Do you keep in mind the primary time you noticed her?
Possibly you pulled off I-435 and took a proper on Stadium Drive. All of a sudden, she was there: the attractive pink bowl with the long-lasting oval scoreboard.
Or possibly you have been driving down I-70 in your manner house from work if you noticed her peeking out from behind Kauffman Stadium, with the dying mild of a protracted day glittering on her white exterior.
Do you keep in mind that feeling?
Picture by Kara Durrette/Getty Photographs
It’s one thing that the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs’ fifth-round draft choose — inside offensive lineman Hunter Nourzad — will always remember.
“It’s fairly surreal,” he stated of his arrival on the Truman Sports activities Complicated for the primary time. “I imply, you sort of attempt to put together your self as finest as doable through the course of — however you actually don’t know the place you’re going to go.
“However as soon as the bus rolled up the street and we noticed the stadium and the ability, it was actually… it was actually breathtaking. It’s actually an unbelievable expertise that I really feel actually blessed to have the ability to expertise.
“It was simply… unbelievable.”
Popping out of The Walker College, a prestigious personal faculty in suburban Atlanta, Nourzad wasn’t extremely recruited. So when he began school at Cornell, he didn’t know what he would do together with his life.
“I didn’t actually have a plan,” he admitted to reporters earlier than the crew’s first rookie minicamp session on Saturday. “To go to high school, I suppose — that was [the] huge factor. Go to high school, get an schooling — after which, like lots of people my age — simply see what I can pull off out in the true world.”
However throughout his junior yr, issues began to vary. NFL scouts began displaying up at follow.
“Nobody [had] actually stated this was a chance for me,” he recalled. “However that was sort of the primary second once I thought, ‘You recognize, if I put sufficient work into this, I could make it come true.’”
So after finishing his mechanical engineering diploma at Cornell, Nourzad went to Penn State with two targets: to get a grasp’s diploma in enterprise administration — and get seen by enjoying for the Massive 10’s Nittany Lions throughout his remaining yr of eligibility. He achieved each targets — however intentionally set no expectations about what might occur within the NFL Draft.
“I imply, there’s by no means actually certainty in any of these items,” he defined. “I attempted to keep away from the Web articles and all of the rating and stuff like that — simply because I didn’t assume it could be a constructive impact on me whether or not it was a superb rating or a low rating.
“And so I actually didn’t know. I figured that I’d be a Day 3 man — and so I sort of went into it simply with that mindset.”
Nonetheless, nothing is promised — even if you’re picked within the draft. Nourzad understands he has work to do. However he’s prepared to do regardless of the crew wants him to do — and after the draft course of, he’s able to return to the routine.
“Soccer is the one factor I actually love,” he stated. “So with the ability to return to that? Being fully centered on studying my playbook, getting to satisfy my teammates, ? Getting out and doing drills — and getting higher?
“It’s actually relieving.”
