One last season. One last game. One last play. One last tackle. For Kai Caesar, this was his last chance as an Ohio University football player to lead his team to victory.

Kai Caesar is in his sixth year at Ohio University (OU) playing middle linebacker for the football team. Caesar graduated in 2020 with an undergraduate degree in communication studies and pursued graduate school at OU with his first master’s in science and management and his second masters in crisis communication. The 2022 season will be his last season with the team.

Born in St. Croix and raised in St. Kitts in the U.S. Virgin Islands, Caesar did not play football until he moved to Lawton, Oklahoma when he was around 10 years old. In sixth grade, his football career started, with the encouragement of his sister. In physical education class Caesar learned more about football and was able to translate what he learned there to playing for the school’s team. His coaches had put him at tight end and linebacker since he liked to receive the ball.

“I didn’t know the plays, but I understood what I needed to do was just get to the ball,” Caesar said.

After middle school, he played at Cache High School in Oklahoma. Once in high school, Caesar developed his skills further as a player with the help of his coaches.

“I got a new coaching staff my second year and they’re actually hall of fame coaches in Oklahoma,” Caesar said. “One was an offensive guy and the other a defensive guy and they both helped me out to understand the game of football, understanding what I needed to do for the team was my biggest role and it translated to college.”

Caesar played wide receiver, defensive end, tight end and full back and recorded 236 yards with 66 tackles and eight sacks. He was named First Team All-State in his senior year, earned All-district first team DE and WR, and served as a captain for one season. He also played basketball and ran track for the school. 

As high school football ended, Caesar was offered a spot on nine college teams, ultimately signing with OU in 2017. He was redshirted his freshman year but was determined to develop a role as a leader on the team.

“I remember going to the back of the bus where all the older guys sit on the way to a game, and I remember a guy, I think he was a year or two older than me, he was like ‘What are you doing? You are too young,’” Caesar said. “And I was like okay, I respect you, I respect it.”

Caesar tried to sit with the older players the following year, but the same result happened.

“He motivated me to be one of the older guys on the back of the bus because everyone looked up to those guys and I wanted to go back there,” Caesar said. “That’s how this whole thing started.”

After his first season redshirted, he played 12 games in the 2018 season where he earned Mid-American Conference (MAC) Honor Roll for his academics. During the 2019 season, he played in 13 games and recorded a career-high of 31 tackles. In the 2020 season, Caesar played one game and was hurt with a shoulder injury and was out for the rest of the season to recover. During this time of recovery and being at home during the COVID-19 pandemic, he asked himself how he can separate himself from everyone he was around.

“I just started sitting down and learning, six months’ worth of knowledge (and) understanding different things about who I am as a person, how I need to be as a leader, different steps that I need to take to understand people and what they go through, how I can help them,” Caesar said.  

At times, Caesar would go on his own and tried to separate himself from the team, but the team pulled him to the front every time.

“It was crazy because I was like ‘They actually want me to be their leader,’” Caesar said.

As Caesar developed his own leadership skills, the team took notice and began to look to him for advice.

During the summer of 2021, the football team had a culture shift as their head coach, Frank Solich retired to focus on his health after being the head coach of Ohio University's football team since 2005. Offensive Coordinator Tim Albin was named head coach midway through the summer, creating a quick transition period for the team. In the 2021 season, OU football went 3-9, a losing season for Albin’s first year as head coach. 

During the 2022 season, the team was looking to rebuild around this new culture as Solich left and Albin took his place. Caesar, being on the team since 2017, now looked to fulfill his role as a leader.

“My job was to be there for them, even though they didn’t ask for it, because I know exactly what they’re going through,” Caesar said. “Losing and having to come to practice every day, it feels like you’re doing it for nothing.”

Caesar would recognize the frustration in his teammates and pull them aside to talk out the issues. As he did this, he approached the other team captains and encouraged them to do the same. He spent time building community with his teammates, talking to them every day about how they felt and to helping them understand the discipline of where they needed to get to. The end goal would be to win the MAC Championship.

As the off-season training began for the 2022 season, Caesar wanted to help prepare his teammates for leadership positions and how to handle adversity as a leader of the team.

Caesar said one of his main points was to help his teammates understand who they are as a person before being an athlete.

“You are who you are and show people that,” Caesar said. “Don’t be anyone else and everyone will love you for who you are.”  

The team took notice of Caesar’s leadership on the field and selected him as the defensive team captain for his final three years at OU. In this position, Caesar further developed relationships with his teammates as well as the coaches.

“I think just being a leader and working hard and doing things that he’s asked to do from the staff to the best of his ability,” Albin said. “The biggest thing is being consistent about coming to work. He’s mastered that.”

Caesar’s relationship with Albin had started well before he started playing football for OU. Albin had visited Caesar’s high school his sophomore year and began to take notice of his talents. Their relationship was fostered through a mutual connection. Albin was coached by and had been a longtime friend with one of the coaches at Caesar’s high school, Larry Derek. Through this connection, Albin offered Caesar a position on the team once he graduated.

In the beginning of the 2022 season, Albin had sent out a message to forget about last year and that the team was onto something different. Caesar had replied that he was behind coach Albin 100% and that they were going to go on to the MAC championship. The goal for the season was set and Caesar was determined to help get the team there. 

The team was met with a rocky start to the season, pulling off close wins against Florida Atlantic and Fordham, but was met with defeat against Penn State, Iowa State, and an overtime loss to Kent State. After the loss to Kent, OU went on to win six straight games with a chance at qualifying for the MAC Championship.

The final step to securing a spot in the championship was to win against Bowling Green for their last regular season game of the year. Before the game, Caesar sent a text to coach Albin, showing his support, echoing the message that Albin had sent at the beginning of the season. The team went on to beat Bowling Green 38-14, securing them a spot in the 2022 MAC Championship.

“I felt like that game was personal,” Caesar said. “As a young guy [Albin] watched a lot of us as an offensive coordinator, he watched a lot of us grow,” Caesar said. “A lot of us have been in the situation to where we had to handle business because we sit in a situation that we couldn't help as young guys, but now that we're older, I mean, it's in our hands now.”

After the game, Caesar held onto the game ball and presented it to coach Albin in an emotional speech about how he as head coach led the team to make such a dramatic change in just one year, that they were now onto the championship.

“To change a program, especially the year after, I mean, that's something that you should be proud of him,” Caesar said. “Giving him the game ball was a proud moment because of the emotion from since I was a sophomore in high school to my last year in college and just seeing his growth and him seeing my growth.” 

In his position as a leader for the football team, Caesar has worked hard to educate himself on how his influence can help those around him. He noted how coming from the U.S. Virgin Islands, the resources and opportunities he has now, are so much more than what is available for the individuals that live there. His goal is to help those in his communities to have access to resources to help them live positive and healthy lives.

While growing up in St. Kitts and Oklahoma and now living in Athens he recognizes the influence of an environment to kids during their developing years. Caesar started a nonprofit in June 2020 called Beyond Yourself, where the goal is to help kids develop mentally, physically, spiritually and help them find ways to better themselves within the environment they are in. He hopes to help them find a new environment within their environment. This would be done through providing resources to form positive habits to help them grow as individuals.

With his nonprofit, he wants to approach athletes in professional sports to hopefully support Beyond Yourself and have them bring it into the communities. These individuals have the resources to fund the non-profit in their community and bring the right resources forward to help it support those in the community. With the help of these athletes, it would hopefully bring those out in the community to want to join and be a part of the nonprofit and the legacy of the athlete. 

Outside of football, Caesar likes to focus on bettering himself through educational resources online. He focuses his research on business information and how to set himself up for success after college by doing things now to help aid in that. He then takes this knowledge and will share it with other players on the team to help them find success outside of football.

“For me, I sat down and learned ways to create income revenue streams, but it’s more about the opportunities it brings,” Caesar said. “I’m not in a rush to go into an industry, I am more trying to figure out myself in the way of who can I help in that time.”

For Caesar, the game of football holds deep importance in his life. He recognizes how it helped him form who he is today through discipline and opportunities.

“Looking back, being from the Islands, if I never came to the United States, where would I be?” Caesar said. “Your environment makes you and in an environment like that you don’t last long. It means a lot because it took away a lot of fear that my family had, or I had myself.”

Caesar remembers where he has come from and the importance of representing his communities from the Islands and in Oklahoma. People mention how he is living out their dream of playing college football and representing his community.

“It means a lot because that means I can go back and create this nonprofit and have a support system,” Caesar said. “Football has allowed me to build an empire and I’m looking forward to seeing the outcome of what happens.”

With developing leadership skills, Caesar works towards bridging his life as an athlete with activism in his community. He is a member of the student organization called Bobcats Lead Change, a group to support unity and justice for Black students and residents in the Athens community with hopes of spreading their message “throughout the athletic conference, state, and nation,” as stated on their Ohio University Bobcat Connect page. The organization was formed in 2020 to work towards support in the community by organizing different marches on campus, creating activist videos, and “actively work to create positive change through education, dialogue, and action.”

With the rigorous schedule, the team has with offseason training, spring ball, summer training camp, fall camp and then the regular season, many times players and coaches will hit burnout. Caesar recognized this in his team and was trying to come up with solutions to combat this.

“One thing I do every day is analyze myself, my teammates and my coaches,” Caesar said. “About week six or seven guys were feeling and looking burnout and having those one-on-one conversations, you can tell the guys didn’t want to tell you what was going on.”

Caesar talked with Albin about what he noticed and began to come up with ways that the team could talk about these issues to help each other out.

“Football is not who these guys are, it’s what they do,” Albin said. “Our coaching staff prides ourselves in knowing who they are and not just about what they do. Kaieem has taken it upon himself, he’s got his own thing going on with the team and I think it’s paid dividends.”

After noticing this, Caesar wanted to create a space where they could come together and talk about these issues. He mentioned this to Quinton Pryor, a first-year student in the master of sports administration and business administration program at OU, and he was on board to start it. With the help of Tia Jameson, the Assistant Athletics Director of Student-Athlete Development and Inclusion they created a new student organization called Barbershop Talk. The three developed a plan of things to discuss and how they wanted this time to take things to a deeper level to help the members discuss how they are feeling.

The purpose of the organization, Caesar said, is to create a space where young men can come together to speak on what is happening in their lives, have conversations and discussions on how they feel mentally, physically, spiritually and financially.

Caesar’s goal is to create an environment where men can feel comfortable to be open about their lives, their upbringing and how it influences them today. He also focuses on leadership and how to make positive changes for yourself in your environment.

During the first meeting, Caesar and Pryor started with asking questions regarding nature vs nurture, prompting discussion about their upbringing and environment. Alongside this discussion, the group ate a meal together.

After the Barbershop Talk, Caesar received positive feedback from participants, but is hoping to develop an environment where more people feel comfortable to share their thoughts as well as bring in other people to help contribute. Caesar said is goal is to help the younger members develop faster.

“The things that I learned as a sixth year, how can I teach someone in their first year, so they have that knowledge?” Caesar said. “How can they develop different things to where they’re four years ahead of the game? How can you discipline yourself to know to get to know yourself while playing football? You can see the dog in you when you play football, but who are you?” 

The creation of Barbershop Talk has influenced fellow OU football player and defensive tackle Dane Middlebrook Jr. to pursue a leadership role on the team.

“He was a shower, not a teller,” Middlebrook Jr. said. “He will show everybody what was right as opposed to what was wrong. On and off the field, he always showed great character. He wanted to help others, like the way he was helped when he was younger.”

Middlebrook Jr. also recognizes Caesar’s impact on the team and those in the Black community in Athens and has since wanted to follow in his footsteps.

“I was telling Miss Tia that when he leaves, I want to take that position where Kaieem was,” Middlebrook Jr. said. “All the stuff he had taught me, I told Miss Tia I will gladly take over for what he has done and continue to do it.”

The impact Barbershop Talk has had on Middlebrook Jr. reaches beyond football.

“We all grew up from different parts of the country and everybody has a different way of how they grew up in life,” Middlebrook Jr. said. “All of us are different, but we all come together as one and we can call each other teammates or friends at the end of the day. We can go to a safe place to talk about reality and what’s happening in our lives today.”

Caesar works hard to develop relationships with the players and coaches on his team to foster a sense of community to build a stronger chemistry for the team.

“I’ve built a relationship with them to where these guys look at me as a big brother,” Caesar said. “When I was younger, everyone was the same age handling their business in their own ways, but now they look at me as a big brother.”  

Bradley Weaver, a redshirt freshman playing defensive end for OU, has also felt the impact of Caesar on and off the field.

“He’s a great leader, he would talk to me and try to build me up,” Weaver said. “The first couple of days, he knew I was a little shy and he knew I was athletic and always saw this potential in me. But when he would go out to practice and lead the team, I was like, ‘I want to be like him someday.’ He knows how to hold those reins and lead a team. He knows how to speak in front of an audience and a crowd and lead young men to be true men someday.”

Middlebrook Jr. attested to a similar relationship with Caesar, starting when he came to visit OU for his official visit to join the team. Middlebrook Jr. had spent two days in Athens with Caesar, where Caesar had showed him what it was like to be a part of the team. This connection led to Middlebrook Jr. committing to OU to play for his college career.
“He was a role model and I look up to him,” Middlebrook Jr. said. “And if I have any questions…he knows where to go, he knows who to talk to and how to approach people. It’s always cool to have somebody like him that’s been there for so long to be a sponge and soak up as much information as possible before he leaves because he is such a great role model and a leader.”

As Caesar’s leadership developed, he grew into the role of representing his team.

“I remember going to pep rallies, or events and he had no problem standing and speaking for the team,” Weaver said.

During an OU Volleyball game, the football team was honored for their win against Miami University a few days prior. Caesar was tasked with representing the team and signed a large foam brick to commemorate their win as the fans cheered for their victory.

“He’d be doing these charity events, the donations and helping out with certain groups and I was just like, ‘How can this big scary-looking dude be so generous in the heart?’” Weaver said. “He was a mean football player, but off the field he was one of the nicest dudes you can meet. You could just go over and ask him for a hug”.  

The leadership of the older players on the team was key to OU's turnaround following their losing season in 2021. During this rebuilding period, Albin’s focus was about his players and what they can build in community to perform at a high level.

“In our industry, our profession is performance based, that’s a fact,” Albin said. “But that’s not why I do what I do. I understand that the performance piece of it, is how I keep my job, but it’s not what fuels me. But with where I am at in my career I am about these young men. If we do that piece of it right, the performance piece will take care of itself.”

Through the leadership of the captains and older players on the team, they were able to secure a winning record and a chance to win the MAC Championship. 

“We definitely had some hardships last season and he made sure that we stuck together,” Weaver said. “He made sure that any negativity and any down talk of our team was just instantly dead and instantly killed because that’s just not healthy. That’s what great leaders do because they look out for what’s best for the team. He was always preaching and being positive and working hard and believing in the system and believing in our coaches and our teammates. We can win, we do have the potential and in the next year we proved it all.”

Caesar said that keeping a positive attitude in tough situations is one of his key points to being a leader.

“For me I remember where I came from,” Caesar said. “There are times where I can say life was hard, but it wasn’t hard, it was just a learning process. The tough times that I’ve had in my life, I just translate that into a learning tool and that’s how I keep my positivity.”

In his leadership, Caesar finds religion to be his main motivation to encourage his teammates.

“I pray to God every day and God helps me through the tough days, the bad days and inspires me to come to work every day and put a smile on my face no matter what’s going on,” Caesar said. “I have 120 guys out there. Guys can come in with a bad attitude and I feel like it’s my duty to inspire those guys in 50 different ways. He inspired me to have a pure heart and a peace of mind to where I can put my problems aside and go help other people.” 

Caesar lives his life by three words: knowledge, technique and originality.

“There’s opportunities behind every downfall and that’s how I look at life,” Caesar said. “That’s pretty much how I live my life and try to be calm through everything. One thing now that is in the back of my head, especially in the leadership position, is that somebody’s watching you, so be calm.”

In the 2022 season, the OU football team went 9-4 overall and 7-1 in the MAC conference. With their win against Bowling Green, they were locked in for the MAC Championship to play against Toledo at Ford Field in Detroit, Michigan. OU lost to Toledo 17-7.

In a postgame interview with the OU Athletic Department, Albin said “I couldn't be prouder. Our locker room is obviously very disappointed right now. When you invest as much as this football team has and you keep stacking the days together, you're going to have some pain. I told them to keep their heads up, shoulders back and chest out. This had been my most fun year of coaching, and not because of the seven or eight games we won in a row or the postseason. It's because of the guys you see to my right and everybody in the locker room. They have been remarkable, resilient, battered and bruised, counted out, and they just kept coming back to work every day.” 

Though the season ended with a loss in the MAC Championship, the team qualified for the Barstool Sports Arizona Bowl where they played against the Wyoming Cowboys. The game was close throughout and almost resulted in a loss until the freshman kicker Nathanial Vakos kicked a 46-yard field goal, tying the game 24-24 with only four seconds left leading to overtime.

Wyoming was able to kick a field goal, taking a lead during the overtime. OU came back with a 10- yard pass to tight end, Tyler Foster for a game-winning touchdown with a final score of 30-27.

For the last time Caesar would take the field as an OU Bobcat, the team secured a win making them the champions of the Barstool Sports Arizona Bowl.

“It’s very rewarding to see a young man grow like he has,” Albin said. “It hurt my heart a little bit extra seeing him play his last game as a Bobcat because of my relationship with him. It’s like your son’s graduated college and he’s going off into the world.”

During this spring post-season, Caesar plans to train with the team and has declared his entry for the 2023 NFL Draft.

“I take it day by day. Since I’ve done that, it has calmed my mind,” Caesar said. “In five years, something new can be developed. It’s more like continuing to grow in the aspect of leadership and who I am and get to understand and love the people around me and grow from that. I know that’s going to create new opportunities that I don’t know about and then that’s just me trusting God on the front end.”