By Matt Moscona
Kentucky quarterback Maxwell Smith never saw it coming.
“He’s gonna be hit and the ball is knocked loose,” exclaimed LSU radio play-by-play announced Jim Hawthorne. “It is at the 23-yard-line. Picked up. Ten–you want me to tell you who it is?”
“No,” said color analyst Doug Moreau. “We already know.”
“Tyrann Mathieu!” exclaimed Hawthorne as the Honey Badger strolled into the endzone.
That moment and call is the embodiment of Mathieu’s career.
There are many different ways to define greatness in sports. Some count championships, statistics or awards. I have come to define greatness as making the extraordinary seem ordinary.
No player that I’ve covered in any sport made greatness a seemingly more effortless pursuit than Mathieu.
The Honey Badger announced his retirement from the NFL Tuesday, ending one of the most spectacular and improbable careers any of us have ever seen.
It wasn’t only the remarkable plays that earned Mathieu his legend. But, oh, were there remarkable plays.
The improbable interceptions against Texas A&M.
The strip-scoop-score against Oregon.
The game-changing punt returns against Arkansas and Georgia.
He was a First Team Freshman All-American in 2010, leading the SEC in forced fumbles and earning Cotton Bowl Defensive Most Outstanding Player honors.
Mathieu’s sophomore season was the greatest individual season for an LSU defender in program history. Among his accolades:
- Heisman Trophy Finalist
- Unanimous All American
- Bednarik Award Recipient
- SEC Defensive Player of the Year
- National Defensive Player of the Year
He was a predictable highlight reel of unimaginable madness.
The improbable nature of Mathieu’s rise, fall and comeback make his story even more legendary.
Five-foot-9, 170-pound defensive backs don’t usually wreck college football. Mathieu did. My goodness, what could the Honey Badger have commanded in the NIL era?
As improbable as his meteoric rise, so too was his fall. Mathieu was dismissed prior to the 2012 season for violation of team rules. Instead of seeking another course, he tried to earn his way back into Les Miles’s good graces. Alas, it wasn’t to be as an offseason arrest ended any hope of a reunion.
Still, how many athletes dismissed from a team continue to foster a relationship with that program? Are there any?
With the help of mentor Patrick Peterson and his family, Mathieu found a path to recovery and, eventually, the NFL.
There, he continued to defy the odds.
The Arizona Cardinals took a chance, selecting Mathieu in the third round of the 2013 NFL Draft. Over his dozen years in the league, Mathieu earned three First Team All-Pro selections, was named to the 2010s All-Decade Team and won Super Bowl LIV with the Kansas City Chiefs.
We shouldn’t be surprised by his success, but Mathieu is greatness personified: he makes the extraordinary seem ordinary.
His diminutive stature was a minor hurdle Mathieu had to clear considering his upbringing. His biological father was incarcerated for murder. His mother was absent. Eventually, he was adopted by his aunt and uncle.
Tyrann Mathieu wasn’t supposed to make it out of New Orleans.
Not only did he make it out, but he came back to make it better. In 2022, Mathieu signed as a free agent with his hometown New Orleans Saints, returning to the city that raised him in an effort to make it better for the next generation of kids like him.
Mathieu’s retirement was sudden and unexpected. Perhaps we should have known it would be this way.
After all, Mathieu is the personification of greatness: making the extraordinary seem ordinary.
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