It’s by no means too late to leap on the Deestroying bandwagon. Nevertheless, conventional sports activities diehards who’re unfamiliar along with his work might should meet up with the greater than six million followers who comply with him religiously on YouTube. The platform has been instrumental in permitting the athlete and influencer to construct a massively profitable and worthwhile inventive outlet over the previous decade.
Deestroying—actual title Donald De La Haye—has constantly confirmed that sports activities will be much more entertaining than what you’re used to seeing on recreation days. In his movies, he’s each challenged and collaborated with an All‑Professional lineup of athletes and influencers on his YouTube channel, staging uniquely entertaining, extremely athletic competitions. His success has additionally afforded him the luxurious of touring so far as New Zealand to coach with that nation’s prime athletes.
A deeper take a look at De La Haye reveals that the previous College of Central Florida kicker helped change the sport of faculty soccer as we all know it. His resolution to forgo his school scholarship to pursue his then‑fledgling social media channel helped usher within the present NIL period, which has allowed school athletes to attain large paydays.
“I feel my life is wonderful,” he says. “Everybody has their very own trials and tribulations and struggles, however I’ve so many constructive, nice issues occurring for myself. I’m joyful, extraordinarily blessed and intensely simply fortunate total.”
What appeared like an enormous gamble in 2017 now appears to be like like a no‑brainer.
The success of his channel has allowed Deestroying to get an actual style of professional soccer as a kicker. However final September, each previous‑faculty and social media‑savvy soccer followers bought their first actual style of Deestroying as an NFL sideline correspondent for the league’s YouTube‑unique broadcast between the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs and the Los Angeles Chargers in Brazil.
His reputation has prolonged his model past sports activities. Deestroying has gone from hitting discipline targets to hospitality entrepreneur, turning into a accomplice in a pair of Phoenix‑space Fats Tuesday eating places.
“I’ve the blessing of simply exhibiting up, clearly, selling, serving to with advertising and marketing, and utilizing my model,” he says.
And though it’s extremely unlikely the cameras will cease rolling on the lately engaged social media star anytime quickly, the rising calls for away from content material creation might have him quietly eager about what comes subsequent for the 29‑12 months‑previous. After asserting that he and his fiancée predict a toddler, Deestroying might be quietly plotting his social media exit technique with the intention to spend extra time at dwelling. It might additionally open up some further time for him to pursue his newfound ardour for golf a bit extra.
“It’s form of ironic, as a result of the older I get now, the much less I’m in having my entire life on social media,” he admits. “So I feel the most important problem is maintaining every part going, maintaining the fireplace and the eagerness going for social media and content material, which I like. However on the similar time, I’m a grown grownup. I’m engaged, so actual life is popping out.”
Whereas a lot of his YouTube drops are over‑the‑prime enjoyable to observe, Deestroying nonetheless slips in not‑so‑refined hints of his intense coaching routine that permit him to maintain pushing his physique bodily whereas evolving as a profitable businessman. As a part of a current Allstate marketing campaign, he kicked 1,000 40‑yard discipline targets in lower than 24 hours—a activity that highlighted the athleticism required to be a kicker.
Behind the scenes—whether or not in his decked‑out dwelling fitness center, on an athletic discipline, or in a lodge fitness center—Deestroying continues placing within the work with the intention to proceed showcasing his abilities for his thousands and thousands of followers. That, he says, received’t finish anytime quickly.
“I’m obsessive about simply train and health. I’ve been that manner since I used to be 14. So if I am going two, three days with out the fitness center, I don’t really feel like myself.”
Deestroying
Inside Deestroying’s Storage Fitness center Grind
A day within the lifetime of Deestroying, he says, makes it almost inconceivable to take care of a set schedule. From fixed flights, to late nights of filming, to waking up and studying and responding to an enormous quantity of emails, to planning the subsequent athletic problem to be filmed—and nonetheless discovering time for household—sticking to a routine has turn out to be as difficult as masking Tyreek Hill one‑on‑one.
“I normally plan the evening earlier than, relying on what I bought developing,” he says.
Discovering time to get in a exercise, although difficult, has turn out to be a non‑negotiable a part of Deestroying’s success blueprint. Whilst you see the ultimate product on social media, you don’t at all times see the work behind the scenes—and that begins within the weight room.
These days, Deestroying has been proud to point out off his newly designed and absolutely outfitted storage fitness center to his YouTube followers. Nike barbells, dumbbells, and kettlebells, together with a Tonal good fitness center, fill one facet of the house, as he walks viewers by way of what it takes to take care of a busy, unpredictable athletic schedule. “You simply bought to maintain the machine going, man.”
He says he usually sticks to a 5‑ to 6‑day cut up routine: higher physique on day one, decrease physique the subsequent, adopted by a relaxation day. Whereas his movies are reducing‑edge, his weight‑room work depends on tried‑and‑true fundamentals. He’ll cycle by way of bench presses, dumbbell shrugs, chest flys, cranium crushers, and loads of rows.
He emphasizes maintaining every rep gradual and managed to extend time beneath stress. He says that method helps construct energy and sturdiness—sufficient to face up to a full day on the sector. The outcomes of the grind, he insists, are well worth the punishment within the weight room.
“It’s simply the worst day of the week, however the very best day of the week,” he says of leg day. “I simply do these and rotate and take a day break after which begin it over.”
His coaching routine is one other extension of the substance-over-style work required to excel over the long run—a message he tries to hammer dwelling to youthful athletes and wannabe influencers. Put within the work, regardless of the challenges, and good issues comply with.
“My issues are totally different than everyone else’s issues,” he says. “It’s nearly the way you deal with it. It’s about the way you present up day by day and don’t let life beat you down and simply present up with a constructive angle.”
Deestroying
As soon as an Outcast Kicker, Deestroying Turned a Report-Setting Influencer
Whereas it’s estimated that in 2026 Texas quarterback Arch Manning will earn as much as $7 million, he’s simply one in every of many school athletes benefiting, partly, from the trail Deestroying helped open when he selected YouTube over school soccer. The NCAA dominated him ineligible in 2017 for refusing to demonetize his channel, which then had fewer than 100,000 followers.
He now sits within the coronary heart of Solar Satan nation in Tempe, AZ, at one in every of his two Fats Tuesday areas—the opposite situated in close by Glendale, the place his influencer success has allowed him to speculate $1 million into the favored nationwide cocktail chain after assembly with firm CEO Alex Monahan whereas in New Orleans for Tremendous Bowl LIX. “Alex and his group are wonderful, he says. “It made issues tremendous straightforward for me.”
Together with his model at an all-time excessive, it’s straightforward to neglect that earlier than the early controversies, Deestroying was a standout kicker within the Sunshine State. After his profession was reduce brief at UCF, he went on to a brief stint with the CFL’s Toronto Argonauts and performed two seasons with the UFL’s San Antonio Brahmas. For a second, he confirmed glimpses of what may’ve been—drilling a 55‑yard discipline purpose within the second quarter in opposition to the Michigan Panthers that traveled one other 10 yards past the uprights. However a damaged neck on a deal with in his first season, adopted by a groin harm the subsequent, successfully ended his professional profession.
“It’s been a bit of little bit of a unfortunate skilled profession, however on the finish of the day, man, I’m blessed and fortunate,” he says. “I’m joyful I get to be right here having fun with sports activities.”
Ten years into his YouTube dominance, Deestroying continues to be discovering new methods not solely to create distinctive content material, but in addition to point out off his kicking experience. A current Allstate marketing campaign set the bar: 1,000 discipline targets from 40 yards in 24 hours. The amount, he says, demanded mobility and persistence, and it gave him an opportunity to point out that each one the work within the weight room helps dispel the notion that kickers aren’t elite athletes.
“It’s very groin heavy, it’s a number of simply groin motion on a regular basis,” he says. “So your groin, hip flexors, they’re undoubtedly going to get sore.”
True to his model, he constructed an expertise across the stunt—from grills for a noon meal to blow‑up mattresses, moveable chilly tubs, and therapeutic massage tables—to interrupt up the psychological monotony of, effectively, 1,000 consecutive kicks. “Simply mentally realizing that it’s gonna be very redundant and really repetitive, I simply needed to discover a technique to distract myself someway.”
A spin wheel added additional leisure for followers however additional punishment for him: gassers, push‑ups, even barefoot kicking. Because the hours piled up, so did the ache: sore groin, tight hip flexor, again ache, leg cramps, blisters, swollen toes. Being ambidextrous helped; he switched to his left foot when the fitting turned too painful.
By evening’s finish, he completed with 1,001 discipline targets. Ultimately, he says, psychological prep was as vital as leg power. “I’d be fairly mad at myself,” he says of a foul stretch. “I’d simply should take a breather, step again for a second, simply form of regroup myself and maintain telling myself: ‘You’ve completed this for what number of years now? That is straightforward. Simply lock in and deal with enterprise.’”
One Golf Duel Extra Essential than Viral Views
His YouTube channel has collected greater than 1.6 billion views. Since launching it over a decade in the past, he’s collaborated with a number of NFL stars together with Cam Newton, A.J. Inexperienced, Marquette King, and this 12 months’s No. 1 draft decide, Travis Hunter. In New Zealand he’s educated with prime rugby star Ardie Savea, whereas again dwelling within the U.S. he has toured the locker rooms of almost each main school soccer program.
His best athletic problem, nonetheless, could also be sitting throughout from him at Sunday household dinner. Together with his current engagement, Deestroying isn’t solely gaining a life accomplice—he’s additionally inheriting an avid golf‑loving father‑in‑legislation who’s very happy to beat him on the course each time they get the possibility.
It’s a activity he takes as critically as matching up in opposition to different influencer athletes, akin to Logan Paul, whom he beat in a 2019 race, working a blistering 10.8 within the 100 meters.
“We’d exit to golf, and I used to be horrible,” he says. “It didn’t really feel good to see this man each time and simply be trash at one thing he cares about a lot. So I put a bit of little bit of time in it. I purchased some golf equipment, went on the market, and I bought bit by the bug. I used to be addicted. I used to be {golfing} like 10 hours a day at one level, and the bug is actual.”
The obsession has been equal elements enjoyable and frustration, however in case you’ve seen the work Dee places in, and the outcomes that maintain coming from it, you understand there’s no give up. Whereas going from Topgolf to the PGA looks like a attain—for now—it’s not utterly out of the query. And possibly that’s Deestroying’s final technique. “I at all times joke round and say, I’m gonna go professional in 5 years,” he says. “However who is aware of if that joke is likely to be a actuality?”
