Undrafted but Undeterred: What I Learned from My First Year in the NFL

The following is a first-person narrative from former undrafted free-agent running back Thomas Rawls, who is entering his second year with the Seattle Seahawks, as told to Bleacher Report’s Gary Davenport. 

“If you put the ball in my hands, I’ll bet I make you smile.”

It’s what I told my coaches during the preseason last year. It’s what I knew I was capable of. All I needed was the opportunity to show them. To show my teammates with the Seattle Seahawks. To show everyone.

If there’s one word I think best describes my running style, it’s “tenacious.” I try to be versatile in the backfield. I can cut back, juke, run you over—I try to be a complete back.

Tenacious is also a word I’d use to describe myself as a person. I’m not going to give up. I’m not easily broken. It’s how I got this far. How I went from recruit at Michigan to running back at Central Michigan to undrafted free agent to starting tailback for one of the best teams in the National Football League.

And I’m going to use that tenacity to bounce back from injury and show in 2016 that not only does this undrafted free agent belong in the league but that I can be the best running back in the NFL.

As a kid growing up playing a game that you love, you have a vision of one day hearing your name called and walking across the stage at the NFL draft. You dream about it.

And leading up to the 2015 draft I was confident it would happen. When I went to the NFL Scouting Combine I thought I did pretty well [4.65 second 40, 15 bench press reps, 35.5″ vertical], and looking at the other backs in the draft I knew in my heart that there wasn’t a better competitor out there. That I could do some things the others couldn’t.

I wasn’t sure when, but I was looking forward to that call. When it got to the sixth round, though, I realized, “Hey, I might not get drafted.”

Rather than be disappointed, however, I looked at it as a positive. The benefit of not being drafted was that I knew I could pick a team, and there were a lot of teams who had expressed interest in me during the draft process. I don’t know why those teams didn’t draft me, but the time for worrying about that had passed.

I got calls from most of the NFL. Many were teams I had visited—teams I thought were highly interested in drafting me. But I figured if they wanted me, they should have drafted me.

I was weighing my options when Coach Carroll called. We talked, and then I called him back because I wanted to clear up some things and make sure I was making the right decision.

One of the things Coach Carroll told me, and one of the reasons I chose Seattle, was the way they view undrafted free agents. A lot of guys have made the team there as UDFAs. The Seahawks give people a chance to really show what they can do. To prove themselves on the field. That’s all I wanted, and I knew it’s all that I would need.

I also looked at the roster. I knew Marshawn Lynch was there and that he’d been one of the NFL’s best running backs for a decade. But before I ever hit the practice field, I told myself, “I don’t know when I’m going to see the field, but one day—sooner or later—I’m going to play on Sundays.”

Personally, I looked at Doug Baldwin as an inspiration of sorts. He made the team as an undrafted free agent in 2011, and last year, he tied for the NFL lead with 14 touchdown catches. I figured if I could get the same opportunity he did that I would make the most of it.

It says a lot about the Seahawks as an organization that they do that. They don’t care what round you were drafted in or if you were drafted at all. All they care about is what you can do to help this team win. Are you competing? Do you have grit? Are you exceptional?

When I saw that …

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