Longino refuses to give up on dream
Former ASU LB had NFL career derailed by arrest
Antonio Longino hasn’t given up. The former Arizona State linebacker is working to keep his pro football dreams alive and to give hope to youngsters in his old neighborhood.
It might seem like he’s facing tough odds on both fronts, but he’s not worried about that.
“This stuff needs to be done, man,” Longino said in a recent phone interview. “The world we live in is just so crazy. You want to see good. We’ve got to just fight back with good.”
‘He put that whole team on his back’
Longino was a star on a forgettable Sun Devil defense.
In 2015, ASU gave up nearly 450 yards and 33 points a game. This was a team that fell apart, losing five of its last seven.
It could have been worse had Longino not saved the season.
“If you go back and watch the Washington game,” said Jean Boyd, executive senior associate athletic director at ASU, “… he put that whole team on his back. I’m not talking about just the defense. I remember being on the sideline, and all of us were just in awe of what he was doing.”
Longino logged four tackles behind the line of scrimmage and two sacks,
accounting for 37 yards lost for the Huskies.
He “willed” ASU to a 27-17 win, Boyd said. That victory ended a three-game skid and gave the Sun Devils a chance to become eligible for a bowl game by beating Arizona the next week in the Territorial Cup.
Longino finished the season leading the Pac-12 with 11 sacks. He was tied for third in the nation with 22.5 tackles for loss.
“You just gotta go get it,” he said. “Gotta be hungry. Gotta make it happen. Hard work.”
‘Always remember watching Antonio’
Former ASU quarterback Mike Bercovici remembers the high-motor Longino.
“Crazy to think it’s been a couple years now since we’ve been on a team together,” he said by phone.
“As a quarterback, most of the time in the game you’re focusing on what you need to do and talking to the linemen and stuff like that. But there’s certain players that you watch on defense because you know that they’re gonna make a play, and I just always remember watching Antonio.”
Longino was ready to take a shot at the NFL. He went undrafted but said he was preparing to try out for Cincinnati. It never happened.
He ended up in jail overnight after a traffic stop in northeast Ohio. He said he had been on his way to report to rookie camp.
“I’m getting arrested,” Longino said, “some guy yells out, ‘Nah, he plays for the Bengals. You’ve got the wrong guy. … (The officer) was like, ‘Oh, yeah, you play for the Bengals? You’re not playing for nobody until I get what I want.’ ”
It’s the sort of complaint that’s led to the erosion of trust between people in poor minority communities and law enforcement.
Longino was charged with tampering with evidence. It took nine months, but the case was ultimately dismissed.
Longino said the judge apologized, but that didn’t bring back his shot at the NFL. It’s hard enough for an undrafted player to get a look, and now he had baggage, too.
“It’s crazy,” he said, “because all the cameras were on when this happened. I’m all over the news. But as soon as the case was dismissed, it’s not one camera in sight. It’s just ‘OK, have a nice day.’”
‘That’s what he had’
Longino refuses to give up on his dream.
He played a few games for the Saskatchewan Roughriders of the Canadian Football League last season, and he’s been working out in preparation for another opportunity.
He recognizes it’s a long shot. He doesn’t have an agent, and he hasn’t been invited to any camps.
The Alliance of American Football could represent another opportunity, but that’s a year off. He’s already 25.
He keeps pushing, though, because he believes he’s got the goods. Bercovici agrees.
“Oh, absolutely,” said Bercovici, who went through two training camps with the Chargers and was on the Cardinals’ roster last season.
“Once you get to the NFL, everybody’s talented. Everybody’s big. Everybody’s strong. Everybody’s fast,” Bercovici said. “The difference is once you get in those preseason games, what do you do? Do you have that killer instinct in you? Do you have that gamer mentality? When the lights are on, do you turn into a different player? And that’s what he had.”
Boyd supports Longino in his pursuit of a pro career. He’s also helping him prepare for life off the field.
“He and I have talked a few times recently about some of his ideas and thoughts around what he would like to do next as he transitions, ultimately at some point, completely out of football, in terms of playing the game,” Boyd said.
Longino also refuses to give up on his hometown of East Cleveland, even if the problems there seem intractable.
“East Cleveland, man, it’s the hood,” Longino said. “People don’t want to go there (to help).”
But there are “still good people in the city that want to see things happening.”
He organized a football camp that turned into a community event recently. Hundreds of kids showed up to play ball and were treated to free haircuts and lunches.
“We don’t need to give up on kids,” he said.
“We need to help build our communities. … That’s one of the things I always looked at and wanted to do growing up. Now I’m doing it.”