Exclusive column: A week in the life of Philadelphia Eagles rookie and Aussie NFL freak Jordan Mailata
EVER wanted to know what goes into preparing for an NFL game? Eagles rookie Jordan Mailata takes you behind the scenes in Philadelphia to give you the low-down in an exclusive column.
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JORDAN Mailata beat the odds to make the roster for the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles and is forging a new path for Aussie athletes to make the NFL.
As he goes through his first season in the biggest sports league on earth, he’ll give you an inside look at the ins and outs of American football in Jordan’s Journal — a weekly series published every Tuesday that gives fans a unique insight into his journey.
LIFE in the NFL is a pretty full-on experience.
It’s a 24-7 life of learning, lifting and adapting. But it’s also an incredible journey and one I couldn’t have imagined 12 months ago.
So let me take you through a normal week of what it is like to be a rookie in the NFL.
SUNDAY
The week starts on Sunday — it’s game day.
So far I’ve been one of the inactives meaning I don’t have to throw the pads on.
But I still go through a pre-game warmup out on the field, which is an experience in itself.
I want to prepare as if I am going to play, so I take it seriously — but then I go and watch the match with the best seat in the house.
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MONDAY
Monday is our day off — but that doesn’t mean we take it too easy.
I live with another rookie, Matt Pryor, and we like to go in and get an extra lift in because we’re so far behind and we want to develop our bodies and try and be prepared as best we can.
If that means getting an extra session in here and there, that’s what we’ll do.
We do that in the morning then we come home and chill out and just do whatever — if we want to go out shopping, we can. It just depends on how we’re feeling.
But usually it means coming home, jam out some Fortnite or watch some movies.
Every Monday the Eagles do a community event — and this week we did some yoga for women who are survivors of cancer.
And it was hard! I was struggling. They kept coming up to me and asking ‘are you sweating?’ and I am like “yeah, I’m sweating — this is bloody CrossFit, not yoga!’.
Such a blessing to be apart of @EaglesCommunity so much love for their community. To the many brave woman tonight who showed up with their families too, I say this. Thank you. Thank you for teaching me to make my days count and to not count my days!
— Jordan Mailata (@jordan_mailata) October 2, 2018
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TUESDAY
It’s pretty much a half day for the players — it starts with a lift, before we have a review for the fellows who played on Sunday, just to fix things up that we missed.
And obviously we had a loss to Tennassee on the weekend and there’s a few things we need to go back and review and see how we can get better from it and learn from our mistakes.
We take the victories but we’ve got to learn to take the losses as well.
Just being a rookie and observing how the veterans conduct themselves is interesting — they’re very professional about how they go about their ways, how they study and take criticism as well is massive for them.
By 1.30pm we’re done with all the reviews and team meetings and we have a rookie meeting where we talk about the transition into the NFL and how mentally and physically demanding it is.
We have guest speakers come in and it’s just a time for the rookies to learn a thing or two about the transition from college or whatever sport you came from.
WEDNESDAY
Wednesday is a big day: it’s the day we have our full padded training.
We go in and have meetings straight away from 8.15, up until about 11 — at 11 we have our walk-through which goes for about half an hour.
We have lunch from 11.30 until we have to be ready for padded practice from 1pm.
That goes for two hours and is essentially there to simulate your workload on a normal game day.
They try to get it to the hottest part of the day and you’re pretty much in game day conditions.
After practice, of course we have more meetings — so much of the NFL life is boardwork.
THURSDAY
Thursday plays out a lot like Wednesday, except that at training we’re not waring the hard game day pads — they’re just little shoulder pads underneath your jersey.
It makes things a bit less intense and lightens the load as you’re building back towards game day.
But we still have the same meetings and the timing of everything is the same.
FRIDAY
Friday is the lightest day of the week — in that it is the same routine as Thursday, but we are all wrapped up by 1.30pm.
It’s nice.
SATURDAY
Our final day of game preparations arrives and it’s basically a day of meetings where we look ahead to the game.
After some meetings we have a mock game and just like that we’re done for the day — it’s all over before midday.
And we’re left to our own devices to get ready for
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