If Tupac Shakur played soccer: goalkeeper, rated 86

Tupac Shakur as a soccer player: scouting report

Tupac Shakur goes in goal, the position that asks one player to stand alone with everyone watching. As a teenager he studied acting, poetry and even ballet at the Baltimore School for the Arts, and a keeper needs that blend of footwork and expression: the balance to set his feet before a shot and the presence to fill the goal for a striker staring him down. Goalkeeping is the best part of his card.

Dribbling is his next best mark, which makes him a keeper who will happily take a touch around a pressing forward rather than hit it long. His pace lets him race off his line to close down a one on one, and his defending is strong enough to read the ball over the top. He wrote poetry for much of his life and moved between music and film, starring in Juice and Above the Rim, and that creative range shows in his distribution, which can be a quick throw to a fullback or a long ball to a winger. The album title All Eyez on Me works as a fair description of any keeper facing a penalty.

Shooting is the weak spot, and for a keeper that is close to irrelevant. Fullback and central midfield are both workable second options thanks to his feet, but his value is clearly highest in goal. Pair him with center backs who like to step into midfield, so his comfort on the ball lets your team play out from the back. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2017; in the keeper rounds, take him early.

Plays like An agile keeper with quick feet and total self belief

Put Tupac Shakur in your lineup

11 rolls, a starting eleven, 38 matches. Can you go 38-0? Free, no account.