Chukie Nwokorie

Chijioke Obinna "Chukie" Nwokorie (pronounced CHOO-key Wha-KOR-ee) (born July 10, 1975) is an American former professional football player who was a defensive end in the National Football League (NFL). Nworkorie played college football for the Purdue Boilermakers before earning a position in 1999 with the Indianapolis Colts as an undrafted free agent in 1999.

Nworkorie had a five-year career in the NFL, followed by a two-year stint in the Arena Football League (AFL). His final season of professional football came in 2007.

Biography Early life

Chukie Nwokorie was born July 10, 1975, in Tuskegee, Alabama, to parents who had immigrated to the United States from Nigeria, making him an American citizen by virtue of birth. He spent his first seven years in Alabama but was uprooted and taken to Nigeria at that age when his parents divorced. He would remain there, living in poverty, until he was 16. This negatively affected his standing as an NFL prospect. He was not invited to the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis and forced to rely upon private workouts for interested scouts. The final cut had been nerve-wracking, with Nwokorie understanding himself to be "on the bubble." He told a journalist: "To tell the truth, I didn't really know if I'd make the squad or not. I came in Friday to practice and I was still looking to my left and looking to my right because of what I've seen so far of being through camp. Things change on a daily basis. So, I wasn't sure if I was part of the team." Deemed too raw for NFL game action, Nwokorie spent most of his first two years on the team's inactive list.

In 2001 Nwokorie was made part of the Colts' regular defensive rotation, seeing action in all 16 games. He started at left defensive end six times, owing to injuries to teammates Chad Bratzke and Brad Scioli.

His career highlight came in the opening game of the 2001 season against the New York Jets. Nwokorie grabbed a fumble that bounced to him at his own 5-yard line. This led to a rumbling, stumbling 95-yard touchdown return swerving down the sideline abreast of Jets quarterback Vinnie Testaverde, who was unable to put the massive Colt on the ground. The injury placed Nwokorie on the Physically Unable to Perform list for the bulk of the season. According to his agent, Frank Murtha, the Packers had pursued Nwokorie for two years and the big defensive end had liked the idea of playing there. Nwokorie was unclaimed following his release by the Packers and found himself out of football completely at the age of 29.

Arena League career

Nwokorie played two seasons in the Arena Football League with the Las Vegas Gladiators (2006) and the Grand Rapids Rampage (2007).

Life after football

During 2004–2005 he took a position as an intern at WNOU, a local radio station in Indianapolis, working on a show called Morning Mess.

As of May 2016 he lived in Indianapolis, Indiana with his wife, Jamila and worked in business development.

As a more than four-year veteran of the NFL, Nwokorie is vested with the league and thereby entitled to be part of a health initiative under auspices of the National Football League Players' Association (NFLPA), the union of the league's players. The program, called "The Trust: Brain and Body," entails a complete two-day exam of body and brain in an effort to catch and address football-related medical situations. Nwokorie underwent the first of these in 2016, receiving a clean bill of health.

A second exam was scheduled for 2021 but was postponed due to the COVID-19 epidemic. In the interim, Nwokorie himself contracted the virus, which laid him up for about 10 days. With the NFLPA's medical program running again, Nwokorie went to the Cleveland Clinic in 2023 for his complete medical exam. He was shocked to learn that tests showed he was suffering from heart failure, with only 25% of the organ functioning properly. Dietary and lifestyle changes brought no improvement, forcing him to undergo open heart surgery to implant a dual chamber defibrillator in March 2024 in an effort to restore heart function.

Cost of the procedure topped $95,000, leading his friend and former Colts teammate Rick DeMulling to start a Go Fund Me campaign on Nworkorie's behalf. Nearly $20,000 was contributed during the first days of the campaign, with NFL Alumni chapters contributing $13,200 of this total.