Rams rookie TE Gerald Everett goes from overlooked to 'beast'

Rams rookie TE Gerald Everett goes from overlooked to 'beast'

Alden Gonzalez

LOS ANGELES -- Gerald Everett's mother was sitting way up in the nosebleed section, but eventually he spotted her from the stage down below. And once he did, Everett never took his eyes off her. This was December, the day of his college graduation. He thought back to the promise he made as a high school senior -- that he would finish his degree no matter where this football thing took him. He thought about that junior year, when the scouts finally started showing up and his name kept popping up and he actually considered leaving the University of South Alabama a year early.

Briefly, until he ran it by his mom.

"She just gave me that look," Everett said, laughing. "I went back and told my mom that I wasn’t coming out early; that I would stay and graduate first."

Everett, who turns 23 on June 25, eventually earned his degree in communications, four months before the Los Angeles Rams selected him in the 2017 NFL draft. Everett was the 44th overall pick; the fourth tight end off the board -- after O.J. Howard, Evan Engram and David Njoku, respectively -- and the very first player the Rams chose.

Back when he made that promise to his mother, Alicia Wise, his path to the NFL was severely muddled.

Everett didn't play high school football until his senior year. He pursued basketball as a sophomore and junior, changing course because he remained 6-foot-3 and the Division-I offers weren't coming.

They never arrived in football, either.

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[www.espn.com]