Caraun Reid looks like a football player. But The Bronx product and NFL Draft hopeful has a number of other talents.
He’s an accomplished vocalist, spent time as a teacher’s aide and is a devout Born Again Christian who led the Princeton campus ministry.
On the field, the two-time All-America honoree, a 6-foot-2, 305-pound defensive tackle led Princeton to the Ivy League crown this year, the Tigers’ first since 2006, while notching a team-high 6¹/₂ sacks and 26 tackles, 11 for losses.
“He’s a terrific person, a leader and grounded,” Princeton coach Bob Surace said.
Reid attributed his well-rounded background to his upbringing. His minister parents from Jamaica, Bishop Courton Reid and mother Claudette, didn’t allow their three children to watch television during the week. There were visits every Saturday to the Bronx Conservatory of Music, where Reid learned to play piano and guitar. He went to summer school, though he always fared well in the classroom, attended Christian Cadet meetings Friday nights and was a fixture at his father’s church, City of Faith Church of God in The Bronx.
“There was always something we were doing, always keeping your mind maintained,” said Reid, the youngest of three brothers.
Very little changed in college, where Reid was a stellar student at Princeton with a sociology degree, on its Christian Faith in Action group, a bass vocalist with the Princeton University Gospel Ensemble and Old NasSoul, Princeton’s only all-male a cappella group devoted to soul music. He lets off steam differently than the traditional football player.
“His idea of fun is singing with his a cappella group,” Surace said. “Other guys it may be staying out until 2 a.m.”
Last spring, Reid withdrew from Princeton for the spring semester, to get a fifth year of eligibility. He had a number of options, jobs that would pay him well. Instead, he served as a teacher’s aide at the Princeton Day School’s Lower School, a minimum-paying job, because the school was in need of help. Reid arrived promptly each day in a shirt and tie, and made such an impression on the first graders, who nicknamed him “Kindergarten Cop,” Princeton had a new set of young fans this year.
“The families still talk about him,” said Surace, whose wife, Lisa, is the school’s headmaster.
Before high school, the only sport Reid participated in was track and field, but he always was competitive. He had to win when the family sat around playing board games. In class he had to be the first to answer a question, score the highest on a test. In high school, he once had an average of 107.5.
“I was one of those bratty kids nobody liked,” he said.
He quickly took to the sport, developing into a star lineman at Mount St. Michael in The Bronx. He yearned to play Pop Warner — all his friends did — but his parents didn’t feel it was safe, which attracted him to the sport even further. His father fondly remembered waking his son up for school, Reid sitting up in bed and would say, “tackle the fullback, tackle the fullback,” Courton Reid said with a chuckle.
Reid is a projected middle-round draft pick, anywhere between the third and fifth round, according to ESPN draft guru Mel Kiper Jr. He met with the Eagles, Buccaneers, Jets and Bears for visits after impressing NFL scouts at the Senior Bowl, compiling two sacks in limited action and performing well at the NFL Combine.
“The stage wasn’t too big for him,” NFL Network draft analyst Charles Davis said.
As an Ivy League product, Reid said he had even more to prove, to dispel the stigma that he believes still exists about players from the elite academic conference. Teams frequently asked him about his dedication to football, because of all his extracurricular activities.
“A lot of people wanted to know if I’m tough enough to play in the National Football League,” he said. “I told them who I was and just from talking to me, whatever stereotype they had was wrong. I’m never going to back down from anything.”
Davis said Reid still needs to work on technique and use his hands more for leverage. But Davis said he thinks he’s a better prospect than former teammate Mike Catapano, a defensive end who was a seventh-round pick of the Chiefs last year and made the team, because of his versatility and ability to play a variety of positions on the defensive line.
For the first time, Reid will be able to focus on football, devote all his energy, passion and time to the sport he has grown to love. Singing will be on the back burner. He has his degree.
“I’ve never had this opportunity to just focus primarily on football until now,” Reid said. “I’m really excited to see where that goes. I know I am going to get better. I know I’m going to be the best. That’s something that drives me every day.”