TEMPE, Ariz. -- Written on a white board in Will Johnson's locker at the Arizona Cardinals' practice facility is a daily reminder of what happened at last year's NFL draft.
In black marker, Johnson wrote "47," his overall draft position in 2025. Heading into last year's draft, that number was expected to be a single digit. He was a projected top-10 pick coming out of Michigan, promised by teams who picked high that, if he was on the board, he'd hear his name called.
That didn't happen. And it shaped his rookie season, giving him a "huge" chip on his shoulder as he navigated his first year in the NFL, trying to prove other teams missed out while also embracing the simple fact that he was, indeed, an NFL-caliber player.
Johnson, along with a contingent of friends and family, sat in the green room at Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisconsin, through the entire first round, waiting to hear his name. Pick by pick, someone else's first-round dreams came true. Johnson finally went to Arizona with the 15th pick of the second round, sliding by every team and then 14 teams twice.
When he arrived in Tempe, he found a dry erase marker. It was his way of always keeping a reminder, impossible to miss, even if it's not always on his mind.
"It's not something I'm always thinking about," Johnson told ESPN. "But it's definitely something I get reminded of here and there."
Late in the draft process, concern about Johnson's injury history spread throughout the league. He dealt with a knee injury in 2023 and shoulder and turf toe injuries in 2024, his last season at Michigan, the latter causing him to play in just six games. Teams got scared, and he fell. The knee injury wasn't ever an issue, Johnson said. The turf toe injury was simply too tough of an ailment to come back from quickly, Johnson's speed coach, Johnie Drake, explained. When Johnson tried to return from it, he reaggravated it.
"It was just smarter for him to just prepare for the draft and let that heal," Drake said.
Drake also explained that once the college season ended he had only a couple of months to prepare for the combine and his pro day. Looking back, Drake said he thinks Johnson was rushed back from his turf toe injury.
"He was not prepared, and it was unfortunate that that had to happen," Drake said.
While his friends and people close to him were told to wear certain colors on draft day, Johnson was snubbed.
And it shaped him from the moment he walked out of Lambeau Field and into a quiet van, headed back to his hotel in Green Bay, through playing his rookie season.
"Just to let you know how people really view you or how things really are," Johnson said. "Can't really have too personal of a relationship in this business. So, yeah, I feel like it really just gave me that mindset."
Johnson channeled his draft slide into his work ethic, Drake told ESPN. He saw Johnson take what he has always done but intensify it 10 times over, getting in the gym two or three times a day. He became more in tune with his body, asking more questions and getting more opinions and viewpoints, Drake said.
Curtis Blackwell, who founded Sound Mind, Sound Body, the life skills and sports academy in Detroit that Johnson attended as a child, looks at Johnson's draft fall not as a loss but rather as a lesson. He reminded Johnson in the green room about everything he had accomplished to that point, including how he handled criticism for playing at a high school not as well known for football.
"When we left the green room, I was like 'Well, Will, hey, this is what we've done our entire lives. We continue to always take everything as an opportunity to get better,'" Blackwell said.
Drake pointed out that Johnson has been able to mentally block out the outside noise since high school.
But it still burned. The emotions started with anger, Drake remembered. Then they turned into devastation and the feeling that teams didn't believe in him.
"It was pretty much devastating," Drake said. "We were all shocked and unaware that that would happen."
And that fueled Johnson heading into last season.
He wouldn't say which teams told him they'd draft him but said he played well against one, "so that felt good." However, dealing with injuries as a rookie, including groin and tailbone injuries, was frustrating but "part of the game." He suffered a knee injury in the season finale and didn't return, but Drake said he's now fully healthy.
The first injury caused Johnson to miss two games, and the third led to three games. Each time he tried to come back, Johnson felt his energy was different and took a bit to get comfortable again on the field.
Last year, the NFL asked Johnson whether he wanted to stay in Green Bay for the second round of the draft, and all he and his group wanted to do was get back to Detroit. He spent the second round at his sister's home in Ann Arbor, celebrating his selection there.
Blackwell thinks that moment has given Johnson more purpose and is part of Johnson's story now.
It's always in Johnson's head, he said, especially when he sees how other rookies or other teams are doing.
The feeling of dropping, of getting snubbed, of waiting like that for an entire round on national TV likely won't ever go away.
"Nah," Johnson said. "Maybe when that next contract hits. Maybe. But I don't think so."
