Ahead of his first NFL playoff game, a former LSU star pulled back the curtains on the addiction that cost him his health and wealth as a student-athlete. As sports betting became the new normal in college football, Kayshon Boutte remembered how it burned his $90,000 NIL asset and sleep at the age of 20, highlighting the dark side of the trend.

Kayshon Boutte spent three seasons at LSU before being selected by the Patriots as a sixth-round pick in the 2023 NFL Draft. He was one of the highest-paid athletes in the Tigers’ 2020 class, which reached up to $1.4 million in 2022. He even neglected an offer from Alabama and coach Nick Saban, who dominated college football with a series of championships. However, Boutte now admitted that his gambling addiction burned all the NIL checks.

“I’d wake up early in the morning, and the first thing I’d do was bet,” Boutte wrote on The Players Tribune. “I’d stay up late and bet. All day. All night. I had insomnia, so if I woke up in the middle of the night, phone next to the bed, I’d bet. Any little money I had was going straight to FanDuel. I knew I was addicted. When you lose, and you’re an addict, there’s this voice in the back of your mind like, No, no, no… I gotta get my money back. I GOTTA get it back.”

Boutte’s unrealistic fantasy pushed him into gambling again and again. The dream that brought him to LSU turned into a nightmare when he got addicted to gambling. He kept chasing the high until he reached rock bottom, with a $0.00 bank balance and “completely broke” after losing a total of $90,000.

“It was like my own mind was working against me,” Boutte wrote. “Nobody was forcing me; I wasn’t being hustled. I didn’t even have anybody to be mad at but myself. I was digging my own grave. Then one day, I shoveled that last little bit of dirt over my head. I had nothing left. I gambled until I was completely broke. When it was all said and done, I put in around $90,000 of my own money and lost it all.”

It was when he stepped out of the fantasy world that he questioned himself, “How the hell did I get here???”

While Boutte dodged out of LSU to the Patriots, he paid the price, suffering arrest for making around 9,000 illegal bets between April 2022 and May 2023, after being sidelined due to injury at the Tigers camp. Those charges were eventually dropped, and he came out clean before turning into the Patriots’ most reliable pass-catcher.

Two things that saved ex-LSU player Kayshon Boutte’s career 

Kayshon Boutte credited his return to the field and his son’s birth for saving him from the fantasy trap. He also gave props to the New England Patriots for sticking with him and giving him an opportunity despite gambling charges.

“Only two things saved me,” Boutte credited. “One was getting healthy enough to play football again. The other was becoming a father as a junior in college. Nothing wakes you up faster than that. I just looked at myself in the mirror one day and realized, “Bruh, the way you’re living isn’t healthy.” And if I’m being honest, I think there was probably a little bit of shame to that realization, too.” 

Having a child brought him to reality and made him understand the purpose of his life. He wanted his son to see him with pride, and that changed him mentally and physically. Boutte now makes around $1 million a year and is poised to earn even more on his next contract, and is turning into a key figure in New England’s offense.

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