Meet Michael Wilson, The Closest Thing To A Kiwi In The NFL Right Now
There was a moment a few years back when it kinda felt like grid-iron was closing the gap on the usual mainstream sports of Australasia. We had NRL players toying with career switches. There were new local broadcast deals. The sport had a real buzz... and then nothing really came of it. The NFL still has a large and passionate fanbase in Aotearoa and Australia, no doubting that, but that crossover appeal never got past the flirting stage. Looking back that probably required the Jarryd Hayne experiment to be a whole lot more successful than it was and as we’ve subsequently learned that bloke is not one you want to be relying upon.
It’s notable that the bloke who made the most successful league/union crossover was the one who went at the youngest age. Jordan Mailata never progressed past the U20s for the South Sydney Rabbitohs, his size was a bit too much of a hindrance in the fast-paced and flowing sport of rugby league – Mailata standing 6’8 and massive. But NFL scouts took a notice of him and pretty soon he was on the International Player Pathway Programme.
Lots of prospects find their way into that particular development course, including several New Zealanders. Lone Toailoa, Lance Leota, and Shawn Tuione are a few names who’ve trialled for the IPPP over the past couple years. It’s one of those outreach things that the NFL likes to pat itself on the back for as part of a wider expansion campaign which has seen official games held in England, Mexico, and Germany while individual teams also now have designated overseas commercial territories – whatever that means. The Los Angeles Rams and Philadelphia Eagles have New Zealand as theirs (both teams also have dibs on Australia as well as a couple other places). In theory that means that they get dibs on bringing a game or a training camp or various exhibition opportunities in those areas... though it remains mostly just a theory.
Mailata’s progress has been incredible. Within a few years of taking up the sport he was been drafted by the Philadelphia Eagles. Pretty soon he was a starting offensive tackle. Earlier this year he played in the Super Bowl. It helps that he had time to learn the game in his journey, rather than trying to jump straight into the highest level like Jarryd Hayne and Valentine Holmes did. But his case clearly proves what we all knew to begin with: that there is so much sporting talent in this part of the world and if the NFL wants a piece of the pie then they can have a piece.
The thing is... the NFL doesn’t really need any more athletes. They’re fine with what they’ve got. The NFL is not going to go out of its way to develop international dudes when there are local fellas who can do the job. Commercial expansion, yeah now we’re talking. Those jokers are all about making money. But with athlete expansion they can take it or leave it. Good for those who make it but it doesn’t make a difference. It’s all the same to the National Football League.
Thus New Zealand’s history of NFL players is a short one. Riki Ellison was the trailblazer, the Christchurch native moved to America as a teenager when his mother remarried (he’d also lived in Malaysia for a bit) and did four years as a linebacker for the USC Trojans – including winning a national championship in 1978. He was selected by the San Francisco 49ers as part of the legendary 1983 NFL Draft. This was the year that John Elway, Dan Marino, Eric Dickerson, Jim Kelly, and a bunch of others all went in the first round... Riki Ellison had to wait until the fifth round (117th pick overall) but no dramas there. He’d win three Super Bowl championships with the Niners as part of the Joe Montana/Jerry Rice Era.
Ellison is related to former All Blacks utility Tamati Ellison, as well as having a few legendary rugby playing ancestors from earlier in the All Blacks/Maori All Blacks lineage, although the most globally famous sporting relative of his is probably his son Rhett Ellison who followed in his father’s footsteps as an NFL player. In Rhett’s case he was a tight end. Rhett went to the same college as his father and went on to play eight seasons in the league between the Minnesota Vikings and the New York Giants before retiring in 2020. Rhett was born and raised in the USA outside of three years in Christchurch while he was a primary schooler so his kiwi-ness is kinda tenuous... but he was the closest we had for awhile there.
The other major figure was David Dixon. His is a remarkable story: he was a young rugby player in Papakura, out for a night at the movies, when a travelling American scout happened to notice him and next thing he was playing for Arizona State University and went on to be drafted in the ninth round of the 1992 Draft. Dixon was an offensive lineman, primarily at right guard. He bounced around a few teams early in his career, including sitting on the practice squad of the Dallas Cowboys when they won the 1993 Super Bowl, before settling in Minnesota for a decade. He retired in 2004.
More recently we had the fun journey of Paul Lasike who was a rugby player of decent note growing up and moved to the States to attend Brigham Young University, a famed Mormon school that has educated quite a few kiwi sportsfolk of that faith through the years. However his main conversion during that time was from rugby to gridiron. From there the running back went undrafted but was given a nudge by the Arizona Cardinals during the 2015 preseason. He did pocket a touchdown during those preseason experiences though was eventually cut and landed on the practice squad of the Chicago Bears instead.
The Bears envisaged him more in the fullback position (a backfield blocker, not a position that many teams still utilise) and the following season he made it to the 53-man active roster. There he played 10 games during the 2016 campaign. Mostly as a rush blocker although he did get three carries for eight yards, as well as making one catch for three yards. 11 total offensive yards. Not a lot but it is an Aotearoa NFL record. Granted, Ellison did make some yardage on intercept and fumble recovery returns over the years. So did Dixon, actually, who once returned a fumble recovery for four yards in a playoff game.
Lasike’s NFL journey came to an end after that season. The Bears didn’t re-sign him and he left the sport, returning to rugby union where he ended up representing the USA internationally. He was even part of their 2019 Rugby World Cup squad. There are a few Paul Lasike x NFL articles in The Niche Cache’s archive. Here’s a good one to start with.
That’s pretty much it. You can make a case for Stephen Paea, a Tongan defensive tackle who was born in Auckland but grew up in his homeland before moving to the States whilst in high school. Paea spent eight years in the league between four different teams, with his early days at the Chicago Bears proving his best. Similarly Johan Asiata was born in Christchurch but mostly grew up in Hawai’i. He played two games for the Chicago Bears as an offensive lineman in 2010.
There hasn’t been a kiwi in the NFL since Paul Lasike’s short but memorable stint and as the 2023 season edges close to its kickoff there isn’t going to be one this year either. But there is a bloke who comes close.
Michael Wilson was drafted by the Arizona Cardinals as a late-third round pick. He’s a wide receiver who went to Stanford – where he met his partner Sophia Smith, one of America’s best young athletes in that other form of football. Smith started every game for the USA at the FIFA Women’s World Cup co-hosted in Aotearoa and Australia including scoring two goals in the win against Vietnam. Funnily enough, one of Wilson’s new teammates is Zach Ertz who is married to Julie Ertz who was also a member of that USA team. Ertz, being injured, was even able to duck down to New Zealand for the first two matches before reporting back to Arizona for training camp. As a rookie, Wilson did not have that luxury... however he did follow it passionately from afar.
That sporting powercouple angle makes for a cute story but Michael Wilson’s soccer connections were there before he ever met Sophia. See, Wilson is the son of Orville and Ngaire Wilson. And Ngaire Wilson was born Ngaire Jacobson in Wellington, New Zealand. In fact she’s the sister of Maureen Jacobson who happens to be a Football Ferns legend, earning 60 caps for Aotearoa and becoming one of the first kiwi women to play professionally overseas.
Jacobson played for Millwall Lionesses and HJK Helsinki. She actually won the 1991 FA Cup final with Millwall – which, if Wikipedia is to be believed, made her the first non-British/Irish player to feature in an FA Cup final, let alone to win one. She’s still the only NZer to have won the trophy although Donna Naker (1996) and Ria Percival (2019) have each been beaten finalists. Percival was the only one whose final was played at Wembley Stadium. Jacobson was also a member of the 1991 World Cup squad.
That’s some kiwi sporting royalty right there. Legitimate links. In fact Wilson even lived in NZ for a little while when he was younger and seems hugely proud of that heritage...
Michael Wilson stands at 6’2 so he’s not huge by modern wide receiver standards but he’s fast and athletic and also intelligent with leadership qualities (according to various pre-draft scouting reports). They reckon he’s a keen blocker too which isn’t all that common in his position – credit that to the NZ heritage for sure.
His draft selection apparently had a lot to do with an excellent showing in the Senior Bowl back in February where he scored a 44-yard touchdown as part of a 4-rec 76-yard performance - although he may have gone higher were it not for pesky injuries. Multiple foot issues and a fractured collarbone combined to mean that Wilson only played 14 games across his final three years at Stanford. He was predicted as a fourth or fifth round pick but ended up going higher than that... and apparently told his team that they’d gotten themselves the steal of the draft. There are probably about 100 blokes who told their teams those same words that day but for what it’s worth the Cardinals brass agreed with him. Pretty much all the buzz about him since rookie team workouts began has been positive.
So positive that he was starting games all throughout preseason. Only made two catches for eight yards and didn’t even get a target in the last couple outings... but in a weird way that might actually be a good thing. NFL teams don’t tend to risk their main blokes very much in preseason, instead using those games largely to trial guys for the lower tiers of the roster. If Wilson, as a rookie third-round pick, was earning the starter’s honours of only getting minimal snaps in the first few series of games and then taking a seat on the bench then that suggests he’s already a legitimate starter for this team.
Now, this is where we get to the current state of the Arizona Cardinals because as a landing spot for a rookie with a chip on his shoulder there is good, bad, and a whole lot of ugly about this situation. He was the only wideout that they drafted this year and while there were a couple of free agent signings in his position they also released their superstar WR DeAndre Hopkins, who has since signed with the Titans. In other words the coast is clear for opportunities.
Yet wide receivers rely on a quarterback to throw them the ball, right? And the Cardinals don’t really have one of those. Kyler Murray is currently injured having torn his ACL in week 14 last season and cannot return until at least week 5 of this one... though the inkling is he may not feature at all in 2023. The Cards did have a solidly reliable veteran in Colt McCoy hanging around during preseason but then they randomly decided to cut him despite not having anyone as good as him to step up in Murray’s extended absence.
They have a first-year head coach in place in Jonathan Gannon. Their front office has been a chaotic place to be for a few years and there’s now a new general manager at work too. They’ve released starting level role players whom they could have afforded to keep (meanwhile they’re paying a large chunk of Hopkins’ salary for the Titans). All things considered this might be the worst team in the entire NFL this year. Las Vegas certainly thinks so, giving them the lowest odds across the board to make the playoffs... and it’s not even close.
Oh yeah, this team is tanking. This team is tanking harder than most NFL franchises have ever even dreamed of. If they win two games it’ll probably be an overachievement. Yet amidst all that there’s a half-kiwi rookie wide receiver named Michael Wilson trying to make a name for himself in the brutal environment that is the National Football League. Best of luck to the brother.
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