Ryan Nece

Ryan Clint Nece was born on February 24, 1979, in San Bernardino, California. Nece attended Pacific High School (San Bernardino, California),^[2][3] where he claimed prestigious titles of All-City honors and team MVP, while also taking on the role of team captain as both a junior and senior. In addition to that, he received all-league honors in basketball and track and field.^[4]

Nece graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and was a four-year starter for the Bruins and finished his career with 281 career tackles (173 solo), with 22 tackles for loss and 10 sacks. He started out in his redshirt year as a safety but converted to linebacker afterwards. In just his first year, he secured a first-team Freshman All-American honors. The following year, 1999, he finished third on the team with 65 stops. In his junior year, despite playing with a shoulder that required surgery, he was selected for the 2000 pre-season Watch List for the Butkus Award. In his final year at UCLA, he was awarded an honorable mention for All-Pac-10 selection and Butkus Award semifinalist. ^[5]

The United Football league announced on September 14, 2010, that Nece would be doing sideline reporting during live games on the Versus network. He joined the Pac-12 Network as a sideline reporter and football analyst in 2012.

In 2010, Nece and former teammate Jeb Terry founded Straightcast Media, a technology which was used by more than 200 NFL players to capture mobile video that could be shared across multiple platforms, including television, digital, and social media. In 2015, Fox Sports announced that it had acquired assets from StraightCast Media. ^[8] Following the acquisition, Nece worked at Fox Sports as a football analyst.

During his time as a broadcaster and entrepreneur, Nece was simultaneously a Principal at Arenda Capital Management, a private investment firm in Los Angeles, California, and a Partner at Provident Investment Advisor. Following these investment experiences, Nece went on to co-found Next Play Capital, a minority-owned and led Venture Capital firm that had given investors access to top-tier, access constrained venture funds and venture-backed companies across their full lifecycle. During this time, Nece was an early investor in Tonal, FanDuel, Rubrik, Stemcentrx, and Pure Storage. ^[9] In 2023, the firm had joined forces with Legacy Ventures, under the new name of Next Legacy Partners.^[10]

In 2006, as a way to formalize his own charitable contributions to the community, Nece started the Ryan Nece Foundation, an organization that empowers teens to embrace the "Power of Giving" through volunteerism and inspirational leadership programs.^[11] Nece actively serves as the chairman to this day.

Nece also serves as the founder and chairman of NextPlayU, a virtual training program designed for athletes that are transitioning into careers after sports.^[12]

Nece was raised by his parents, Ronnie Lott and Cathy Nece. His parents chose to give him his mother's maiden name with the hopes he would create his own identity and avoid expectations from being Lott's son. Nece and Lott became the second father-and-son duo to both win a Super Bowl, joining Bob and Brian Griese.^[13] Nece is married to actress and singer Willa Ford. They held a wedding ceremony in April 2015.^[14] In March 2016, it was announced that the couple was expecting their first child.^[15] In 2016, they welcomed a son.^[16]