Whitney Mercilus, the 21-year-old NFL linebacker who played for the University of Illinois in college, was selected with the 26th overall pick by the Houston Texans in the first round of the 2012 NFL Draft .
Wilner Mercilus, Whitney’s father who moved from Haiti to the U.S. in 1985, says that newspaper stories regarding his having worked three jobs to support his family at one point are simply untrue. As a man of honor, he felt compelled to set the record straight as he was quoted by Chron.com having said:
“I have never had three jobs at one time. That isn’t really humanly possible for a man to work three full-time jobs at one time. I had only two jobs at any given time.”
Not to say that Whitney is anything short of a hard worker, as hard work runs in the family. “Hard-working” is the most common phrased used by the family to describe the Texans’ new All-American linebacker Whitney Mercilus.
Whitney boasts a degree in community health from the University of Illinois at which he played college football. The Ted Hendricks Award winner started playing football in high school, was introduced at a news conference Friday afternoon at Reliant Stadium.
Father Wilner worked as a New York taxicab driver prior to moving his family to Akron, Ohio, where he worked as a maintenance engineer for seventeen-years at GOJO Industries. He currently works as a nursing home physical therapy assistant.
Whitney’s younger brother Donald is 6? tall and 190-pounds. While Don is anything shy of little, he’s not quite as large as his 6’4? tall and 261-pound “big” brother.
