The Reality Behind the Glamour – Part One

It has been well over a year since I last posted to my blog. If you follow Maj or me on social media, you probably know why. Eight months ago, we welcomed the sweetest, most perfect baby girl into the world. She is the absolute light of our lives – even when she lets the (very prominent) feisty part of her personality show through. We have grown and learned so much over the past eight months, and I plan to share many of these experiences with you all soon. In my next couple of posts, though, I want to share the story of the NFL roller coaster we’ve been on this past year and bring you all along as it continues to unfold. 

When most people look at the life of an NFL player from the outside, they see the glamour of it all. The glory. The money. The perks. As I hope I’ve been able to shed some light on through documenting our journey, there are many more difficult aspects others do not see. Injuries. Lack of flexibility. Instability. Every player’s story is vastly different, and there is almost always more to it than meets the eye. 

As I’ve shared in previous posts, our story started in the most “typical” way one might think. Maj was drafted to the Redskins; we stayed there from then on. But recently, a couple of twists have been thrown into that story, starting with the events that unfolded at the start of this season. 

In April, when our daughter Landyn was just three weeks old, we made the drive from our off-season home in Oklahoma to our in-season home in Virginia, where Samajé spent the next three months training with the Redskins, just as he had the past two years. We returned home for the players’ month-long summer break before heading back to Virginia once again to prepare for the season.  

Maj spent most of the month of August at the Redskins’ training camp in Richmond, Virginia. Our lease was set to end at the end of September, so we began to look for houses that would give us a little more room to accommodate our growing family. Having been with the team for two and a half years, we were comfortable. We knew the area well. We had a great group of friends. We even happened to have family nearby. 

Now, don’t get me wrong – we knew better than to get too comfortable. The Redskins kept Samajé inactive for most of the 2018 season, keeping him on the roster but hardly utilizing him on the field. Even if this had not been the case, players get cut or traded all the time at the drop of a hat. Maj was open to heading to another team; he was just ready to get back on the field. Still, though, all signs pointed to us staying with the Redskins for another season, so we prepared accordingly. 

On the morning of August 31, Maj got the call we had been anticipating in the back of our minds. It was cuts day, when every team pares their roster from 90 guys to 53 in preparation for the upcoming season. Over 1,100 men lose their jobs in one day, and that call we received was Samajé’s agent telling him that he was one of those guys. He hung up the phone and told me the news. I sat for a second in a bit of a shock, because in that instant we were facing so much unknown – but then I laughed and said, “Well, here we go. This should be fun.” 

Once cuts are complete, each team has 24 hours to decide whether they want to sign a newly available player. Every team is also able to establish what is called a practice squad of 10 players. These men practice with a team throughout the week but do not play in games. They are paid significantly less than roster players, but being on a practice squad allows a player to learn the workings of a team in an effort to hopefully be moved up to the roster later in the season. 

Maj spent much of the next day on the phone with his agent. He jokes that he talked on the phone more that day than he had in his whole life combined – which, actually, probably wasn’t that far from the truth for my non-talkative guy. His agent kept him updated as he spoke with teams around the league. We learned that no teams had plans to put him on their roster at that point, but Buffalo and Baltimore were a couple of the teams interested in him for their practice squads.  

We debated back and forth through the next morning, weighing the pros and cons of going to each team that was interested. Finally, it seemed like we had our decision. I was out grabbing coffee with my best friend when he called me and told me that after talking with his agent, we were all in agreement regarding our next home. I cried as I drove home and realized my life was about to be so drastically different from what I had grown accustomed to (which, I thought, was pretty crazy already).  

When I got home, Maj told me he was just waiting on the 24-hour claim period to expire and he would be ready to go to the new team. I went upstairs to put Landyn down for a nap and ended up rocking her for a little while. When she woke up, Samajé met me upstairs and told me we had a new home. “You signed to the practice squad?” I asked.  

“Nope,” he responded, “I got claimed. We’re going to Cincinnati!” 

And so it began. He immediately started to pack his bags. We went to grab a celebratory ice cream and buy a baby tiger costume from Party City, because what better way to celebrate our new team than with an adorable little mascot? Then, in a matter of a few hours, Landyn and I were dropping him off at the airport to head to Ohio to start his career as a Cincinnati Bengal. 

While I was so glad this whirlwind of a weekend ended with such excitement, the reality soon hit that I had one month to figure out a new living situation for our family and manage a move. Add that to being alone with a five-month-old and a few weeks into my fourth semester of grad school, and the stress piled up.  

Thankfully, I was surrounded by an amazing community who kept me sane and helped me through it all. His agent helped manage the move and answered my millions of questions. My friends kept me company, loved on Landyn, and helped pack up our house. My aunt and uncle watched Landyn while I got some schoolwork done. I got connected with some other Bengals wives who helped me find a realtor and gave me some housing recommendations. 

A couple weekends after Maj left, I flew with Landyn to Cincinnati to celebrate mine and Maj’s birthdays and find a place for us to live. Five days after I returned to Virginia, my Dad flew in to help me with the move. We finished packing, the movers came to pick everything up, and he and I loaded up Landyn and the two dogs and made the eight-hour drive to our new home. 

I wish I could say that after this point, everything was smooth sailing and we lived happily ever after… But, of course, that is just not the way the NFL works. Stay tuned for part two of this chapter – and all of the parts that are to come! 

<3 Meg