There’s Heartbreak Behind Puka Nacua’s Sudden Rise to NFL Stardom

The words replay in Puka Nacua’s head, again and again:

“I … AM … SPEED.

“I … AM … SPEED.

“I … AM … SPEED.”

He borrowed the mantra from Lightning McQueen, the underdog rookie from Cars, and has repeated it to himself before every Los Angeles Rams game this season, convincing himself that he belongs on this NFL stage, despite falling to the fifth round of the draft in part because he ran too slowly in the 40-yard dash. He has other affirmations, ones far more personal, far more meaningful. These mantras help the 22-year-old rookie wide receiver, who has become the breakout star of this NFL season, remember those he has lost, those who remind him of the gift of being alive and the joy of being able to play football for a living.

And during a game against the Indianapolis Colts earlier this month, the manifestation worked. Nacua became speed. In overtime, Nacua sprinted off the line and maneuvered by one defender. No one from the Indianapolis defense picked him up, so he found himself wide open in the middle of the field. He ran and ran, as fast as he could, as quarterback Matthew Stafford found him for the 22-yard walk-off touchdown. It was Nacua’s first NFL touchdown.

It took Nacua a second to register what had happened. Teammates rushed toward him. “I was getting hit in the face. I’m just screaming,” Nacua says a few days later. He saw people running toward the field. Nacua, a little confused by the NFL’s convoluted overtime rules, wondered whether the game was over. But as more and more people congratulated him, it hit him: The game was over.

He turned to the sideline. As his teammates praised him, he began celebrating them. For blocking for him, for being there for him during his rapid rise to NFL stardom. A huge smile washed over his face, one that he couldn’t shake even hours later, on the plane ride back to Los Angeles. At one point, replaying the touchdown in his mind, he thought to himself: Hell yeah.

It really happened. “That’s going to be my story I get to tell my kids,” he says.

It’s just one of many tales about the magical start to Nacua’s rookie season. A fifth-round pick in April’s draft, no. 177, out of BYU, has stepped up in spectacular fashion for the Rams, filling in for superstar receiver Cooper Kupp, who was sidelined for the first four games with a hamstring injury.

Nacua is rewriting the NFL history books, proving to be not just the steal of the draft, but also one of the league’s brightest young stars. He leads the NFL in receptions (46) and is second in receiving yards (572), behind only Tyreek Hill. Nacua holds the record for the most receiving yards by an NFL rookie through five games, and was just the second player in league history with 100-plus receiving yards in three of his first four games.

Nacua’s lack of speed (a 4.57 at his pro day, which was slower than 33 receivers who ran at the NFL combine) and playing time in college (injuries limited him to 32 games during a four-year career) likely hurt his placement on teams’ draft boards. But Rams coach Sean McVay admired Nacua throughout the predraft process. When healthy, Nacua played fast and simply understood how to get open—a critical skill in McVay’s timing-based West Coast offense. That Nacua was unselfish and a willing blocker made him an intriguing fit in the Rams offense, which already had a clear WR1 in Kupp, but had been missing a trustworthy second option since Robert Woods was traded after the 2021 season. Nacua, McVay believed, would be much more than just a guy who could temporarily replace Kupp.

“You can’t measure people’s heart, their desire to play,” says Eric Yarber, the Rams’ wide receivers coach. “I give credit to coach Sean McVay. He had a vision right off the bat. He knew he wanted Puka, and that he would complete his offensive philosophy.

“What you’re seeing is coming to fruition right now,” Yarber says. “The piece that [McVay] thought he was missing was Puka.”

Shortly after scoring his first pro touchdown, Nacua called his mother, Penina, as he does after every game, often right from the locker room. “She was very emotional,” Nacua says. “Just trying to say how proud she was of me. How proud she could imagine my dad would be of us, just making it to this point.”

Nacua’s father, Lionel, died in 2012, two weeks before Puka’s 11th birthday. “It’s been a hard journey,” Nacua says. It still is. Many people within his circle, especially his mother, have helped keep him afloat. He depended on this support not only during his father’s death, but later as his family encountered more loss.

These days, Nacua realizes how similar he is to his father—especially when it comes to his father’s work ethic and mentality: no excuses, just work. Sometimes Nacua can hear his father’s voice. He most remembers waking up as a child to the sound of the garage door opening each morning, as his father headed to his job as an executive at a concrete company on little sleep after shuttling his sons to their various sports practices the night before. Nacua, amid his newfound fame and the expectations that come with it, imagines what his father might say to him now. “One day at a time, I think that would be his saying,” Nacua says.

He was given the name Makea when he was born, but he soon became “Puka,” a nickname bestowed upon him by his Samoan grandmother.

“It’s funny hearing it,” says Kai Nacua, Puka’s older brother, “because people are like, ‘What kind of a name is Puka?’”

Seemingly overnight, Puka has morphed into a first-name-basis star in a city used to LeBron and Kobe. Even Nacua can’t believe all that has happened so quickly. “Dream come true,” he says. “It’s just better and sweeter than anything I could have imagined.” He’s been inundated with interview requests. “It’s still surreal,” Nacua says. “Every day I get to walk in the building, and Matthew Stafford says, ‘What’s up?’ Aaron Donald is saying, ‘What’s up?’ I’m on the same team as those guys. … It still makes me feel like I’m living in a movie.”

In just a few months in the NFL, Nacua has become beloved by his teammates and coaches. He’s known for his warm, goofy personality, and he’s almost always flashing a smile. He’s an infectious ball of energy that never stops moving. “If you want to smile and be happy, go to Puka,” says Kalani Sitake, BYU’s head coach. “He’ll lift your spirits.”

His joy, his enthusiasm are palpable on the field. It’s almost as if he’s playing in a pick-up game rather than on the world’s biggest stage. Having fun has allowed him to play freely, and to rise to the occasion when the Rams needed him in Kupp’s absence. “I am absolutely having an absolute blast out there,” he says.

He’s happiest when a teammate scores, and he once received a penalty for excessive celebration while at BYU when his brother Samson, a receiver on the team, scored a touchdown. Those closest to Nacua describe him as someone who dances to his own beat, who often paints his toenails bright colors and thoughtfully pieces together unique outfits.

But make no mistake: Nacua is not a happy-go-lucky late-round pick just excited to be in the NFL. He knows he still has much to prove, and he yearns to show he belongs in the Rams’ long-term plans. He’s added “best in the world” to his list of mantras, repeating the phrase over and over in hopes of manifesting greatness on the football field. “I try to help that confidence kind of carry me through the day and attack everything as if I am the best in the world,” Nacua says. “I know I’m definitely not there, but I’m trying to achieve that.”

Kupp, who returned to the lineup on Sunday, has not only embraced Nacua but mentored him. When Nacua was drafted, Kupp immediately asked Yarber, the team’s receivers coach, for his number. He wanted to help the rookie in any way he could. Around the Rams facility, whenever you see Kupp, you almost always see Nacua, asking him a question. Kupp is gracious with his time, Nacua says, and is constantly encouraging him and offering advice: how to run this route, how to set up that defensive back. “[He tells me] to take a breath and slow down. I think he noticed early on that I have a lot of fun. I’m excited. But that also gets my internal clock kind of ramped up because I’m always thinking of trying to move fast. Go, just go go go. There’s never a moment of processing.”

Nacua says many of his teammates, as well as his coaches, have helped increase his confidence. They trust him, and they critique him, too, breaking down nuances during practice, correcting his mistakes. Nacua loves it; he’s eager to learn.

“I give the Rams a lot of credit,” Kalani Sitake says. “They gave him a chance and they believed in him, and that’s all he needs. He needs someone to give him a chance. … He’ll take care of the rest.”

He won’t take this moment for granted. Not after all his family has endured. His dad’s words echo in his mind, his heart, and he approaches each day with a similar resolve: to not let anyone outwork him. Many ask him about the hunger he had to prove that he belonged in the NFL, and how he so quickly went from a fifth-rounder to atop the league’s receiving leaderboard. But he prefers a different term than “hunger.” “Love,” he says. “The love I have for the game.”

“My life journey,” he says, “has definitely helped build me for this moment.”

It wasn’t easy for Puka when he was growing up in Las Vegas and Provo, Utah, as the second-youngest of Penina and Lionel’s six sons. He was smaller and skinnier than his older brothers—four of the Nacua boys would play at BYU, and two of Puka’s brothers, Kai and Samson, had brief stints in the NFL—and Puka would often end up at the bottom of the pile when the brothers would roughhouse. He tried to muscle his way out, but oftentimes lay stuck underneath, not yet strong enough to break free. No matter how hard he tried—“Trying to fight them, trying to kill them”—he simply wasn’t strong enough yet.

Puka wouldn’t quit, no matter how much his brothers challenged him, and he eventually chose to play youth football in a division against boys two years older. “He always carried himself with the confidence in knowing he could hang with the big guys,” Kai says. “Every time, he’s always stepped into the challenge, and had the confidence of, ‘Hey, I know I may be smaller, I may be younger,’ but he had the confidence of, ‘I’m that guy. I’m going to go out here and prove it.’”

The brotherly shoves, hits, and dogpiles were temporary. After an afternoon in the sun, he and his brothers would rush to the dinner table. “Going back to loving each other,” Puka says. Love, family, and respect were core values in their household, and in their Polynesian culture. Nacua’s mother, Penina, is Samoan, while their father, Lionel, was Hawaiian. They instilled a strong sense that the siblings must take care of each other. Respecting elders was also central to their ethos. The siblings learned to respect not just their parents, but the elders in their community.

Nacua leaned even more on his family after Lionel’s sudden, unexpected death. “It just happened so fast,” Puka says. “There was just no time to pause.” He was devastated. Barely in middle school, he struggled to grasp how someone could just be there one day—and gone the next. About a week after Lionel passed, Nacua’s brothers remember seeing him glued to the TV, watching the NFL for hours. Football became an obsession, but the hurt of losing his father resurfaced during his own games, when he’d look into the stands and not see his dad. The world he knew no longer existed. Sometimes, it hurt, too, on the rare occasion Penina couldn’t make a game.

He was so young that he couldn’t grasp what he knows now: After losing her husband, she had six kids at home to care for by herself. The only reason she ever missed a game was because she was at one of his siblings’ games. She couldn’t be multiple places at once, but damn if she didn’t try. She modeled inner strength and resilience, even though she, too, was steeped in grief. “I’m forever grateful,” Puka says. “I don’t know if I could ever repay that debt for my mom.”

Nacua felt he had to be strong not just for his younger brother, but for Penina, too, and it forced him to grow up a little bit faster as his older siblings moved on to college. Those years brought Puka and his mother closer. He tried to take on more responsibility, yet she was the one keeping him on track. Once, during one of Nacua’s summer basketball games, she walked straight onto the court. She had learned that Nacua had an issue with his grades, and she wasn’t pleased. She told him, in front of the entire team, that they were going home. That was her love. Nacua, she insisted, had to be responsible if he wanted to be successful—no matter how difficult things were.

“Mama bear,” Kai says. “She’s always been a superhero.”

Sports were Puka’s refuge and, he says, a “coping mechanism,” and he was good, breaking numerous Utah high school football records during his career at Orem High, including for career receptions (260), receiving yards (5,226), and touchdown receptions (58). “He had the ‘it’ factor,” says Golden Holt, Puka’s high school basketball coach at Orem High. “When he walks in the gym, when he walks on the football field, there’s a presence that you just feel.”

Holt said he’d often tell his young athletes to focus on the present—“Today is a good day,” he’d say—to not think too far ahead to state championships or college scholarships. Holt said it was a message that resonated with the teenage Nacua, and it helped him play freely and with joy. But as he left for college in Washington, loss soon found him again.

Fa’atamali’i Saole, his grandmother, was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in early 2021. Puka and his older brother Samson, who was playing for Utah, wanted to come home to Provo. Together, they decided to transfer to BYU to be able to comfort their grandmother and support their mother.

Saole, however, died in September 2021, around the start of Nacua’s first season with the Cougars. It was painful to lose someone else he loved dearly. He channeled his sadness into football, leading his team in receptions, and helping BYU win 10 games. His final college season was more of a struggle on the field, and BYU dropped four straight games last October. Nacua, sensing the panic around the locker room, approached head coach Kalani Sitake and gave him a hug. “Coach, you’re doing good?” Nacua said. “I need you.”

The gesture caused Sitake to shift his own perspective. Nacua, despite all he was going through, never complained. “It’s easy in life for us to complain,” Sitake says. “This guy, he has every right to complain about everything and I never hear him complain. Never. He takes the field like it’s the last time he’s ever going to play.”

A game against Boise State last November provided a preview of what the Rams would discover about Nacua: He plays his best when his team needs him the most. On a fourth-and-goal on the 6-yard line with less than two minutes left, Nacua beat the defensive back who was in coverage and made a seemingly impossible catch in the corner of the end zone to give BYU the lead. “One of the most incredible catches I’ve ever seen,” says Fesi Sitake, his wide receivers coach and passing game coordinator at BYU.

The win helped BYU turn its season around and finish 8-5. “He had gone through so much,” Fesi Sitake says. “You can put everything on him and he’s going to do everything in his power to make sure he doesn’t let anyone down.”

Nacua led the Cougars in receiving yards in 2021 and 2022, despite battling an ankle injury in that second season. He totaled 1,430 yards on 91 receptions, along with 11 touchdowns. He rarely sat out in practice, even as his coaches tried to limit his reps. He even jumped onto the scout team, burning to be out there. Nacua kept that same work ethic heading into the NFL draft, even as questions about his injury history and 40-yard dash time followed him. BYU’s coaches believed he played faster than what that 40 time indicated, and his college film would show it. “He’s one of those rare breeds,” Fesi Sitake says. “There’s actually been a lot of people in the history of the NFL who didn’t put up a great 40, but their speed on the field is completely different. And Puka’s one of those.”

Kai told Puka to stay positive, no matter what happened in the draft, and to focus on his work. But initially, Puka struggled. “There was a moment where he was like, ‘Man. I feel like things are falling apart right now,’” Kai says.

But Nacua couldn’t control what NFL scouts might think about his college injuries or combine metrics, so he focused on what he could control: working hard to make sure his body felt 100 percent healthy. Gradually, his confidence returned, and he continued to believe in himself. In April, though he fell to the final pick in the fifth round, he just might have ended up in the perfect place, with the right coach and the right quarterback.

During Rams training camp in August, in the team’s first intrasquad scrimmage, Nacua caught a pass from Stafford on a sideline corner route to convert a third down. It was a seemingly routine play, but in that moment, Nacua realized that Stafford not only wanted to throw him the ball in an important game situation, but trusted him enough to make the catch.

Nacua paused. That’s when he knew, deep in his bones, he belonged. “Shoot,” he thought. “If they believe in me that much, then why should I not believe in myself?”

“He couldn’t wait until the season started,” Kai says. “Just because he knew there may be people out there like, ‘Oh, he’s a fifth-round pick. He’s probably not going to be as good.’”

Nacua has not only risen to the occasion, but has been integral to the Rams offense for other, less-recognized reasons: He does the little things, the dirty work—such as blocking defensive ends, linebackers, and safeties—that makes a big difference. “Just like Cooper, [he’s] selfless,” Yarber says. “He has aggressive hands, he can run intermediate routes, and when you send him deep, he’s able to make the contested catch. I mean, I knew he was good, but I didn’t know he was that good.”

Nacua often racks up hidden yards, leaning forward and dragging an opponent for extra yardage that racks up by the end of a game. Through five games, Nacua is third in the NFL with 14 explosive plays (defined as receptions of at least 16 yards), and he’s third in total yards after the catch, with 182. “Not many receivers can do what he’s doing right now,” says Fesi Sitake, his former BYU wide receivers coach.

Nacua starred in the Rams’ first game, against the Seahawks, making 10 catches for 119 yards in his debut. Afterward, Holt, his former basketball coach, texted him: “Puka. You’ve been working for this your whole life.”

Indeed it was an arrival, but one big game couldn’t be his final NFL destination. Something else tugged at him. The moment, he knew, was always the next moment. Then the next moment after that. Kai taught him that, sharing wisdom he learned after going undrafted before signing with the Browns in 2017. “Every day is your interview,” Kai told him. Meaning: Every day you have to prove yourself. Every day you start over. One good game doesn’t always translate to a lasting career.

“Everyone can do it once,” Kai told Puka. “But let’s see how consistent you can be. That’s what the greats do.”

That’s Nacua’s focus now, in addition to helping the Rams win, after L.A. dropped a Week 5 game to the Eagles. He has made it, but now how can he stick? How can he continue to be consistent? The answer lies not necessarily in routes or catches. It’s in reminding himself why he’s out there. Why he loves the feeling of clutching the ball, running toward the end zone. As he plays, the memories of his father and his grandmother wrap around him like a hug. “Life is good,” he says. “I can’t complain.”