FORT WORTH, Texas — Daniel Trejo figured his entire life came down to this punt.
Here he was, just a kid from Castleberry high school who started his college career at Tarrant County College, kicked his way to NAIA Texas Wesleyan, standing at the University of Texas’ 8-yard line playing for the Texas Longhorns.
When UT hosted Louisiana-Monroe on Sept. 3 maybe five people inside Darrel K. Royal Stadium had any idea what some random player with the famous name went through to get there, just to punt.
On the first play of the fourth quarter in UT’s blowout win over the Warhawks, Trejo waited for the snap.
“If you mess this up, everything you went through, all of these struggles, sleeping three hours a night, working at Amazon, going to school, and you’re never going to play again,” he told himself. “If you give up, or you’re too scared, no one will notice. No one will care.”
He just focused on the ball. The ball was snapped. The rush was coming.
Just like he had done so many times before at Castleberry, at Texas Wesleyan, and on his own, he caught the ball and put his right foot on it.
The box score reads that Daniel Trejo’s first punt at the University of Texas ended in a fair catch.
There is no box score that could quantify what the University of Texas player nicknamed “Machete” did just to kick the hell out of that ball.
Castleberry to juco to Texas Wesleyan with some Amazon
After Trejo finished his high school career as the punter and kicker at Castleberry high school where he was second-team all district in 2017, he figured his football career was over.
He enrolled at Tarrant County College, and for the next 18 months and a half he was a student. Then came the itch to be a student athlete again.
On his own, he returned to kicking and immediately tried to kick a ball to Atlanta without properly stretching. He was asking to get hurt, which he did.
Nothing terrible, but another stop sign.
One day he was sitting in class at TCCC, and he asked himself, “What am I doing?”
Before trying to kick a ball again, he did some research. He warmed up. He trained. It started to all come back.
In 2019, he registered for classes at North Texas, and asked the football team about potentially walking on.
“I was sure they would have me at least try to walk on. They said they had enough guys,” he said. “Worst day of my life.”
He had not paid to attend classes at UNT, so this part of this story does not include time in Denton.
He went home, where his cousin said he should try to look at Texas Wesleyan.
While enrolling in January of 2019 his counselor turned out to be the equipment manager for the Rams, who introduced Trejo to assistant coach Paul Duckworth.
Duckworth told Trejo they wanted him to try out, which immediately he agreed to only to flop on his audition. Trejo was kicking field goals and punts, and the coach watching all of this didn’t say a word.
Trejo told himself, “That’s it. I’m done.”
The coach told him, “I’ve never seen anyone kick a punt 60 yards into the wind.”
“OK,” Trejo said. “So, that’s good for me?”
He made the team on the spot.
Of course, the year he did make the team was 2020. COVID killed all but two of the Rams’ games that year, and Trejo was stuck mostly on the sidelines.
He wasn’t on scholarship, and while he was given some financial aid and some grants he worked at Amazon and lived at home with his parents.
In 2021, it finally lined up and Trejo was to kick and punt.
Then he got COVID. Bad COVID.
“Body totally shut down. Couldn’t run. I thought, ‘Are you serious?’ ” he asked.
Of course.
He couldn’t be around the team. Because of protocols, he would have to miss the first two months of the season. He called the doctors every day, and the two-month process was cut in half.
Making the team
Trejo missed the TWU 2021 scrimmage and the first two games of the regular season before he was cleared.
On Nov. 6, 2021 against Central Arkansas, Trejo averaged 49.2 yards on eight punts. Seven of those punts were downed inside the 20-yard line, and four traveled more than 50 yards.
One of his punts traveled a school-record 61 yards.
A UCA coach asked Trejo after the game, “What are you doing here? You need to go to the big schools.”
That season, he averaged 39 yards per punt, made 5 of 6 field goals, and finished second-team all-conference. His 47 points are the most by a kicker in a season in TWU history.
Because of COVID, Trejo had one more year of eligibility at TWU. He was making connections in the professional world, including one with a local judge.
Trejo had a good thing at TWU, but if he made this far he figured he might as well take a look at some of those big schools.
Heading to Texas
Trejo started working out with a kicking coach in Frisco, who was also working with Cameron Dicker. Dicker The Kicker was a four-year kicker at Texas, and he saw Trejo while preparing for the 2022 NFL draft.
Dicker mentioned Trejo to some of the coaches at Texas, who reached out to see some game footage.
At the time, Trejo was finishing his undergraduate degree from TWU while working at Amazon, and training to play football somewhere.
Texas offered him a spot to walk-on, and that was it. He would have to compete for the spot, with nothing else promised.
He would be a 24-year-old first-year player at one of the biggest programs in the sport.
“I knew this was the only time I’d ever get this kind of an offer, and if I didn’t take it I would wonder for the rest of my life, ‘What would have happened?' ” Trejo said.
Trejo graduated at the end of July, and because of some issues with his transcripts he could not join Texas for fall practice until Aug. 20.
He had two weeks to cram all of the pertinent special teams calls before the Longhorns’ first game of the season.
Trejo was behind redshirt freshman, Aussie Isaac Pearson, but was told to be ready to punt in that first game.
The Horns didn’t punt until they were leading 45-3 in the second half. Pearson mishandled the snap, nearly ran with the ball before connecting on punt that traveled 15 yards.
On the sideline, Trejo was told he would punt next if needed.
On the first play of the fourth quarter, Trejo trotted out near the Longhorns’ own end zone.
“You have to remember, I’m used to playing games at Castleberry and Texas Wesleyan; there were 100,000 people at this game,” he said.
Trejo did not see this as a punt.
This was his life.
The ball was snapped, and the Warhawks came after him.
In one fluid motion, Daniel Trejo caught that ball and punted that thing as hard as he could. Forty three yards later, the Warhawks’ Boogie Knight called for a fair catch.
To the fans, and those watching the game, it was a nothing play in the fourth quarter of a blowout.
That play made him the starting punter at the University of Texas.
“I’m the starter and that’s how it’s going to be until someone beats me out,” said Trejo, who averages 42 yards per punt, and ranks fourth in the Big 12.
He has one more year of eligibility, and currently is pursuing a master’s degree in strategic communications; he hopes that Texas will put him on scholarship. Until then, he maximizes every single “free penny” offered to UT student athletes.
“I eat breakfast, lunch and dinner (at the University of Texas training table),” he said. “I have not bought any food since I got here.”
The kid who couldn’t figure out what to do with his life at Tarrant County College is now a part of the University of Texas football team that faces its biggest game of the season on Saturday against unbeaten TCU, complete with his own nickname.
His teammates call him “Machete,” the name of actor Danny Trejo from the movie with the same name that was directed by Robert Rodriguez.
No, Daniel Trejo has never met Danny Trejo, but he’d like to. Don’t be surprised when he does.
At this point, don’t be surprised when Daniel Trejo punts in the NFL.
“I’m going to give it a shot,” Trejo said.
The box score says Daniel Trejo’s first NCAA punt traveled 43 yards, but it covered, and changed, his entire life.
