Mario Raymond Celotto (born August 23, 1956) is a former

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 with ...

linebacker Linebacker (LB) is a playing position in gridiron football. Linebackers are members of the defensive team, and line up three to five yards behind the line of scrimmage and the defensive linemen. They are the "middle ground" of defenders, p ...

Football career

Born in

Los Angeles, California Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

and raised in

Rancho Palos Verdes, California Rancho Palos Verdes (Spanish for "Green Sticks Ranch") is a coastal city located in Los Angeles County, California atop the bluffs of the Palos Verdes Peninsula, neighboring other cities in the Palos Verdes Hills, including Palos Verdes Estate ...

to Ray and Cecilia E. Celotto, owners of Dreamland Bedding Corporation, Celotto graduated from St. Bernard High School and played

college football College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States. Unlike most ...

at the

University of Southern California The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in C ...

from 1974 to 1977. During the game against rival Notre Dame in his 1977 senior season, Celotto once recovered a fumble by Terry Eurick of Notre Dame at the Notre Dame 5-yard line and scored a touchdown. He was drafted in the 7th round (171st overall) of the

1978 NFL Draft The 1978 NFL draft was the procedure by which National Football League teams selected amateur college football players. It is officially known as the NFL Annual Player Selection Meeting. The draft was held May 2–3, 1978, at the Roosevelt Hote ...

by the

Buffalo Bills The Buffalo Bills are a professional American football team based in the Buffalo metropolitan area. The Bills compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's American Football Conference (AFC) East division. ...

. He played for the

Oakland Raiders The Oakland Raiders were a professional American football team that played in Oakland from its founding in 1960 to 1981 and again from 1995 to 2019 before relocating to the Las Vegas metropolitan area where they now play as the Las Vegas Raide ...

for the 1980 season, when the Raiders won

Super Bowl XV Super Bowl XV was an American football game between the American Football Conference (AFC) champion Oakland Raiders and the National Football Conference (NFC) champion Philadelphia Eagles to decide the National Football League (NFL) champion for ...

; the next season, he played for the Raiders,

Los Angeles Rams The Los Angeles Rams are a professional American football team based in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. The Rams compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the National Football Conference (NFC) West division. The Rams play ...

, and

Baltimore Colts The Baltimore Colts were a professional American football team that played in Baltimore from its founding in 1953 to 1984. The team now plays in Indianapolis, as the Indianapolis Colts. The team was named for Baltimore's history of horse breed ...

. After 1981, Celotto left the NFL due to a knee injury.

After football

After retiring from football, Celotto founded Humboldt Brewing Company in 1987. In 1997, Humboldt Brewing merged with Mendocino Brewing.

Personal life

Mario Celotto met Julia Lendl, who played track and volleyball at USC, and married her after she graduated with a degree in physical education. They had two sons. His younger son, Tonio Dante Celotto, played college football at the

University of Oregon The University of Oregon (UO, U of O or Oregon) is a public research university in Eugene, Oregon. Founded in 1876, the institution is well known for its strong ties to the sports apparel and marketing firm Nike, Inc, and its co-founder, billion ...

in the 2007 and 2008 seasons and graduated from Piedmont High School in 2007. After Julia divorced Mario, he married Deirdre Taylor Haizlip, group account director at Carol H. Williams Advertising. Their wedding took place on May 21, 2005 at

Charlotte Amalie, United States Virgin Islands Charlotte Amalie ( ), located on St. Thomas, is the capital and the largest city of the United States Virgin Islands. It was founded in 1666 as Taphus (meaning 'beer house' or 'beer hall' in Danish). In 1691, the town was renamed to Charlotte A ...

and officiated by The Rev. Skip Sikora from

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

. In 2009, Tonio Celotto left the team and said that he was interested in joining the

Los Angeles Police Department The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), officially known as the City of Los Angeles Police Department, is the municipal police department of Los Angeles, California. With 9,974 police officers and 3,000 civilian staff, it is the third-large ...

. On February 4, 2011, arranged by the Silicon Valley Education Foundation, Celotto visited a physics class in

Yerba Buena High School Yerba Buena High School is a public, comprehensive four-year high school located in the East San Jose area of San Jose, California, USA. Its athletic teams are well-known, and the school has the Engineering MAGNET program and the Green Construction/ ...

San Jose, California San Jose, officially San José (; ; ), is a major city in the U.S. state of California that is the cultural, financial, and political center of Silicon Valley and largest city in Northern California by both population and area. With a 2020 popul ...

to demonstrate how

Newton's laws of motion Newton's laws of motion are three basic laws of classical mechanics that describe the relationship between the motion of an object and the forces acting on it. These laws can be paraphrased as follows: # A body remains at rest, or in moti ...

apply to football.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Celotto, Mario 1956 births Living people American football linebackers Baltimore Colts players Buffalo Bills players American brewers Los Angeles Rams players Oakland Raiders players People from Eureka, California Players of American football from Los Angeles USC Trojans football players