From Fayetteville to desert: Washington gets his NFL shot

It took a lot of patience and a few extra hours of waiting, but Mike Washington is headed to the NFL.

The former Arkansas running back signed with the Las Vegas Raiders after going undrafted longer than just about everyone expected at this year’s NFL Draft in Pittsburgh.

For a player who ran for 6.4 yards per carry and averaged 8.1 yards per reception during his time with the Hogs, the wait was a surprise to a lot of people watching.

When Washington stood on the combine floor in Indianapolis and the clock stopped at 4.33 seconds in the 40-yard dash, he broke down right there. He knew.

After everything he’d been through to get a single season in the SEC, that number meant his NFL dream was real.

At 6-foot-1 and 223 pounds with that kind of speed, Washington looked like exactly the kind of back NFL teams dream about finding.

The comparisons started flying almost immediately. People were throwing around names like Adrian Peterson and Derrick Henry.

It seemed like a no-brainer that he’d go in the second or third round as the third-ranked running back in the draft class.

Draft didn’t go as planned

Then the draft happened and things got complicated. Those things happen more than most people think because too many people are all looking for that little edge.

The NFL’s well-known trend of not valuing running backs early showed up in a big way.

A pair of Notre Dame backs went at opposite ends of the first round and then the position went quiet. Round after round ticked by without Washington’s name being called.

When the San Francisco 49ers finally took a running back late in the third round, a lot of people thought Washington’s moment had arrived.

Instead, Indiana’s Kaelon Black got that call.

The first three rounds ended up featuring the fewest running backs drafted in the modern era, which was a tough break for Washington and others at his position.

Still, Las Vegas eventually came calling and Washington is now a Raider. The storybook keeps getting written.

Road from Buffalo, New Mexico and Fayetteville

Washington’s path to the pros wasn’t a straight line and it wasn’t even close.

He started at Buffalo before transferring to New Mexico State and even then his road to the SEC wasn’t guaranteed.

He committed to Utah at one point, even though he felt like the Utes coaching staff wasn’t totally sold on him.

He stuck with that commitment out of principle, but the feeling of not being truly wanted wore on him.

Then he took a visit to Fayetteville on a whim and everything changed.

“I just felt like I was wanted and that was like one of the main things — going somewhere where you’re wanted, where they want you to be on the field,” Washington said. “So that was like one of the main things that led me to come here.”

That welcome feeling wasn’t something he took lightly. After bouncing from school to school, it meant everything.

COVID changed everything

Washington also credits the pandemic for reshaping his entire recruiting path.

When he was a high school junior, he was a highly recruited player, but mostly by Group of Five programs. That was starting to change when COVID-19 hit and shut everything down.

“When I was a junior, I was highly recruited, but it was all G5 schools,” Washington said. “After that, COVID ended up hitting. I remember like it was yesterday. Just before COVID, Texas A&M wanted me to come to one of their camps. Me and my family, we felt once they could see how I move, they’d probably end up offering me.”

That camp never happened. The visit never happened. The offer never came.

“[Lockdown] ended everything. I wasn’t able to visit any schools. Actually, when I had transferred to New Mexico State, that was my first official visit that I had ever taken. COVID kind of ruined a lot of things, but we’re still here,” Washington said.

That resilience became a theme in his life. Every time a door closed, he found another one and kicked it open.

SEC question and answer against Aggies

When Arkansas running backs coach Kolby Smith sat down with Washington during his visit, he asked him a simple question that Washington already knew the answer to.

“[Coach Smith] asked me, he’s like, ‘You want to play in the SEC?'” Washington said. “And it was like, one of them things was like, yeah, it was a no brainer.”

Once he got to the Razorbacks, Washington had to fight his way into the starting lineup, just like he’d fought for everything else in his career.

Once he got his shot, he delivered.

The game that turned heads around the league happened to be against Texas A&M, the same program that had wanted to see him at a camp years earlier before COVID shut things down.

On the very first play of that game, he powered through the Aggies’ defensive line for 15 yards off the left side.

On the very next play, he found a gap and outran the entire defense to the 10-yard line. Two plays. Sixty-five yards. Power and speed on full display against a defense that NFL scouts respected.

By the time that game was over, Washington had 147 yards on just 16 carries — nearly 10 yards per carry — and added three catches out of the backfield to show he could be a weapon in the passing game too.

That performance did exactly what it was supposed to do.

Headed to Las Vegas with something to prove

Now Washington boards a plane as a professional headed to Las Vegas, the same way he’s approached every stop in his journey.

His numbers at Arkansas showed NFL-level ability. His combine showing confirmed his physical tools.

His story proved his toughness and his character.

The wait at the draft was longer than expected.

But he’s never been afraid of a challenge or a detour on the way to where he’s going.

Las Vegas is just the next chapter and if his track record means anything, it won’t be the last one worth reading.