As he introduced Max Iheanachor for an introductory news conference Friday at UPMC Rooney Sports Complex, Pittsburgh Steelers president Art Rooney II noted that Iheanachor had made it there from his home in Los Angeles in less than 12 hours from the point he was drafted in the first round Thursday.
“(He took) a red eye last night,” Rooney said, smiling. “So Max, I hope you’re feeling all right.”
After joining the Steelers as the 21st overall pick of the draft, Iheanachor was certainly feeling just fine. And the frenzied, tiring overnight trip from Southern California to Western Pennsylvania is far from the most arduous journey Iheanachor has taken — in life, and in football.
Now a hulking 6-foot-5 7/8 and weighing 321 pounds, Iheanachor was a still-large-but-not-as-massive 6-4, 250 when he graduated high school five years ago.
Most notably, he hadn’t yet played football. Well — American football. Born and raised in Nigeria until he was 13 years old, the only football Iheanachor knew was what we call soccer.
Somehow, that kid from Nigeria whose parents moved to the United States to give their children a better opportunity, he almost inexplicably ended up a first-round NFL draft pick.
“It still feels like it’s crazy,” Iheanachor said Friday. “It’s crazy still. I don’t know if it’s ever going to (stop being crazy).
“But it’s just really exciting, just so blessed. All we can ask for in this life is opportunity.”
Before he played for a Big 12 title-winning or College Football Playoff-qualifying Arizona State team, Iheanachor’s first opportunity in football came at East Los Angeles College. That’s the two-year school where a young, raw, athletic basketball player enrolled at in 2021 in large part to pursue playing (American) football.
“When I first started,” Iheanachor said, “honestly, man, I knew it was going to be hard. Obviously, the vision (of a football career) was there, but I knew it was going to be hard. So, I just tried to get better every day, just put your head down and work, not to try to look too far ahead. Don’t try to predict stuff; just work every day. That was my whole motto.”
Iheanachor joked Friday how when he first started playing football, he needed to be told basic terms and base-level fundamental techniques related to the sport and the position he played.
Truth be told, Iheanachor probably never would have been exposed to football — let alone pursue it — if it hadn’t been for his AAU basketball coach who brought it up to him during the drive home after a summer-league basketball game following Iheanachor’s senior year of high school.
“It was probably a 30-minute conversation,” Iheanachor said. “‘You should probably look into football.’
“He was just really advising me on that, telling me to really look (into) it, and said he envisioned me being an offensive lineman. Ever since then, the rest is history.”
Until it almost wasn’t. Iheanachor almost abandoned his football journey before he even got into a game after enrolling in junior college as a 17-year-old in fall 2021.
“Honestly, that first year was rough,” Iheanachor said. “Switching to a new sport, wasn’t playing (in games), had to gain weight. And honestly, if you guys are (not familiar with) Nigerian parents, they love (their children to be) doctors, nurses. My mom was kind of on my (rear end). She was like, ‘Man, you’re not even playing. You’re wasting your time. You should go to a four-year (college).’
“I was just trying to earn that respect. So I went in (to the coaches) and sat down and was like, ‘My parents, they really wanted me to go to a four-year, that’s the whole point of us coming (to the United States). They’re really big on education.’ That first year was really rough. But I just stayed through it and just kept fighting everyday just trying to get better.”
Iheanachor sure did, to the point he earned second-team All-Big 12 status and made 31 starts at the FBS level, allowing only three sacks in 1,159 career pass-block snaps. He wound up as the sixth offensive tackle taken in Thursday’s draft.
Now that he’s in Pittsburgh, Iheanachor’s football journey’s ascension to the pro level begins in earnest.
“You’ve just got to do the work, and everything else falls into place,” Iheanachor said before motioning to Steelers coach Mike McCarthy and general manager Omar Khan. “These guys, big shout-out to them, forever in debt, and I’m ready to get to work.”