Darius Robinson’s life-changing impact on and off the field

DETROIT, Mich. 一 Two days before one of the biggest days of their lives, Valori Robinson and Gwendolyn Lawson sit in the living room of Lawson's two-story home and reflect on the 22-year journey they’ve taken to get here.

On this Tuesday evening, the mother and daughter are wearing matching black outfits with the only semblance of color coming from the blue, white and red “NFL Draft 2024 DETROIT” logo on their shirts.

The cream-colored carpet and walls combined with a chandelier in the middle of the room, a lamp to the left of Robinson and the smiles on their faces brighten the room and bring energy to what is otherwise a gloomy day.

Robinson sits on a cream-colored couch while Lawson sits on a teal loveseat and the two gleefully swap stories about Robinson’s son and Lawson’s grandson, Darius Robinson, a potential first-round pick in this week’s NFL Draft.

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In front of Valori is an oval glass coffee table with a framed picture of Darius donning his red Canton High School football gear, which is in between two programs: one from the 2018 Canton Chiefs football team and the other from the 2012 Westland Comets Youth Football season.

Directly in front of the coffee table is a fireplace draped in Darius’ memorabilia.

On the foot of the fireplace are his old Canton helmet, shoes and a duffle bag full of other football items he collected in his pre-Missouri football career.

Above the fireplace to the left, is a picture of him as a Southfield Jayhawk football player when he was seven. In the center, is a team photo of him during his junior year at Canton and to the right is a poster of Darius from his senior year.

The common theme in all of the pictures? Darius' ear to ear smile.

It's that expression that's been therapeutic for his mother and especially his grandmother for the last two decades.

The 85-year-old Lawson retired in 2000, a year before Darius was born, but not too long after that her husband’s health began to decline and he was making frequent trips in and out of the hospital before his passing in 2005.

With the free time on her hands from retirement and the loneliness she experienced as a widow, hanging out with the young and energetic Darius was a big reason why she kept living life happily.

“It was a great thing for me to be able to keep up with Darius because that helped me get through the time of (my husband's) death,” Lawson said. “So, that worked out well. It kept me active and happy because he was always so happy. There were no sad looks at all. Just trying to get him to the field where he can get started 一 he was so excited and it made me excited.”

The trio were and are still very close, and that’s kind of how it had to be.

Darius’ older brother Reggie is 22 years his senior. Meaning Darius was more or less an only child. That’s partially why his mother got him into sports. Most importantly, it made him happy, but it allowed him to be around kids his age.

“It’s my responsibility and it was important to expose Darius to education, sports and whatever is available,” Valori said reflectively. “It was very important that I do all of that so that he would grow up to be a responsible individual.”

“I remember the happiness and the joy he had,” Lawson added happily. "There were so many good things that came out of his interaction with other children. Even though he was younger than most of them, they treated him with a lot of respect. And Darius felt that. He felt happiest when he was headed to the field. When he knew that was where he was going to be, he was content.”

Darius played soccer, baseball, football and basketball growing up. The three of them were always on the run trying to make sure he attended all sporting events.

To make things work, Valori would work a flex shift at her Blue Cross/Blue Shield job that allowed her to work from 7 a.m. to 3:10 p.m. so they could make the 4:30 p.m. practices or games. Other times it would be Lawson taking Darius out for a meal in Westland until Valori could make the trek from Southfield 25 minutes away and take him to wherever he needed to be.

The possibility of having an NFL player on their hands was never a thought to them. It was just something they did to ensure the smile on his face was always there, and another opportunity to hang with him.

This carried on through high school and even when Darius went to Missouri. They were at most Mizzou home games during his career. As much joy as they got out of being with Darius, he got just as much out of them being there.

“It makes me feel good that I can be there for my family and just be myself and be the person that they raised each and every day,” Darius said during a quick interview amidst the pre-draft activities for the prospects who have been invited to the event this week. “I’m really excited and thankful to make more memories with my family. Like this draft.

“You’ve always got to say thank you and show appreciation for supporting me and anything that I can do to help them out I’m going to do.”

Darius stuck with most of those sports through middle school and played basketball through his sophomore year of high school at Canton Prep. However, he transferred to Canton High School after his sophomore year.

Canton Prep didn’t have a football team, so his only experience was playing in a youth league with the Westland Comets, which didn’t allow players to weight train. He had stopped playing with the Comets sometime in eighth grade, meaning he didn’t play football during his first two years in high school.

That was around the time Valori decided to talk with Darius about joining the military after high school if he didn’t get a scholarship.

“I just had a conversation with him," she remembered. "I said, ‘Well if you don't get into college or something, you’ve got to think about what you want to do next. So, you may have to go to the military,."

Darius’ family had a big military background. So, it was a more than logical suggestion. Reggie was in the Navy, Darius’ aunt was in the Army and his dad was in the Marines. In an alternate universe, if he did go to the military, he thinks he would’ve attacked it as seriously as he attacked football.

The suggestion didn’t bother him but, it certainly pushed him to earn a scholarship.

“It motivated me and that’s when I started playing football again and realized that was a good way to earn a scholarship and give me an opportunity to be successful,” Darius said.

It wasn’t easy. Darius was behind the curve since he hadn’t played real football. So when in an incredibly raw Darius joined the Canton Chiefs football team the summer entering his junior year, it was a wake-up call for him.

“When he first showed up, he had this frame and this body but it was very difficult because it wasn't a place where, ‘Hey, we can develop you in a spot,’” Andy LaFata, his former head football coach at Canton, said. “We have four or five guys who started (still) playing. Guys who started the year before, guys who played. So, I'd say his first time playing football was probably a real eye-opener that, ‘I don't know if I'm cut out for this. I don't know if this is the right path. Basketball was easy and fun. Now, I'm here and they expect me to do all these things because I have the size but I'm still learning stances, techniques and all the different lingo that comes with it.’”

However, a couple of months after his junior season ended Robinson got his first college offer. By the time he got to the summer, he had amassed at least 15 more.

Before LaFata’s stint as head coach of the Chiefs (2018-22) he was an assistant on the team from 2008-17 under Michigan High School Hall of Fame coach Tim Baechler, who led the Chiefs for 20 seasons. During his tenure, the Chiefs were 172-53 and a perennial state title contender.

When it was time for the then-30-year-old LaFata to be Baechler’s heir apparent, he was a nervous wreck.

Who was the person to calm his nerves? A 17-year-old Darius Robinson.

“I'm taking over this program that’s had a bunch of success and I'm going, ‘I'm not in the building (he didn’t have a teaching job at the school at the time). I have no idea how our workouts are going,’" LaFata said. "I'm scared to death that the wheels are going to fall off in year one. And he was just like, ‘It's not going to happen, coach, I've got this.’

“I'm like, ‘I don't know how much I believe a 17-year-old telling me that they're going to run this stuff, but I had a few assistants who could pop in and be there and they're like, ‘Wait 'til you see it. Never seen anything like it. Wait until you see it. Wait, until you see Darius.’ He's like, ‘They just follow him. They follow him and he makes sure he's accountable. Everyone's there. Everyone has to do it the right way.' So it was a blessing for me for sure. So, I owe him a bunch for that 一 for being that guy.”

LaFata was hesitant of Darius’ proclamation because he was coming off an okay, but not great, junior season. In all honesty, LaFata and his staff were just hoping he’d be more of a contributor in his senior season.

LaFata's fears dissipated within two weeks. By the second game of Darius’ senior season, he had made a play that would forever stick in the coach’s mind.

Darius had been listed as a tight end but was primarily just starting on the defensive line. He had been asking the coaching staff for a while to let him get a play in at tight end and after being reluctant for a while they finally let him get a snap in, hoping the play would be a learning moment they could put on tape and show him.

It was a learning moment 一 but not for Robinson.

(Skip to 30 seconds to see the play.)

“So, the movie The Blind Side, where Michael Oher blocks that kid out of it. Darius did that,” LaFata said. “Before the play, he's like, ‘Who do I block?’ I said, 'Just block the guy in front of you. We're running behind you. Block the guy in front of you.' Takes him out of the back of the end zone. And I look like, ‘Well, I guess we're pretty stupid for not playing him.’ Like, yeah, we probably should play the 6-foot-4 kid here. And from that moment on, he was a two-way player.”

Darius saw it as a way to stop the comparisons between him and the opposing team’s defensive end.

“It used to make me mad because he’d be comparing me to the other dude (on the opposing team),” Darius said with a sheepish grin. “So, I said, ‘Don’t worry I’ll just play offense and block him.’ I just drove him and drove him like 20 yards down the field.”

True to his word, Robinson helped keep Canton above water. The Chiefs didn’t go 10-2 and win a playoff game like they did the year before. They were 6-4 with an appearance in the state playoffs. But LaFata doesn’t take that record lightly. He knows the season would’ve been a lot tougher without Robinson and he credits some of his success during his five-year stint as head coach to the future Missouri Tiger.

"If it wasn't for Darius Robinson, I don't know what that first season would've looked like," LaFata said. "Brand new and 30 years old. (You) think you have all the answers but really you realize you're clueless, but you had a leader like that to kind of help you out and guide you. And I was forever grateful for that."

Valori and Lawson could talk endlessly about the trips they'd take with Darius to get to different events, camps and later colleges when he was being recruited.

However, they were more excited talking about the person they raised.

They chuckled and reminisced about when Lawson first taught a five-year-old Darius about holding the door for people, especially his elders. The dedication that has him on the doorstep of being drafted into the NFL was the same level of commitment he had for helping others.

"I thought he would never leave that door. He'd stand there all day and it was so cute," Lawson said adoringly. "He was so proud that he was letting these elderly people in. He still does it. I'm just grateful for the fun we had together. It was so helpful for me."

It wasn’t always good. Sometimes, Darius was too nice. Valori had to tell him that as much as he liked helping others and sharing, some things were meant just for him.

"I had to get on him one day," she exclaimed. "We had a (Detroit) Lions book that we got and he thought it was okay to give it to that kid (their neighbor) and I said, 'No, that's yours. You got that. So, you go back and get it back.''"

He's always been that type of person and he only treated people better with age.

“To me, my grandma made it a game almost to see how fast I could open the door,” Darius said. “But just be kind and grateful because you don’t know what people are going through every day."

LaFata credits Robinson with helping rehabilitate the team's long-standing buddy system, which paired senior football players with freshman football players to help acclimate the latter to high school. The system usually started well, but over time, seniors would do what you expect high school seniors to do and act out a bit. But when Robinson got his chance as a senior mentor, he bucked the trend and helped turn the system around.

“With Darius it was different,” LaFata said. “Darius would take these kids and actually would help them, mentor them and teach them about like, ‘Hey, here's what you need to do. Here's what you want to do.’ And his group was the first one that really got rid of, ‘We're seniors, they're freshmen, we're going to treat you like freshmen. Hey, you have to be in this part of the locker room. Don’t touch this. Don’t touch that.’

“So, he’s really open to that and the incoming freshmen when they graduated as seniors 一 they would always bring that up, that Darius was one of the guys who introduced them to high school and in the hallway would give them a fist pound. That was one of our things you fist-pound kids in the hallway that you see. When they first saw him they were like, ‘Oh my gosh.’ They're intimidated. Who is this big kid? But he was the one that would always go down there and give them pounds before the games and wish them good luck and things like that.”

Even after Robinson went to Mizzou, he was the same stand-up guy LaFata met in 2017. He'd give speeches to the team before their games when the Tigers were on a bye or whenever he was on break from school he'd participate in Canton's workouts like he did when he was a Chief.

So, it didn't surprise Valori, Lawson or LaFata when the two-time Missouri team captain held a back-to-school drive at his church in Columbia last August to donate backpacks with school supplies using his own NIL money.

They believe he's just as good of a person, if not better, than he is a football player. That’s saying something for a player a lot of draft analysts expect to be a first-round pick on Thursday night.

So when LaFata meets up with some of his former assistant coaches to watch the draft this week, he hopes to see Robinson be the second player from Canton to get drafted (Devin Thomas in the second round of the 2010 draft) and the first to go in the first round.

“To see a player possibly be able to get drafted and walk across the stage and all that, as a coach, it's about as good as you can get," LaFata said. "It wasn't just based on his pure raw talent. Yeah, he's always been the best. But it was 100% his work ethic and the kind of person that he is.”

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