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ATHENS, Ga. — They slept in hotels. Some nights it was an aunt’s living room, other nights an uncle’s couch. The Starks family of four — mom, dad, daughter and son, Malaki — found shelter wherever they could, depending on the kindness of family and friends or finding the money when they could.
Many years later, Malaki Starks will say that one of the causes closest to his heart is homelessness because he knows what it was like. Between his third- and sixth-grade years, the family experienced it in and around their hometown of Jefferson, Ga., but mom and dad kept working, and things got better.
“My parents just worked. If we didn’t have anything, if we had anything, they just worked,” Starks said. “And they got the opportunity to start working and earn some really good money, good enough to where we could get out of the situation we were in.”
His father is now the manager at a chicken plant. His mother stays at home. And Starks can use the money he gets as a college football player to send to his family, while he’s on track to make a lot more next year after the NFL Draft, where he’s likely to be one of the first safeties taken, almost certainly as a first-round pick if he chooses to go pro.
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And to hear people tell it, nobody deserves it more.
“He is such an incredible kid,” Georgia coach Kirby Smart said. “It was a joy recruiting him.”
“Man, what a great kid,” Georgia secondary coach Travaris Robinson said. “I talk to my kids a lot about Malaki. Malaki is a guy who you want your son to be like.”
Malaki Starks has 120 tackles and five interceptions during his Georgia career. (Kim Klement Neitzel / USA Today)
Robinson told a story this preseason: He was gaining a little weight and told Starks he was going to start running. Starks asked Robinson what time he was going to run. Robinson replied before dawn, at about 5:30 a.m.
“So I get in at 5:30, and Malaki’s in the dang indoor (facility) waiting on me,” Robinson recalled.
They ran that first day, and when it was over, Starks asked what time the coach was coming in the next day. Same time, Robinson answered, and they ran again, but then Robinson’s knee was bothering him, and he wasn’t going to run again. But Starks texted him late that night, asking what time they were running the next morning. So back out they went.
“It’s the same thing he does on the field. He’s holding people accountable,” Robinson said. “I think that’s one of his greatest traits. Yes, he’s a good football player. Yes, he’s a great ball hawk, all that kind of stuff. But at the end of the day, Malaki holds people accountable, and he holds himself accountable. That’s why he’s a good player.”
That’s one of the reasons, at least. Starks was a five-star recruit, which isn’t unusual at Georgia, but because of all the blue-chip talent on the roster, it is unusual to start as a true freshman. It’s basically unheard of to start right away in the secondary and to flourish: Tyson Campbell is now a starter for the NFL’s Jacksonville Jaguars, but he struggled when thrown out there as a true freshman in 2018 and eventually was pulled.
Starks, on the other hand, made his debut against Oregon in the opener in 2022.
“So all the knocks and all the things said out there about you can’t start as a freshman at Georgia, it’s too hard to play on defense,” Smart said. “The first game he ever was in, I guess Oregon, he started and started ever since.”
Starks competed in a lot of sports growing up: football, basketball and track. He had a cousin, Sammy Williams, who was a high school star as a running back. Starks’ older sister played basketball. Starks looked up to them but also the other high school stars in and around Jefferson. That was always the goal, to be successful at that level.
At some point, it became obvious he could do more. And so Starks went on the recruiting circuit, with the high-profile camps and college visits. But he still spent most of his time in Jefferson, working for years at the city’s recreation center.
“The biggest thing is when I was a kid, people poured so much into me,” Starks said. “Like my parents, my older cousins. People I saw at the highest level. For me, the highest level was high school. They came back and spent time with me. My mom always told me that God gave me a gift, and it would be a shame and a sin not to use it and not to give back.”
His mother, Tisha, first told him that in middle school. God gives everyone a gift, Tisha told her son, whatever it may be. Starks’ gift is to play football, and he can use that to impact lives.
Some of that is earning money via name, image and likeness opportunities. Starks just signed a deal with Rhoback, an apparel brand, joining other college stars like Texas quarterback Quinn Ewers, Ohio State safety Caleb Downs and Alabama quarterback Jalen Milroe. Starks, represented by Everett Sports Management, reportedly has deals with Dick’s Sporting Goods, Beats by Dre, Powerade and more.
But it’s not just pocketing money to send home. One day this spring, Starks held a camp for disadvantaged kids, sponsored by Associated Credit Union’s foundation. It wasn’t a huge event, about a dozen kids, so it could be more targeted. The camp brought kids from Atlanta to Athens and took a tour of Sanford Stadium and the Georgia campus.
The highlight may have been a pickup football game at Meyers quad, where ESPN’s “GameDay” usually sets up when it goes to Athens. Georgia receiver Dominic Lovett joined the group, along with Starks’ girlfriend, and the campers, engaging in a spirited seven-on-seven. Or six-on-six, depending on who bowed out.
At one point, Starks caught a deflection and returned it for a pick six. On another play, he counted to five Mississippi and then rushed the quarterback — Lovett — who heaved the ball downfield, leading to an argument over defensive holding.
Rob Kremer, a public relations specialist who has also worked with Champ Bailey, watched the game and how Starks carried himself.
“Champ’s pretty similar,” Kremer said.
The game wrapped up after about an hour. Nobody got hurt, much to the Georgia coaches’ delight. The campers went home to Atlanta. Starks went back to football life: spring practice, then summer workouts, then appearing at SEC media days, then preseason and now a junior season during which he may be one of college football’s biggest stars.
“I never thought — I won’t say I never thought I’d get here; I never thought it would be this big, I guess I would say,” Starks said. “People often ask me what would I want my legacy to be. Obviously, I want to be known as a really good football player. That’s why I came here. But mostly for the impact I left on other people’s lives. How I affected other people to be better. That’s what I wanted to be remembered for.”
(Top photo: Kevin C. Cox / Getty Images)
