Manti Malietau Louis Te’o is an American football linebacker who is a free agent. Check his Draft | Notre dame | Heisman in this article.
Manti Te’o : Draft | Hoax | Notre dame | Heisman
Te’o decided to return to Notre Dame after the 2011 season despite being projected a late first-round pick for the 2012 NFL Draft as early as mid-season of 2011.
| Personal information | |
|---|---|
| Born: | January 26, 1991 Laie, Hawaii |
| Height: | 6 ft 1 in (1.85 m) |
| Weight: | 241 lb (109 kg) |
| Career information | |
| High school: | Punahou School (Honolulu, Hawaii) |
| College: | Notre Dame |
| Position: | Linebacker |
| NFL Draft: | 2013 / Round: 2 / Pick: 38 |
In preseason mock drafts from May 2012, Te’o was listed as a late first-rounder for the 2013 NFL Draft as well. By mid-season, he had moved up to the mid-first round.
Notre Dame has not seen one of their linebackers selected in the first round since Bob Crable in 1982.
At the conclusion of the 2012 college football season, Te’o signed with agent Tom Condon.
He was training at the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida, in preparation for the NFL Draft.
Manti Te’o draft
Manti Te’o was not selected in the first round of the 2013 NFL draft Thursday night.
Fresh off a sterling season at Notre Dame, Te’o was generally considered a late first rounder, the only question being which team would scoop him up.
But a host of red flags, both on and off the field, combined to drag him down and out of round one.
The most memorable strike against Te’o is the fake girlfriend story that unraveled earlier this year.
As you may recall, Te’o said throughout the season that he was playing with a heavy heart because his girlfriend, a Stanford student named Lennay Kekua, had died in September.
Te’o’s perseverance in the face of adversity was one of the most inspirational storylines of the college football season.
Hoax
According to a new two-part documentary about Te’o’s ordeal, however, premiering this Tuesday on Netflix, the scandal needs to be understood as more than the simple tale of catfishing as which it’s often presented.
As it’s framed in The Girlfriend Who Didn’t Exist, the romantic hoax at the heart of Te’o’s national humiliation was about much deeper and more interesting questions of identity, faith and belonging – for minorities in particular – in early 21st century America.
Almost a decade after the story became meme-fodder, the basic outline of the Te’o scandal is still fairly common knowledge: Te’o, a star Samoan-Hawaiian linebacker at Notre Dame, claimed that his grandmother and girlfriend had died on the same day in December 2012.
An outpouring of national sympathy fired Te’o to new heights of excellence on the field, Notre Dame finished the regular season undefeated, and Te’o seemed destined to become a first-round pick in the 2013 NFL draft.
There was only one problem, though, and in January 2013 that problem became international news: Te’o’s girlfriend, Lennay Kekua, was not real.
In fact, Kekua, who purported to be a student at Stanford and with whom Te’o had pursued a purely online relationship, was the Facebook creation of a young man – also, like Te’o, of Samoan ancestry – from Seattle.
Manti Te’o Notre Dame
Te’o, a Heisman Trophy candidate and star linebacker for Notre Dame, became the center of a media firestorm in 2013 when it was revealed that his girlfriend, Lennay Kekua — who had purportedly died of leukemia — did not really exist and was actually the social media creation of Naya Tuiasosopo, who has since come out as a trans woman.
Nearly a decade after the bizarre incident that upended Te’o’s career, Te’o opens up about it all in the intimate two-part Netflix documentary.
In “Untold,” Te’o walks viewers through his online relationship with Kekua, sharing how it started and evolved over time.
He states that he was relatively unaware of the dangers of the internet at the time — although he does indicate that other friends and family confirmed Kekua’s existence to him through their own online interactions.
Heisman
There’s no denying that Notre Dame senior linebacker Manti Te’o has been one of the most dominant players in college football this season.
He led the Fighting Irish to an undefeated regular season and helped them clinch a spot in the BCS National Championship Game.
However, there comes a point where Te’o’s Heisman Trophy case falls short.
Sure, he has 42 more tackles than the next leading Notre Dame defender this season. Yes, I know Te’o has three more picks than the next leading linebacker in the nation.
But if Te’o supporters have any argument at all, it’s that their man is the most valuable player in college football, not the most outstanding.
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