Calais Campbell: Giants sign 27-year-old DT Leki Fotu

Calais Campbell now has another veteran body next to him after the Giants agreed to terms with 27-year-old defensive tackle Leki Fotu on Wednesday. New York added size and experience to the front with a player who arrived in football late but kept climbing once he got there.

Leki Fotu’s path to New York

Fotu was born on August 23, 1998, in Oakland, California, to Tongan immigrants Toa and Likiliki Fotu. His childhood was marked by loss: when he was 8, his three-year-old sister Ema died in a balcony fall, and his father died of diabetes-related complications just weeks later. The family later relocated to Utah for support.

That background sits behind a football career that did not begin until his senior year at Herriman High School. Before that, Fotu earned USA Rugby Boys High School All-American honors, trained with England's London Wasps, and played basketball as a youth, where he was known for dunking and breaking backboards.

Herriman High School to Utah

His first football season still turned into a major one. Herriman High School won a state championship that year, and Fotu earned all-state honors and MVP recognition. At Utah, he turned that late start into production, becoming a two-time first-team All-Pac-12 performer and a third-team All-American.

At 6-foot-5 and 320 pounds, Fotu brings the kind of frame the Giants were clearly seeking on the interior. Teammates also remembered him kneeling in prayer before games, and he once made scratch waffles for the Arizona Cardinals during holidays, a small glimpse of the routine around a player built on uncommon detours.

Giants add to the rotation

The signing gives New York another defensive tackle as it continues to build out that group around Campbell and the rest of the line. Fotu’s résumé is unusual, but the practical result is simple for the Giants: a bigger, experienced lineman arrives on Wednesday with college production, pro size and a background that shows how late he entered the sport.