From the streetlights to the spotlight, Efe Obada's remarkable NFL journey
Trafficked from Nigeria at the age of 10, Obada will suit up as a professional American football player for the first time on Sunday
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Your support makes all the difference.Waiting for a calling has been a long time coming for Efe Obada. And, as fate would have it, when that moment finally came, there wasn’t a call at all.
“I wasn't told,” he says of the moment last week that he found out he’d made the Carolina Panthers’ final 53-man roster. “If one of the coaches talks to you it means you’re likely to get released. If no one talks to you, it’s kind of a sign that you’ve made the team.
“I walked into the facility and I saw the guy that usually collects people's iPads. When I finally got past him and walked in to the locker room, you know, people were coming up to me, shaking my hand and telling me congratulations.
“I didn’t believe it myself until the head coach came up to me whilst I was lifting and told me that I'd made the team and he said ‘Congratulations’. I think I was the last person on the 53 that actually believed he was in the 53."
Trafficked to England from his native Nigeria aged just 10, Obada bounced around London foster homes and even found himself on the streets through his teenage years. Life was hard for Obada and his family. Until he found his way out.
“I moved over to the Netherlands to be with my mum,” he recalls. “She met myself and my sister and wanted us to have a better life. So we somehow find ourselves going to London but things didn't work out the way we wanted it to and we found ourselves being homeless and ended up in foster care. I went to school and then got myself into some trouble and found American Football and that kept me out of trouble.”
Four years later and Obada, now 26, is preparing for his first game as a professional American football player and will suit up this weekend for the home opener against the Dallas Cowboys on Sunday.
Veterans who have grown up with America’s game in their blood struggle to make NFL teams. So for a complete novice, one who had never played a down and barely even knew the rules a matter of years ago, to do so is one of the uplifting stories of this offseason.
A physical standout a friend suggested he try American football while still back home and after just five games for the London Warriors it was clear that the second journey of Obada’s life was only just beginning. He was recommended to the Cowboys by British coach Aden Durde and a place on the practice squad followed. After spells with the Kansas City Chiefs and the Atlanta Falcons the NFL’s groundbreaking International Player Pathway programme finally saw him land in Carolina.
“The program is amazing,” he says. “It gives opportunities to people like me that love football but didn’t really have the options in front of them. It’s an amazing program and I hope that my achievements shine a light on it and hopefully opens door for other people.”
A new initiative a year ago the scheme allows international players the chance to hone their new craft on a team’s practice squad without fear of being cut. For Obada it was just the chance he had been waiting for.
“It’s a security that I feel like we needed in the NFL that a lot of people don't have,” he adds. “I've often been told that the NFL careers aren’t for very long and you know being able to have that year even though it was in the practice squad, just to learn just to grow and to find yourself as a player and a person.
“To find your fit and work on your weaknesses is huge. A lot of people do it in college and a lot of people do it in the off season – just to have that is amazing.”
Obada’s story is an undeniably inspiring one and while it would be easy to get carried away after just how far he has come, his feet remain firmly on the ground.
“I'm always looking forward and trying to get better and progress in life and support for my family and things like that,” he adds. “These things happen. There are still things happening around the world and I'm not the only person or only child who has been affected by some of these situations.
“It's only because I'm in the position that I'm in right now that it’s come to light as much as it has done.
“I just know how much it means to me. I’ve seen people come and go and if whenever my time does come, I wouldn’t want to leave knowing I could have done more.
“I don’t want to live with regrets. It’s an amazing opportunity and I will give it my all in everything I do. Whether I succeed or fail, I just want to know that it’s not because of a lack of effort.”
Watch highlights of the season opener between Atlanta Falcons and Philadelphia Eagles, and a preview of all of Sunday’s opening weekend fixtures on The NFL Show at 11:00pm on 8th September on BBC1. Plus catch Dallas Cowboys take on Obada’s Carolina Panthers at 10:00pm on 9th September on Sky Sports.
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