through. You've been doing that your whole life. You've been stepping up and doing stuff that I never asked you to do. I don't know. I mean, I don't know how I was able to think like that. I don't know. I just feel like I always had a big heart. So you go and think about, like, once the fire happened, like, my life, I didn't have a fire. And then now I just started. Everything went downhill. Like, it was already not great. Exactly. And that just made it worse. My life was already crazy. And a crapper. Yeah. So I'm about to take you guys to my grandma's house right now. I haven't been here in a long time. And it wasn't until I opened my eyes and I just saw red. Like, I just saw red. What the hell? The house is about to burn down. Everything is catching on fire. It was still just a roof over my head. There was no water. Electricity would be out at the time. And we slept on the floor. I remember I was wearing some friggin' slides, the same slides that I put over there on the wall. Right. And then some boxers and a t-shirt. And when I pulled up, and I remember, I was just grateful that you guys were all alive. And once we became homeless, that was just... That was literally like the ice on the cake. That was the ice on the cake. Turn everything. We went to the hotel, the extended stay hotel. Every paycheck was just enough to cover our weekly rent. So we didn't have money. Because remember, Mimi was buying us bus passes. Sometimes I'm like, a lot of people get the money for the bus. But I'll be so hungry I want to eat something. I'll just spend the money and I literally will walk from Hillsborough all the way down. Probably the longest walk in my life. It's like a three-hour walk. But I'd rather just walk three hours because of my mind. At least I got to get this little meal. I got many else. It's like some of the craziest time I feel like. I told him that probably what was going on. This is one of the fellows up on the bulletin board. You might want to go in there and take a liberty. Got some other NFL guys up there. You see that one? He signed that for us. Very proud of this guy right here. Make yourself at home, man. You got to shoot whatever you need to shoot. There's a guy that found him right there. In the way roads. That whole fall of 10th grade year, I played literally. And then throughout that time, my 9th grade and my 10th grade year, my grades were so bad. So I was like working my way to get my grades back good. And I finally had like a 2.0 on the dot to be able to play spring football. So that's when I go to this weight room. Oh, he blamed me. He put in the blame on you already. He signed a new contract and saw you something else. Oh, this is true. I found him. I was in there doing drugs. And I saw somebody dip their head around the corner. And he was like, I kind of want to play football. I don't know who to talk to. I said, well, I think he found the right person. It was when my son, who's my defensive coordinator, said I found this kid in the weight room at P.E. And he wants to come out. He's never played before. I said, I don't see him. I used to think of these home every single day for practice and the games. After every time we lost, he'd just beside himself in the truck, in my old Chevy truck. He wouldn't want to get out and be crying. He's trying to do the right thing. He's trying to leave the rest of the board. He'll be straight, bro. And then the common denominator of all those kids that we had, they were all honor students. You know, after he's got on the right track and he was an honor student all the way through college. I used to bust his ass because I knew I saw it. You know what I mean? I saw he had it in him. You know what I'm saying? One thing about it. They were dedicated, committed, tough, emotional and they were great, greatly dependable, you know, and that's why they're where they're at. Now I'm a Tennessee Taken fan. You're not gonna, you're not taking me hard, but you're gonna be amazing, man. Your pain is about to be the hardest one possible. The rockiest, bumpiest, your tires gonna fall. You might have four flat tires dragging the car and your back through the finish line. For sure. That's how I feel mine is too. For sure. And that's the thing. It's like, you know, you always told me we don't come from kings and queens, but we come from warriors and survivors. So it's like, I truly believe that that's what I am. And that's who you are. When I see you, when I think of you, I think of a warrior, I think of a survivor. I would tell you all the time, like, if I played football, if I did this, it's gonna be our way out. Being able to play Friday nights, like, at that age, like there was nothing else at that age that you wanted to do. Man, was he a hitter? He did everything 100 miles an hour. Being on that field, it was the equalizer for me. That was the one place where nobody judged you for anything other than what you did. I knew that I could make it. I'm breaking barriers. Generational curses. If I want to break through these things that never been achieved, then I have to be willing to be met with some resistance. You know, I never opened up about being homeless. FAU was the first school I opened up to about that. When I got my first scholarship offer, that's when I was like, okay, now, like, this is starting to fall in the way that I want. Upon calling Victus, and my grandfather used to always tell me, the things that always stuck with me was the last two lines. I'm the master of my fate. I'm the captain of my soul. You got to guide your life in the direction you want. But the reality of it is, is you knew that if you didn't make it in this, it was going to be hard for you to do anything else.