Before 2014, George Karlaftis never had football on his radar.
Growing up in Athens, Greece, his sporting plate overflowed with swimming, soccer, tennis, basketball, track and field, judo and water polo, in which Karlaftis fast-tracked as a young teen. Karlaftis fit in every arena. He has a confluence of gifts -- size, speed, confidence and drive -- that allowed him to pick any athletic endeavor and excel. But Karlaftis ultimately pivoted away from all of those sports, and toward one that rarely, if ever, came up during his childhood.
"[Football] was perceived as very dangerous, barbaric," he recalled. "A little bit of fear tactics for us not to play."
His father, Matt, an accomplished athlete in Greece who competed in track and field at the University of Miami, hoped Karlaftis and his two brothers would never participate in football. Matt's only brush with the sport had led to a traumatic head injury and surgery.
"I was scared, I never really wanted to play growing up, you know, and [in Greece], it's not really an issue," Karlaftis said.
