Kansas City Chiefs: Column
When the Chiefs drafted Laurent Duvernay-Tardif as an offensive-line project in 2014, then-general manager John Dorsey understatedly called him a very interesting fella.
It wasnt just that Duvernay-Tardif played the violin and twice had been on approximately yearlong educational sailing trips with his family to open his mind to different cultures and ways of living, and that he was a rare Canadian NFL prospect.
It was that he was in his third year of medical school at McGill University … and determined to keep going from where he was, which on the day the NFL draft began meant he was amid a rotation in a neo-natal intensive-care unit.
So while family and friends and media were waiting for him in his Montreal apartment that day, he was detained for an emergency C-section with premature twins.
Theres protocol, you have to look for any meconium aspiration, you have to suction … so you end up doing a lot, he explained upon his arrival in Kansas City as the Chiefs sixth-round pick.
Words surely never before uttered by an NFL draft pick.
Immersed as he was, his intention to simultaneously continue pursuing his doctorate in medicine and the enormous physical and mental challenges of NFL line play _ especially with his raw roots in the game _ seemed daunting, if not downright preposterous.
Early on in all this, he said, Right now, I have the feeling that Im studying more (football) than Ive ever studied for medicine.
So his graduation earlier this week, coupled with his development as an offensive-line fixture for the Chiefs, was momentous and cause for celebration from Canada to Kansas City.
Congratulations Laurent! An incredible achievement that makes us proud, Justin Trudeau, the prime minister of Canada, wrote on Twitter.
This man is a treasure doing unprecedented stuff, and heres hoping the NFL is smart enough to relent on policy and allow the first of its active players to earn an M.D. to have that adorned to his name on his jersey.
Were working on it, he said.
Whatever is to come of that, LDT radiated a certain joy about the achievement as he spoke Thursday after a Chiefs offseason workout.
Its been a great journey for the last four years, he said, smiling, while conceding he was glad it was over.
In this time of celebration, maybe its easy to overlook how grueling and complicated it was to make this happen.
