Kwity Paye ( ; born 19 November 1998) is a Liberian professional

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

defensive end Defensive end (DE) is a defensive position in the sport of gridiron football. This position has designated the players at each end of the defensive line, but changes in formations over the years have substantially changed how the position is ...

for the Indianapolis Colts of the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...

(NFL). He was born in Guinea as a refugee of the First Liberian Civil War and emigrated to the United States as a baby. Paye played college football at

Michigan Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...

and was drafted by the Colts in the first round of the

2021 NFL Draft The 2021 NFL Draft was the 86th National Football League Draft, the annual meeting of National Football League (NFL) franchises to select newly eligible players for the 2021 NFL season. The draft was held in Cleveland from April 29 to May 1, 202 ...

Early years

Paye was born on 19 November 1998, to a Liberian

Krahn The Krahn are an ethnic group of Liberia and Ivory Coast. This group belongs to the Kru language family and its people are sometimes referred to as the Wee, Guéré, Sapo, or Wobe. It is likely that Western contact with the Kru language is t ...

mother in a refugee camp in Guinea in the aftermath of the First Liberian Civil War. Named Kwity after his maternal grandfather, who was killed during the war, his mother brought him and his brother Komotay to

Providence, Rhode Island Providence is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island. One of the oldest cities in New England, it was founded in 1636 by Roger Williams, a Reformed Baptist theologian and religious exile from the Massachusetts ...

in the United States when he was six months old. He and his brother found an affinity for

growing up there, with Kwity later attending

Bishop Hendricken High School Bishop Hendricken High School (or Hendricken) is a Catholic, all-male, college preparatory high school located in Warwick, Rhode Island, in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence. Founded by the Brothers of the Holy Cross in 1959, and named ...

Warwick, Rhode Island Warwick ( or ) is a city in Kent County, Rhode Island, the third largest city in the state with a population of 82,823 at the 2020 census. It is located approximately south of downtown Providence, Rhode Island, southwest of Boston, Massachu ...

. Playing

running back A running back (RB) is a member of the offensive backfield in gridiron football. The primary roles of a running back are to receive handoffs from the quarterback to rush the ball, to line up as a receiver to catch the ball, and block. Ther ...

and

, he was named Rhode Island's

Gatorade Football Player of the Year The Gatorade Player of the Year awards are given annually to up and coming high school student-athletes in the United States. They are given for boys' baseball, boys' and girls' basketball, boys' and girls' cross country, boys' football, boys' a ...

as a senior in 2016. Paye originally committed to play college football at Boston College, but later switched to the

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

College career

As a true freshman at Michigan in 2017, Paye played in nine games and had five tackles and one sack. As a sophomore in 2018, he started four games and recorded 29 tackles and two sacks. As a junior he started 11 games and finished with 50 tackles and 6.5 sacks. Paye returned to Michigan for his senior year in 2020 but only played in four games due to the season being affected by the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...

Professional career

Paye was drafted by the Indianapolis Colts in the first round (21st overall) of the

. He signed his four-year rookie contract on 6 May 2021. In his rookie season, he finished with four sacks, 32 total tackles (16 solo), one pass defended, and one forced fumble. He was named to the PFWA All-Rookie Team. In the 2022 season, Paye appeared in 13 games. He finished with six sacks and 45 total tackles (32 solo).

References

External links

Indianapolis Colts bioMichigan Wolverines bio
{{DEFAULTSORT:Paye, Kwity 1998 births Living people Players of American football from Providence, Rhode Island American football defensive ends Michigan Wolverines football players American people of Liberian descent African-American players of American football Indianapolis Colts players Krahn people Liberian players of American football Liberian refugees 21st-century African-American sportspeople Bishop Hendricken High School alumni