Andru Phillips loves football. Probably more than anyone he knows. His parents, both high-level athletes themselves, didn’t want him to play growing up. He did anyway and has been obsessed with the sport since first changing their minds at age 5.
The NFL Draft evaluation cycle forces players to go through intense fact-finding trials, featuring questions that range from the mundane to the absurd, all so teams can try to discover whether a guy is telling the truth when he says he cannot live without football. In Phillips’ case, that love of the game is genuine.
But so are a lot of other things.
Growing up in Louisville, Ky., Phillips built a garden in his parents’ backyard. He weeded and watered it daily. By the end of summer, his family was eating radishes grown by a first-grader. He spent hours in the woods and built a treehouse that would’ve made adults jealous, using stuff he found lying around. At Kentucky, Phillips read to elementary school kids and encouraged others to speak their minds freely. He loves his dogs, Jet and Bruno. He fishes. He’s a mental health advocate, with his own story to share.
On the field, Phillips — a versatile, explosive cornerback from Kentucky who ranks No. 69 on Dane Brugler’s latest top 100 NFL Draft board — is a physical defensive back capable of wearing multiple hats in multiple schemes. He’s smart enough to understand zone responsibilities throughout the secondary, fast and explosive enough to press in man and disciplined enough to fit the run without fear. As a player, his versatility is his best trait.
It also happens to be one of his best traits as a person. He’s decidedly more than “just” a football player.
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Players used to be nervous talking about stuff like this. In the old days, if a draft prospect spoke about his love of music or acting (or gardening …) in an interview, he could bet his last dollar a pro team would ask privately and seriously if he was truly committed to the game. In some circles, that type of thinking still exists. Not nearly as many, though. And Phillips hopes to help erase those that remain.
“Football can mess with you,” Phillips says. “And it’s not talked about enough. Especially men, we don’t talk about our feelings. We don’t want to open up.
“But, really, it’s so important. It’s such a key part of everyone’s development.”
In football, “tweener” is no longer a swear word. The ability to play multiple positions is heavily desired, and being able to emotionally connect with the people you’re going to battle with is openly discussed. You don’t win games with robots. You win ’em with people.
Meet Andru Phillips, one of the most versatile prospects — and human beings — in the 2024 NFL Draft.
With Carlos and LaTonya Phillips, excellence runs in the family.
Carlos helped Owensboro (Ky.) High to the football state championship game as a sophomore, and by 1985, he was a 6-foot-2, 220-pound defensive tackle hoping to draw the interest of the University of Kentucky. The summer before his senior year, he went to Kentucky’s camp and worked out as a linebacker — something he’d only done early in his high school career. It paid off. Phillips’ quickness at his size and his natural football instincts blew the coaches away and landed him a scholarship.
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During his college career with the Wildcats, Phillips played three positions (defensive line and two linebacker spots). He did whatever was needed — a literal coach’s dream. Off the field, Phillips was president of Owensboro’s local “Youth Council” as a high school senior and remained active in community matters throughout college life. Today, he serves on several charity boards while working as president and CEO of the Greenville Chamber of Commerce in South Carolina.
LaTonya grew up on the opposite side of the state, in Danville, Ky., where she ran hurdles and relays for the mighty Danville Admirals, who won seven team state championships (three while LaTonya was in high school) during the 1980s. She took the combination of discipline and structure she learned from track and field and put it into studying radiology at Louisville, before graduating and going back to study occupational learning and development. She now works in health care IT as a corporate trainer.
Carlos and LaTonya met through friends, by chance, after college, got married in 1991 and have been happily together (arguing about Kentucky and Louisville) ever since. All four of their children played sports, and Carlos stayed active with football through youth coaching. Two of their three boys, including former Morehead State offensive lineman C.J. Phillips, were blessed with size.
Andru was not. And his voice wasn’t all that big, either.
“Dru’s a great kid. He’s not really that outgoing, not (an) ‘I’ll meet a friend wherever I go’ type. He’s more timid, more humble,” LaTonya says. “Until he gets to know you.”
Neither Carlos nor LaTonya wanted him to play football, fearing he’d get hurt. Andru more or less wanted to play because they didn’t want him to. When he finally convinced his parents to let him join a pee wee team, the smallest player on the field turned into the most tenacious.
Andru was hell-bent on proving to his parents that size isn’t everything in life.
What started as a mission quickly turned into an obsession, as everything about the game consumed Phillips — how it worked, how to get better at it and everything in between. Like so many, one of his favorite parts of football is that when it comes to understanding the game, there is no endpoint.
“I think,” his mom says, “that football kind of saved him.”
People can dedicate their entire life to learning as much as they can about the game and still have questions in their final breath. It changes as much as it stays the same. If done right and in the proper environment, a person can completely and totally lose themselves in the game, in the absolute best and most productive way possible.
Not unlike, say, gardening.
“We really wanted them to be engaged in things. Academics was primary with that. But also, really find something you truly enjoy that you can engage in,” LaTonya said. “Because when you’re not doing anything, that leaves room for other activity … that may not be desirable or what we want in our household.
“(And with Andru), you couldn’t keep him away from (football).”
Carlos and LaTonya never pressured any of their children to play sports, merely insisted they find a passion and explore it without boundaries. Then, maybe, have the curiosity to find something new. Be happy with what you do and be proud of how you do it. Football has been the central force in Andru Phillips’ life for as long as he can remember.
When he was a freshman in high school, Phillips put a dry-erase board on the wall in his bedroom. The only thing he wrote on it was a giant number zero — the number of college scholarship offers he’d received. It was the first thing he saw when he woke up, the last thing he saw when he went to bed.
Throughout high school, Phillips gave himself to the game. He worked out with trainers or coaches or anyone else willing to run around every weekend.
His parents hadn’t gifted him much size, but they had blessed him with incredible speed and explosion. Phillips, who ran a 4.48-second 40-yard dash at the NFL combine earlier this spring, has always been able to jump out of the building. (His 42-inch vertical tied for second best at the combine, regardless of position.)
By the end of his sophomore year, after attending five camps and getting nothing, he was finally able to erase that zero and write a No. 1. Eventually, the number on the board grew to 17.
When it was time to make a college decision, Phillips dialed the number of 16 of the head coaches who’d offered him and told them he appreciated everything, but he’d be playing ball elsewhere. He’d be going with his No. 1, the first school to offer.
The University of Kentucky.
“Crazy,” Phillips says, “right?”
Phillips took the whiteboard with him to Kentucky (LaTonya thinks it’s in his apartment right now, actually) and continued to fill it up with one goal after another — from a backup who barely played to a part-time starter in 2022 to a full-on breakout campaign in 2023. Just like his dad, he did a bit of everything for the Wildcats, serving mainly as an outside corner but also playing a bunch in the slot and even some at safety. He had five pass breakups to go along with 47 tackles last season, and his nine run stops were the second most by an SEC corner.
He followed that production up with a great showing at the Senior Bowl. He has shown scouts continued improvement — both in coverage and against the run — almost every time he’s stepped on the field.
“He’s competitive as heck and very versatile,” Kentucky coach Mark Stoops said after the team’s pro day last month. “It’s very difficult to play inside, at that slot position, and cover the type of wideouts you’re asked to cover, with a lot of technique and nuance. It takes a bright guy with instinct.
“Dru has that. He can also hold up outside at corner at the next level. That’s why his stock’s up.”
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The instinct and drive to be better come from his parents. The other elite gift Andru Phillips inherited from Carlos and LaTonya — one that will serve him well in the NFL — is perspective.
In the old days, if a player talked about having aspirations outside of football, it was frowned upon. Those spaces are tightening more and more each day, though. The game gives and it takes. It’s up to the individual to find the right balance necessary to continue moving forward productively.
These are all things Phillips thinks and talks about, and he encourages others in his orbit to do the same. Versatility requires balance. And there might not be another player in this draft who understands that better than the feisty cornerback from Kentucky.
“(Football) can almost give you an identity crisis,” Phillips says. “You’re a football player. You’re walking around on campus and no one knows what you are or what you do. And maybe you’re not even playing, you know? Maybe you’re not who you want to be at that time.
“And a lot of athletes, they’re only athletes. It’s important to branch out. It’s important to be able to relax the mind … and find out who you are.”
(Photo: James Gilbert / Getty Images)
