Former LSU Running Back Leonard Fournette Donating 56,000 Meals to New Orleans Area

LSU running back Leonard Fournette hasn't been shy about giving back to various communities across the country and amidst the COVID-19 outbreak, once again he's doing his part to help in any way he can. On Tuesday, the Jacksonville Jaguars announced that Fournette would be donating 7,000 meals per week over the next two months to the New Orleans area.

New Orleans is one of the cities most devastated by the coronavirus outbreak with over 21,000 confirmed cases and 1,013 deaths as a result of the disease.

For the next eight weeks, @_fournette is donating 7,000 meals per week that will be distributed by @2ndHarvestGNOA in his hometown of New Orleans.
— Jacksonville Jaguars (@Jaguars) April 14, 2020

This isn't the first time Fournette has given back to a community in need. In 2015, as a member of the purple and gold, Fournette was granted permission by the NCAA to auction off a jersey he wore against South Carolina to help the relief effort in the aftermath of severe flooding in the South Carolina area. The auction raised $101,000 for the South Carolina flood relief efforts.

Two years later, when Hurricane Harvey devastated Houston, Fournette donated $50,000 to help in its relief efforts as well. Fournette's story is one that's well known in New Orleans as his home was destroyed during Hurricane Katrina.

He described the horrors of that time in his life while he was a member of the Tigers back in 2015.

"The hurricane was coming. New Orleans always had hurricanes, but no one took them serious. We thought Hurricane Katrina wasn't going to be as serious as it was," Fournette said. "There was too much traffic, we waited too long so we got a hotel on Canal street. I can't remember the name of the hotel because they took it down. We were in there and the hotel was catching on fire, people were killing each other in there. The water was rising so we had to leave. We were picking up our grandparents, carrying them through water. We slept on the bridge for four days and five nights, just surviving, seeing dead bodies on the water floating around or just staying on the bridge. People were dying on the bridge."

Fournette would go on to be one of the most physically dominating high school running backs in recent memory and ultimately wind up at LSU, where he carried on that tradition. In three seasons with the Tigers, Fournette rushed for 3,830 yards and 40 touchdowns while gaining another 526 yards through the passing game.

He was drafted No. 4 overall by the Jacksonville Jaguars in the 2017 draft where he's rushed for 2,631 yards and 17 touchdowns in three NFL seasons.