After losing his biggest fans, Colts’ Zaire Franklin ‘put all my pain into the game’

Zaire Franklin was ready to give up on football.

The game was fun, but being a self-labeled “chubby kid” trying to make the 75-pound weight limit for his youth league was not. As a 9-year-old, Franklin recalls wearing trash bags with holes cut in the top and sides for his head and arms to bed and waking up in a pool of sweat.

The next morning, on game day for the Oak Lane Wildcats, the North Philadelphia native would hardly eat. A full breakfast was too risky.

Franklin’s grandmother, Juanita Highsmith, helped him convince his mother, Shelice Highsmith, to let him play and served as his unofficial dietitian. Under her guidance, there would be no compromise — and certainly no quitting.

“If we had like a 1 o’clock game, grandma would get him up early and put him on her scale and call me, ‘He’s two pounds over,'” said Eric Taylor, Franklin’s former Pop Warner coach, who’s known him since he was 7 years old. Juanita would bring Franklin to the field a couple hours early and he’d start running laps, trash bag still on. “We’d have to get the wet clothes off him because that would add weight, but most of the time he’d make the weight,” Taylor said. “Boy, he’d go out there and wreak havoc.”

Taylor credited Juanita for the intensity and physicality that has carried Franklin all the way to the NFL. His old coach remembers many times when Juanita would bend down, peer into Franklin’s eyes through his facemask and relay the message she wanted him to send: “You’re gonna go out there, and you’re gonna hit somebody.”

Franklin describes his mother and his grandmother as his biggest fans. They often wore custom shirts emblazoned with his name to his Pop Warner games. Without those two women, he wouldn’t have earned a scholarship to Syracuse, wouldn’t have been selected in the NFL Draft or shattered the Colts’ single-season tackles record in 2022.

Those accomplishments are as much theirs as they are his. He just wishes they were here to see it.

“I put all my pain into the game,” Franklin said. “I promised them that I would make them proud of me.”

Ahead of Franklin’s sophomore year of high school, the Highsmiths decided to enroll him in the private all-boys Catholic La Salle College High School in an effort to set him on a different path.

That path would require sacrifice, determination and the audacity to look beyond their current circumstances. Juanita and Shelice were doing their part, scraping together whatever money they could despite being on welfare to send Franklin to a school that would change the course of his future.

“My mother and my grandmother used to always try to make me see further than my environment,” said Franklin. “It’s hard to understand that there’s life outside of that. … That was all I understood at the time. I didn’t understand anything else.”

It didn’t matter that Franklin’s father wasn’t around, or that he grew up in a rough neighborhood that often swallowed up young souls. Franklin’s mom and grandmother were determined for him to become the first college graduate in their family and to set — and reach — limitless goals.

“When he transferred to La Salle, they told me he had to take a test,” said Taylor, who remained connected to Franklin and also coached him at La Salle. “So, I called his grandma and said, ‘Grandma, they want him to take a test.’ Her exact words: ‘I’m not worried about no damn test. Zaire’s smart as a whip. I’m gonna have his belly full in the morning, and he’ll go and take that test.'”

Franklin aced the exam and hit the ground running, emerging as a standout linebacker and offensive lineman under Taylor.

But as quickly as his life came together as a sophomore, it fell apart as a junior. Shelice had suffered reoccurring brain tumors for years and died from heart failure on Feb. 11, 2013. Taylor was the first person Franklin called after his mother’s death.

“Right when everything at La Salle became normal for him, everything at home wasn’t,” Taylor said.

Rest in Heaven Queen they don't make 'em like you no more 💜 miss ya everyday pic.twitter.com/wAplhzFz8u

— Zaire Franklin (@ZiggySmalls_) May 8, 2022

In some ways, Franklin said, he’d prepared for life without his “sweet and soft-spoken” mom because he could see her deteriorating. But 77 days after Shelice’s death, Juanita died due to sepsis-induced kidney failure, and her grandson — now a full-blown high school football star — was crushed.

“I almost wasn’t able to go to Syracuse for my first visit because my grandmother was in the hospital, and it looked like she wasn’t gonna make it,” Franklin said. “I was gonna stay home, but then it was like she took a turn for the better, and it was like, ‘Oh, she’s actually doing a lot better, so we can make this little day trip. She’s gonna be OK.’ But as soon as I came back, she passed.

“It was almost like she held on just for me to get through that weekend. I always felt like that was a little bit of divine intervention.”

Franklin became the first three-time captain at Syracuse since the 1890s. (Brett Carlsen / Getty Images)

Syracuse wasn’t a part of the plan.

When Taylor and Franklin sat down to talk about his college recruitment, Taylor asked Franklin to come up with a list of 20 schools split into three categories: maybe, probably and sure thing. Syracuse wasn’t even a maybe.

“That was my dream school,” Taylor said, laughing. “I love Syracuse basketball. Sherman Douglas, Derrick Coleman, I’m old-school. Everybody was giving out tickets to basketball games (on recruiting visits), and I’m like, ‘If we can get into the Carrier Dome, we’re going up to see Syracuse!'”

Without Franklin knowing, Taylor sent his film to the Syracuse coaching staff, and after getting help from an administrative assistant to flag Franklin’s tape, the Orange invited him and Taylor up for a visit. They were blown away by the program’s hospitality, and shortly after their trip, Franklin was offered a scholarship.

Of course, Taylor wanted Franklin to immediately commit, but he forced himself to take a step back and remember what Franklin’s grandmother told him when he became her grandson’s high school coach: “Take care of my baby. He’s yours now.”

They weren’t just a player and coach anymore. They had become family, and Taylor has taken pride in treating Franklin, “like the son I never had.”

“We talked a lot about our dads,” said Taylor. “One of the things we always talked about is, ‘Are we gonna be like our dads or not be like our dads?’ Our dads weren’t around, so you’re either gonna be like him or you’re not. It’s no in-between.”

Many of those heartfelt conversations took place on recruiting trips when Taylor was behind the wheel of his gold 1997 Nissan Altima. Juanita used to make them breakfast sandwiches for the road. Sausage, egg and cheese for Franklin. Bacon, egg and cheese for Taylor.

After Juanita and Shelice died, Franklin leaned on the one man who showed him what it meant to be a man. “I’d call him in the middle of the night,” Franklin said. “He taught me how to change a tire, stuff like that. He’s my closest friend, and our bond, it really transcends a title.”

Taylor knew he couldn’t be there every day once Franklin left for college. So, as they weighed Franklin’s scholarship offers, Syracuse rose to the top, not because of Taylor’s affinity for the school but because then-linebackers coach Clark Lea felt like someone they could trust.

“He was probably the biggest reason I went to Syracuse,” Franklin said. “Some coaches knew my parents passed and were like, ‘Aw, man, sorry to hear that. But when are you going to send us your SAT scores?’ … I could really sit back and just talk to Lea, because we really built a true personal relationship.”

The chants were intoxicating.

“ZA-IRE FRANK-LIN! ZA-IRE FRANK-LIN!”

Unranked Syracuse had just upset No. 2 Clemson 27-24 at home during Franklin’s senior season in 2017, and the pandemonium on campus was unfolding like a movie scene.

“It was a Friday night, so we had two days to party,” Franklin said, laughing. “I remember I went up to this balcony that overlooked everything and was thinking, ‘Damn, this sh– is crazy. I can’t believe we really did that.'”

It was the pinnacle of Franklin’s career at Syracuse, but years before he’d help send the school into a frenzy, he was a reliable freshman who caught the eye of Lea and then-Syracuse head coach Scott Shafer.

“I always felt like I was really gonna have to pay attention to Zaire early on, because at some point he was gonna really need to grieve the loss, the trauma, the shifting ground underneath his feet, and he did that,” said Lea, now the head coach at Vanderbilt. “But I had never seen someone come in and be as steady as he was. Never once did he lose sight of the vision that he had for his success, and I think so much of that had to do with promises that he’d made to his mom and grandma.”

Shafer noticed Franklin’s work ethic and leadership qualities beyond his years.

“When we moved him up from being one of the backup linebackers to the main guy in practice, he just took over the huddle,” said Shafer, now the defensive coordinator at Middle Tennessee State. “There was just the sense of, ‘This is my defense,’ and he was just a young kid who stepped right up.”

The following summer, Shafer called Franklin into his office and challenged him to become the team captain in a conversation Franklin said set the stage for the rest of his college career. He was voted captain by his teammates ahead of his sophomore season in 2015, suddenly leading upperclassmen as the face of the program.

After Shafer and Lea were let go following the 2015 campaign, Franklin’s leadership carried over under new head coach Dino Babers. He became only the second three-time captain in Syracuse football history and the first since Robert Adams, who captained the Orange from 1894-96.

Babers said Franklin, who still wears his orange Syracuse Nike sneakers in the Colts’ locker room, left an invaluable mark on the program. Knocking off the reigning national champs in 2017 was the most noticeable example.

“I remember the determination of that defensive crew going out there, and Zaire was the leader,” Babers said. “When you talk about him being raised by his mom and his grandma, those ladies put a lot of confidence in him, and it just made him different. It made him special.”

Franklin took a knee in the end zone at MetLife Stadium, placed one hand on the turf and dropped his head during pregame warmups in Week 17 against the Giants. There were just two games left in the 2022 season, and Franklin had become overwhelmed with emotion.

The trials and the triumphs he’d been through bubbled up to the surface and manifested themselves in the tears falling down his face.

“As a college team, we played (at MetLife Stadium), but we really weren’t supposed to be there,” Franklin said. “So, when I came back, it just felt eerie. When I looked at the MetLife sign, in my mind it was just like a flashback of every single thing I had to do to get to where I was in that moment, all of the sacrifices I had to make, all of the times I went a different path, all of the people doubting me, all of the people supporting me — it just hit me like a ton of bricks.”

Franklin, finishing up his fifth NFL season, thought mostly of his family. The mom who knew he was special, the grandma who never let him slip. They’d likely still be wearing custom shirts at his Colts games today if they could.

A letter to Momma. 🫶 @ZiggySmalls_ pic.twitter.com/E03xOL395O

— Indianapolis Colts (@Colts) May 14, 2023

Then there was Marla Winder-Burke, Franklin’s aunt, who moved into his grandma’s house and became his guardian when the other two were no longer here. The same aunt he once lashed out at.

“It was a lot of pain and a lot of anger,” Franklin said. “For her to lose her sister and her mom and then for me to lose my mom and my grandma, I feel like we lost the most. And I think a lot of our clashing stemmed from that. So, once we kind of sat down and realized we were the two who went through the most, we were able to bond through it and understand where each other was coming from. That changed our whole relationship.”

Unlike Franklin’s mother and grandmother, Winder-Burke saw her nephew play in the NFL. She even came to a game in person, about one month before she died on Oct. 19, 2020, the third matriarch lost.

“She had been fighting cancer since my sophomore year of college,” Franklin said. “But she came to the Jets game at home, and I ended up being a game captain and even playing a little bit, too. I felt like in that moment, she saw me and thought, ‘He’s good. He’s gonna be OK. He made it.'”

Franklin racked up a franchise-record 167 tackles in 2022, surpassing the mark teammate Shaquille Leonard set four years earlier. (Aaron M. Sprecher / Getty Images)

In 2022, Franklin became the second player in Colts history to eclipse 160 tackles in a single season. The former seventh-round pick also notched career highs with three sacks, two forced fumbles and six pass deflections.

Franklin was expected to be a fill-in until All-Pro linebacker Shaquille Leonard came back from offseason back surgery. But Franklin played so well that even when Leonard briefly returned (before eventually going on IR), the Colts were unable to take him off the field

Leonard isn’t surprised one bit. He remembers Franklin’s determination before their rookie season in 2018. As the Colts’ last pick that year (No. 235), Franklin wore No. 97 during training camp because that was one of the few numbers available, and “he still beat all the odds against him,” Leonard said.

Now, Franklin’s No. 44 stands alone in history thanks to his 167 tackles last year, four more than the previous single-season franchise record Leonard set in 2018.

“I wouldn’t want anybody else to break my record besides him,” Leonard said, “He’s a true underdog.”

As Indianapolis enters a new era led by No. 4 pick Anthony Richardson at quarterback, Franklin is one of the players tasked with bridging the gap. He’ll embrace that challenge head-on, as evidenced by his indomitable spirit and the respect it’s warranted in every locker room he’s been a part of.

“What Zaire taught me is to never make assumptions and to never lose that sense of what’s possible,” Lea said. “What I’ve watched him do, it’s a reminder that young people are tough and resilient, and we should not put governors on what they’re able to accomplish.”

Franklin said his resiliency reflects that of his mother and grandmother, who saw greatness in him and pushed him toward it long before anyone else did. He’s just honoring his vow to them.

“Everything I’ve ever been through … every time something happened, I always just thought to myself, ‘Man, this is gonna make the story even better,'” Franklin said. “It was like, ‘When I really hit, when I really boss up, that’s just gonna make the story that much better.’ That’s what I always told myself because I knew what I was destined for.

“My mom and my grandmother, they told me I could do this.”

(Illustration: Sean Reilly / The Athletic; Photos: Cooper Neill / Getty Images)