NFL star Jonathan Brooks he turned to his faith following a series of personal and professional pains – and when he returns to the football field in 2026, it will be as a newly baptized athlete.
“I've been through a lot in my life,” Brooks, 22, said Tuesday, April 28. AP Games. “I lost my father. I've torn my ACL twice. I always come back to my faith.”
The Carolina Panthers running back revealed that after the death of his father in 2022 and a second ACL tear in 2024, he chose to rededicate himself to God.
“For me, my baptism was a commitment to my faith—to not only change myself, but from that day forward to stop making excuses around me,” shared Brooks, noting that he was baptized after learning he was cleared to participate fully in Carolina's offseason conditioning program earlier this month.
Although Brooks has always been a man of faith, he said his time away from the football field made him realize, “I didn't live the life I deserved.”
“I used to use the excuse of being in the locker room for my entire football career, whether it was high school, college, or the NFL, and I was like, 'Oh, I'm around people who yell and do all this,'” he recalls. I kept trying, I think, to blame others in some sense. And, of course, I had to check myself.
Brooks has had a long road to the NFL, filled with personal struggles amid the high profile of being one of the league's top prospects.
Jonathan Brooks.
Matt Kelley/Getty ImagesFootballer father, James “Skip” BrooksHe died in March 2022 due to complications from a blood clot that affected his heart. He was 49 years old.
Jonathon, on the other hand, was a freshman at the University of Texas, Austin, when his father died. In honor of his late father, Jonathan and his brother, in Jordanthey got matching tattoos of the day Skip died on their right arms.
Whenever Jonathon scored a touchdown at Texas he would touch or point to the tattoo as a nod to his father. While Jonathon was selected in the second round of the 2024 NFL Draft by the Panthers, he has yet to find his way onto the NFL stage after two major injuries.
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Jonathon entered his rookie season in the fall of 2024 while still recovering from a torn ACL knee, which he reinforced for the 2023 college football season. (Anterior cruciate ligament, or ACL, tears occur in your knee and are common in athletes. They usually require surgery to repair.)
The Texas native underwent months of rehabilitation and made his NFL debut in November 2024. After just three games in two weeks, he tore his ACL for the second time.
That injury caused Jonathon to miss his rookie year and the entire 2025-2026 season.
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However, the Panthers confirmed on Tuesday that Jonathon was healthy enough to return to full practice ahead of the 2026-2027 NFL season.
“I was cleared by my surgeon,” said Jonathon on Tuesday Charlotte Observer. “[Panthers vice president of health and performance] Denny [Kellington] and the coaching staff and coaches have a plan for me. And, you know, I just go from what they tell me to do. And just taking what it's like, you know.”
He noted that he's “getting better every day still – and yes, I'm ready to go.” Although Jonathon knows his knee recovery is “something I have to work on” as spring training continues, he said he'll “get there.”
