Concerns about his production and positional value were enough to push Emmanwori out of the first round entirely. For a player who looked like a lock heading into the weekend, the slide stung.<\/p>\n
He talked about it on a recent episode of \u201cThe Pivot,<\/a>\u201d and didn\u2019t hold back on what that night felt like sitting there waiting.<\/p>\n \u201cI remember the first thing I did, I was outside, came back in, I dapped up everybody, like, appreciate them for coming, just ain\u2019t wanna be a sore loser. But I remember when everybody left, and I just sat down, I was just pissed. I was mad. I couldn\u2019t really explain the feeling, it doesn\u2019t really bother me, because, you know, everything worked out in the end but back then, the mindset I had was just, I was so pissed.\u201d<\/p>\n South Carolina defensive back Nick Emmanwori (DB40) runs in the 40 yard dash during the 2025 NFL Combine at Lucas Oil Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images<\/p>\n \u201cIt was just a feeling I would never forget. It was just, I felt disappointed in myself, that I didn\u2019t go first round, because I felt like, the everything I had, that I did up to this point, the Combine, everything I did in college, a real team should definitely see and be like, No, we can\u2019t let this dude go, but I\u2019m not sure what the, you know, the GMs were thinking, I know they pissed off now, though.\u201d<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n Those GMs have reason to regret it. The Seattle Seahawks closed the season as champions, beating the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LX behind a dominant defensive performance.<\/p>\n RELATED: Patriots\u2019 Stefon Diggs\u2019 December case takes new legal twist as next court date approaches<\/a><\/p>\n Seattle Seahawks safety Nick Emmanwori (3) reacts after a fumble recovery against the San Francisco 49ers during the second half in an NFC Divisional Round game at Lumen Field. Mandatory Credit: Kevin Ng-Imagn Images<\/p>\n Emmanwori was a steady presence throughout that run. During the regular season, he recorded 56 tackles and 11 pass breakups as a rookie finding his footing in the NFL.<\/p>\n He carried that into the Super Bowl, five tackles on the biggest stage, with NBC\u2019s broadcast team consistently pointing him out as someone always around the ball. The draft slide is old news now.<\/p>\n Advertisement<\/p>\n The Lombardi Trophy tends to have that effect.<\/p>\n \u2014 Enjoy free coverage of the top news & trending stories on The Big Lead <\/a>\u2014<\/p>\n OLYMPICS: 2026 Winter Olympics medal count, standings entering February 13<\/a><\/p>\n NFL: NFL teams with the highest winning percentages over the last 10 years<\/a><\/p>\n CFB: Ole Miss given huge Trinidad Chambliss boost for 2026 college football season<\/a><\/p>\n MLB: Former Dodgers World Series champion to sign with Angels<\/a><\/p>\n NHL: Full list of NHL players in the 2026 Winter Olympics men\u2019s hockey tournament<\/a><\/p>\n VIRAL: Myles Garrett, girlfriend Chloe Kim share heartfelt moment after Olympic stunner<\/a><\/p>\n The post Super Bowl Champion Nick Emmanwori opens up on unexpected first-round NFL Draft snub<\/a> appeared first on The Big Lead<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nick Emmanwori had every reason to expect his name to be called in the first round. The South…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":473332,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[436],"tags":[49,48,511,13294,2214,1718,514,7259,948,1739,517,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-473331","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nfl","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-dodgers","11":"tag-kyler-murray","12":"tag-myles-garrett","13":"tag-new-england-patriots","14":"tag-nfl","15":"tag-nick-emmanwori","16":"tag-san-francisco-49ers","17":"tag-seattle-seahawks","18":"tag-south-carolina","19":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/473331","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=473331"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/473331\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/473332"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=473331"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=473331"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=473331"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Seattle](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/0ab9281ad21cf5b0ed2a258e72a90467.jpeg\"\/)
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