Bobby Okereke: The Mindset Behind NFL Success

Unblinded with Sean Callagy - Sean Callagy

In this episode of 'Unblinded with Sean Callagy,' NFL linebacker Bobby Okereke shares his journey from a disciplined upbringing in Orange County, California, to becoming a New York

Key takeaways

• Discipline and consistency are essential for long-term success; Okereke emphasizes choosing the pain of discipline over regret.
• Football served as an outlet for creativity and physical expression that was previously unfulfilled in his structured upbringing.

Main topics

• The impact of a disciplined upbringing on athletic success
• Transitioning from non-football background to NFL stardom

Notable quotes

"Football was the first time that I was able to be as creative, as violent, as sporadic as I wanted to be. And I was really, you know, celebrated for it."

"We all suffer one of two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret and disappointment."

Conclusion

Bobby Okereke's story exemplifies how discipline, resilience, and purpose-driven mindset transform challenges into

Transcript preview

Speaker 2 (0:00) My parents were very strict growing up. Education was number one. If you got a bad grade, which is probably a C or less, you're not going out on the weekend. I Speaker 3 (0:06) didn't tell my Speaker 2 (0:07) parents too much about really playing freshman, junior, sophomore, junior year. Speaker 3 (0:12) Bob, you're an Eagle Scout. Speaker 2 (0:14) It'd be funny. My parents would be at the grocery store. My mom's like, people would come to my mom and be like, wow, your son had such a great game. And she's like, he had a game yesterday? When did he play? I think my parents got on board when I got my first scholarship when I was a junior in high school. And I told my mom I got an offer. And she was like, what's that? I said, it's a scholarship. She said, oh, how much? I said, oh, it's a full ride. Oh, I think we like Speaker 1 (0:34) this football thing. And Speaker 2 (0:37) football was the first time that I was able to be as creative, as violent, as sporadic as I wanted to be. And I was really, you know, celebrated for it. So I leaned into that. I really had to get internal and kind of... build like a almost a little force field around me and just feed myself positivities feed myself conviction and not listen to anybody sometimes you gotta you gotta decide what's best for you and and go across the grains you know you're a good player you do everything right you've made a lot of plays but to me right now it looks like you have your foot in the door and The onus is on you. If you really want to reach your potential, you got to kick the door in. We all suffer one of two pains, the pain of discipline or the pain of regret and disappointment. I can't be my greatest self if you're not your greatest self and you don't bring that every day and force me to compete. And if you're not trying to be better than me, then I'm not going to be my best self because iron sharpens iron. You got to keep the main thing, the main thing. And we're here talking about off the field stuff. We're talking about finance. We're talking about business. But for me, football is my engine. Football is the engine that makes everything go. That brings me all the opportunities that I want, brings me all the leverage in negotiation. So the better I play and the better player I am, the bigger the impact I can have. Speaker 3 (1:54) To our feet, please. And let's give a warm, unblinded welcome to Bobby Okereke of the NFL New York Giant Captain, Walter Payne Award nominee. Let's hear it for Bobby. Speaker 3 (2:10) Hello sir, how are you? Please, how are you? Let's hear it for Bobby! Speaker 3 (2:16) Okay, so first we're going to start doing some tackling drills right here up front. Okay, yeah, yes. So, Bobby, thank you so much for being here. Thank you for having me. Yeah, really appreciate it. And one of Speaker 2 (2:27) the Speaker 3 (2:27) first things I said is like, wow, like coming from the state of New Jersey, you sound much more articulate than the average person from New Jersey. And he laughed, and he's from Orange County, California. I'm like, why is everybody coming from California just... speak so masterfully. So this is something I will try to figure out because I have, I think, yet to meet anybody from California that isn't like a just net better communicator than anybody I find anywhere else. So see if you do not find the same with this incredible man. So Bobby, again, I thank you so much for being here for sure. Speaker 2 (3:00) Yes, sir. Speaker 3 (3:00) And so if we could, you know, take you back in time. Where were you born? Speaker 2 (3:07) I was born in Orange County. California. Speaker 3 (3:09) And what part of Orange County? Speaker 2 (3:12) Born in Tustin, Irvine area. Cool. Awesome. Speaker 3 (3:15) And your folks are from? Speaker 2 (3:17) My parents are from Nigeria. Speaker 3 (3:19) Nice. And so as we're chatting about it, you're sharing that education was foundational for them. Tell me a little bit about, please, your grown-up years. Speaker 2 (3:26) Yeah. My parents were very strict growing up. Education was number one. If you got a bad grade, which is probably a C or less, you're not going out on the weekend. Had a curfew all through high school. Wasn't allowed to hang out. Sleepovers, that whole thing. Let's hear it for that. Speaker 3 (3:46) Seriously, love it. That's awesome. And then what were you, what did you do before high school? So like up to like 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th grade, academics is there. What did you do for fun? Speaker 2 (3:59) Yep. I played baseball. I loved that. I played soccer. I was in choir. I was in my high school and middle school choir. I got a deep voice. I'm a bass. And then I was a Boy Scout. I was in the Boy Scouts for America for about nine years. An Speaker 3 (4:16) Eagle Scout. Yeah, let's hear that. And just for those that don't know, that is an incredible accomplishment. Eagle Scout. Can you give us a little context on that? We talk about here, clearly you're a humble man. but not minimizing what we do. Like an Eagle Scout is a really rare accomplishment, is it not? Speaker 2 (4:38) 100%. My mom put me in it definitely just to kind of get like a youth development program for me as a kid, as a young man growing up. And it teaches you a lot of values. It teaches you team building. Like you have patrols. I was a senior patrol leader, assistant senior patrol leader. And obviously outdoor skills. I have probably over 40, 50 nights outside camping. Speaker 2 (5:02) Built a lot of structures with ropes and knots and stayed in tents and cooked on stoves. So I had my time outside. Speaker 3 (5:09) And how old were you when you became an Eagle Scout? Speaker 2 (5:11) I was 17. Speaker 3 (5:13) Wow. That's a heck of a journey. How old were you when you started? Speaker 2 (5:17) I started when I was maybe seven. I think I started Cub Scouts when I was seven years old. Wow. Speaker 3 (5:22) So like a 10-year period. Yeah. Wow. That is absolutely awesome. And so you get to high school and you had... Am I correct, you hadn't played football before? Speaker 2 (5:32) Yeah, played football for the first time in high school. Yeah, and Speaker 3 (5:35) so why the transition into football? Why not football before high school, and why football in high school? Speaker 2 (5:42) Yeah, understandably, my parents were definitely a little nervous about the sport. I think my mom told me I could try out if I chose to be a kicker. Speaker 2 (5:52) Definitely didn't stick with that position. So a long Speaker 3 (5:54) way from kicker to starting linebacker, defensive captain in the NFL, right? That is wild. So how did you pivot? How did mom decide that it was okay to not let you only be a kicker? Speaker 2 (6:08) You know, I didn't tell my parents too much about really playing freshman, junior, sophomore, junior year. Speaker 3 (6:16) Bob, you're an Eagles now. Speaker 2 (6:18) It'd be funny, my parents would be at the grocery store, my mom's like, people would come to my mom and be like, wow, your son had such a great game, and she's like, he had a game yesterday? When did he play? But I think my parents got on board when I got my first scholarship when I was a junior in high school. And who was that from? University of Washington. Speaker 3 (6:36) And Speaker 2 (6:37) I told my mom I got an offer, and she was like, what's that? I said, it's a scholarship. She said, oh, how much? I said, oh, it's a full ride. Oh, I think we like this football thing now. Speaker 3 (6:50) And you played a few different positions in high school, correct? Speaker 2 (6:52) Yep. Yeah, started out defensive end, transitioned to tight end, wide receiver, and then ended up playing a little wildcat quarterback. Speaker 3 (7:00) Yeah, and I'll only say this for folks that have a little context for this. I asked Bobby what his 40 time was. He's 240 pounds, and what's Speaker 2 (7:08) your Speaker 3 (7:08) 40 time? Speaker 2 (7:09) 4'5". Yeah. Speaker 3 (7:10) So, like... 4'5", let's go back to 1978 or something. If you're running a 4'5", you're a running back in the NFL, and nobody was 240. So it's just unbelievable to be running a 4'5", and be 240 pounds. That's completely crazy. Although Bobby was impressed by Mike Vesuvio's bench press, were you not? Yes, Speaker 2 (7:32) sir. He's a beast. Look at him. Speaker 3 (7:35) Yes, so... Speaker 3 (7:38) High school moves along, and how did you like high school? How were your coaches in high school? Did you have great coaches, good coaches? What was the high school coaching world like for you in football? Speaker 2 (7:51) Yeah, I had great coaches. Dan Schell was my freshman football coach. Doug Case was the varsity football coach. And for me as a young kid, I didn't watch too much football growing up, didn't have too much exposure. They really... kind of submerged me into the game from a psychological standpoint, from a love of the game, understanding scheme. That's definitely where my passion grew. And Speaker 3 (8:13) how about psychology? Like what was it psychologically they were bringing forward? Because soccer, certainly is physical contact, you know, baseball less, but football is a whole different animal. Like how did they, how did you come to master the psychology of football and how did it begin with your coaches in high school? Speaker 2 (8:32) Yeah. It was really a whole other world for me. I have three sisters. So growing up in a household with three sisters, playing soccer, playing baseball, it wasn't the most aggressive kind of physical upbringing. But once I started playing football, it was this whole other outlet that I really just fell in love with. Speaker 3 (8:53) Awesome. And what did you like about it? For folks out there, because this is where I'd love to go, the intensity of physical contact, person against person, tackling drills. Do you remember back to your first tackling drill in football? Did you just immediately take to it? How did asserting yourself physically, it was just natural? Was it developed? What was that like? Speaker 2 (9:19) Yeah, it was instinctual. For sure. Obviously, that competition, there's nothing like one-on-one, just physical competition with another person. But I feel like for me, my upbringing has always been so structured, and football was the first time that I was able to be as creative, as violent, as sporadic as I wanted to be, and I was really, you know, celebrated for it. So I leaned into that. Speaker 3 (9:46) How did your high school teams do? Speaker 2 (9:48) We did all right. We went to the semi-championship of our league. But I was the first person to get a D1 scholarship from my school in like the past 30, 20, 20, 30 years. Wow. Speaker 3 (9:59) Let's hear it for that. Speaker 3 (10:03) That's awesome. So you start having these offers roll in, and Washington, like who else were you looking at? I know Stanford obviously comes in, but who else was in that mix? Speaker 2 (10:14) Yeah, Washington, USC, UCLA. Wow. Northwestern, Vanderbilt. My parents were really fun. My dad wanted me to go to Ivy League school, but I told him there was not playing too much serious football in the Ivy Leagues. He's breaking Speaker 3 (10:29) my heart. So for fun, when I went to Columbia, they were in the middle of the, well, they were at the end, had just broken actually, the longest losing streak in the history of college football. Wow. So, and they just won, during my freshman year, they won their first game. I think it was a 45 game losing streak. Fact check, man, the number, it was in the 40s, I believe, what that streak was. So I lived, the captain of the football team was on the baseball team as well. So when they won their first game in like four and a half seasons. the crossbar was in the party lounge in our fraternity. I always say that. We didn't have a big fraternity pledge, like you're on the baseball team, you're in. I always like to make the caveat, I'm not a big fan of pledging and those things, so it wasn't like that. But yes, we did have in the party lounge the crossbar from when they tore down the goalposts, winning their first game in, I think it's 45 games. If I didn't make a fact check, Columbia's record-breaking losing streak. So yes, good thing you didn't go there. Yes, but... Did you ever, Marcellus Wiley, is that a name that you know from? It Speaker 2 (11:36) does. Yeah, Speaker 3 (11:37) he played at Columbia. Yeah. So he was a Columbia guy. He played in Speaker 2 (11:40) the Speaker 3 (11:40) league for a little Speaker 2 (11:40) bit. Speaker 3 (11:40) Yeah, California. So you go to Stanford. What made you choose Stanford? Speaker 2 (11:48) Just the combination of academic and athletic excellence. At the time, you know, they were winning Rose Bowls. Andrew Luck had played there. Kobe Fleener had a long pedigree of guys in the NFL. So really. drew my interest there and obviously it's one of the top academic institutions in the nation. Very, Speaker 3 (12:06) very cool. And I'm a huge Notre Dame guy. So how did you guys do when you're years at Stanford against Notre Dame? Speaker 2 (12:12) I think we traded off. I mean, I was there for five years. I think we played them four times, maybe two and two. Very cool. Maybe fact check me on that. There's a gentleman. Notre Dame fans. There's Speaker 3 (12:23) a gentleman that's in our work here at Unblinded named Ned Bolcar. And he was captain of Notre Dame when they won the national championship in 88. Wow. So long before your time. But he's good friends with Mike Vesuvio as well. So we have, I don't think Ned's here today, but it'd be fun to have a little Notre Dame-Stanford conversation. Because they were, how big was the rivalry with Notre Dame from your guys' perspective? And who was your biggest rival? Yeah, very Speaker 2