Will Campbell was skinny when he arrived in Baton Rouge.

Asked how much he squatted at that time, Campbell was embarrassed.

“I could probably squat maybe 400 pounds, maybe, on a good day, with a lot of smelling salts and caffeine,” he said eventually. Lately, he’s been maxing out at 616.

Campbell was then a top prospect out of Neville High in Monroe, Louisiana. You couldn’t miss him on a high school football field: his 6-foot-6 frame towered over the other athletes.

“I can’t hardly think of any times that he got beat,” said Chad Johnson, Neville’s offensive line coach.

Still, he was all length and no bulk. Campbell knew he needed to transform his body when he enrolled at LSU in the spring of 2022.

By August, he’d gained 50 pounds.

Even as a true freshman playing one of the most difficult positions in sports – left tackle, which protects the quarterback’s blindside – he was named a starter for the Tigers.

His work ethic practically demanded it.

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That work ethic that has made Campbell a player head coach Brian Kelly consistently points to as an example for other young members of the team.

“Across the board, with especially the younger players, can they be a Will Campbell?” Kelly said of how he’s evaluating the team’s newcomers. “Every day, when he was a freshman, you knew what you were going to get.”

Campbell makes it a point to emphasize to freshmen that the path to playing time is hard work, just the way he earned it.

“You’ve just got to come in here and work hard, just put your head down,” Campbell said. “At the end of the day, everything is in your hands… So do you want to talk about it or do you want to go do it?”

“When he says something, it’s got substance”

Campbell’s Southern drawl is the type you’d grow used to hearing at a Monroe corner store, but maybe not what you’d expect from someone who spends his Saturdays on national TV.

When you talk to him, it’s striking how humble and unassuming he is.

And yet, chances are that if you took a locker room poll of who the best player on LSU’s team is, the majority would say Campbell.

It’s not a hard conclusion to come to, even without witnessing how he throws pass-rushers to the ground, taking note of his uncommon quickness for his size or seeing how many sacks he’s allowed in his 1,687 snaps at LSU (only three, and none since his freshman year).

All you’d have to look at is the number on his back on the practice field: No. 7.

It’s a number that looks so aesthetically odd on a lineman that you’d have to conclude that the guy who wears it is special.

The meaning behind it goes deeper; the number is annually given out to LSU’s most electric playmaker dating back to 2008 with All-American cornerback Patrick Peterson. In 2023, Campbell was the recipient.

However, due to NCAA rules, Campbell wears his normal No. 66 on game days, which perhaps better suits his low-key style.

Despite his quiet nature, Campbell is a confident leader, even dating back to his high school days. He makes his points in few words, but he has no problem offering praise or criticism.

“When he says something, it’s got substance,” Johnson said.

“I’m not going to be the guy that’s, you know, just talking to talk, because I don’t like those type of guys,” Campbell said. “When I say something, I want it to be meaningful.”

Campbell holds himself to a high standard. When he gets beat in a rep at practice, he makes sure it doesn’t happen twice. Losing is not an option.

“If he got beat, he’d kind of grit his teeth, set his jaw, and you know, he’d get back to work,” said former Neville head coach Mickey McCarty, now the school’s principal.

Campbell was once held out of a second round playoff game in his junior year with a groin injury, much to his agitation.

With Neville down 8-6 in the first half, he could no longer sit and watch.

“Will is going to the damn bus, and he’s getting his stuff on,” Johnson remembers a coach saying in disbelief.

The coaches rushed to ask Campbell’s parents in the stands if it was okay if their son played through injury.

It wouldn’t have mattered what they said. Campbell was already gone.

Minutes later, he was in full pads and warming up on the sideline. He came out for the second half, and Neville won 19-15.

“I don’t like getting beat. It doesn’t sit right with me,” Campbell said. “I don’t like losing in any form or fashion.”

That attitude toward losing is why he’s been one of LSU’s most outspokenly dissatisfied players after back-to-back 10-win seasons in Kelly’s first two years.

“10 games is cool at other schools. Not here,” Campbell said. “10 games gets people fired.”

“Our lives have been forever changed”

Campbell has always been a self-motivated player, but, this season, he’s playing for more.

In January, Campbell’s 16-year-old cousin, Tarver Braddock, passed as a result of a campfire accident. Their bond was tight-knit, and the loss affected Campbell deeply.

“Will and Tarver were like two peas in a pod,” Campbell’s mother Holly told the Reveille. “I don’t think anybody thought Tarver was funnier than Will. I would constantly be scolding them in church.”

“[Tarver] was a giver. He was a doer,” his mother Lindsey Braddock said to the North Delta Network. “He just loved to make people happy.”

In honor of Tarver, his parents, Brett and Lindsey, established the Tarver Braddock Foundation, whose mission is to spread “love, laughter and happiness through random acts of kindness,” paying respect to Tarver’s giving nature.

The foundation has hosted a home run derby, had the local baseball field named in his honor, gifted a car to a hearing-impaired student and donated thousands to local ministries and to students for scholarships, among many other charitable acts.

“We do anything and everything we can to keep his name alive and remembered,” Holly said.

In April, the foundation put on a football camp at Neville hosted by Campbell and several LSU teammates that had 145 attendees.

Even amidst tragedy, Campbell continues to uplift others in his community, not unlike how he uplifts his teammates. Keeping that mindset despite his devastating loss required the same mental fortitude and commitment to growth that Campbell has always displayed.

Campbell keeps evolving and growing no matter what’s thrown at him, his coaches say, and so does his role on the team.

This year, with quarterback Jayden Daniels gone to the NFL, LSU will employ more of an outside zone running scheme that’ll require Campbell utilizing his athleticism to get out in space and run long distances to make blocks.

Beyond that, an offense with a lot of contributors taking on unfamiliar roles will need Campbell’s steady leadership.

But, as always, Campbell is prepared, and it’s his preparation that has him confident LSU will exceed the standard it’s set in the past two years.

Because when Will Campbell practices hard, the team takes notice and emulates it.

“I just got to come in and set the example by the way I approach every day,” Campbell said.