The best moment of the 2025 NFL Draft involved one 'Michigan man' being there for another
Michigan Wolverines football defensive tackle Mason Graham experienced the feeling that very few get to: getting drafted in the NFL, walking out onto the stage and being embraced by commissioner Roger Goodell.
That moment is a culmination of a long journey to that point but also the beginning of a new path in the NFL. It’s euphoric.
Graham was chosen No. 5 overall to the Cleveland Browns, who traded back from the second pick, receiving not only Graham but further assets to bolster the team.
The former Michigan defensive tackle was one of two Wolverines who attended the first round of the draft in Green Bay, Wisc., joining cornerback Will Johnson. Graham went through the whirlwind that is the media car wash following his selection, but he put aside his own excitement and decided to be there for Johnson, whose slide due to medical reasons was one of the top stories of the first round of the draft.
“After you get picked, you go do a bunch of media, so I was doing media, and I was continually checking up to see if Will got picked,” Graham said on a clip released by the Cleveland Browns. “Everyone had him written down in the first round, so this is kinda worst case scenario.”
Graham went back into the green room with the unselected players and sat with Johnson and his family and friends throughout the first round. All 32 picks came and went, with Johnson not being picked, but Graham was there the entire way through.
“Once I found out he was still in there, I wanted to go support him like I know he would support me in that case,” Graham said.
ESPN insider Adam Schefter, a Michigan alum who was working the draft on television, said it was his favorite moment of the entire weekend.
“Mason Graham gets picked No. 5. Michigan man, Mason Graham — and I want to point out Michigan here, because I’m proud that Mason Graham represented Michigan in this way,” Schefter said on the ‘Pat McAfee Show.’
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“Mason Graham gets picked, goes out, puts on his Browns cap, hugs the commissioner, goes through all his press conferences, does everything he’s supposed to do — and finds out that his fellow teammate, his fellow Michigan Wolverine, Will Johnson, who was attending the draft, was still in the green room. Hadn’t been picked yet.”
Schefter, who has many years of experience working on set at the draft and watching these events unfold, pointed out what a selfless act it was.
“So on what would be, I would think, the greatest night of his life, aside from maybe when Michigan won the national championship, Mason Graham goes back into the green room to sit with Will Johnson and be with Will Johnson and comfort Will Johnson until the end of the draft, when his name does not get called on the first night,” the Michigan alum continued.
“And I just thought that’s the coolest thing. Here’s a guy that could be celebrating, could be starting his trip to Cleveland, could be doing any one thing. And instead, at his single greatest moment, he decides to be there for a teammate in need.”
Schefter, who graduated from Michigan in 1989, got choked up relaying the story on air.
“In life, all we ask for is people to be there and to support us and to be good friends,” he said. “And the fact that Mason Graham did that, I gotta tell you something, it touched me, it moved me. I’m a little emotional about it.
“I just thought that was such a cool thing for one Michigan man to be there for another Michigan man.”
