Mr. Irrelevant always has the last laugh in the NFL Draft

At Mr. Irrelevant headquarters in Newport Beach, Calif., officials — chiefly, and well, really, only Melanie Fitch — is weeks if not months into an arduous, around-the-clock, scientific scouting process for the approaching NFL Draft.

Fitch’s mission is simple, yet compared to the task of the Los Angeles Rams with the No. 1 pick, hers is nearly impossible: Determine which player will be the very last name called, the 253rd and final pick of the draft.

Hello, Mr. Irrelevant.

The Super Bowl champion Denver Broncos own this year’s final pick, but they also have pick No. 228, acquired from San Francisco, Fitch noted, which is causing her some significant head-scratching. After all, detailed plans for a weeklong celebration of Mr. Irrelevant in Southern California hinge on the one player selected when only the cleanup crew will be around to applaud.

“There’s going to be a lot of quarterbacks going early, but what I’d like to see is Cody Kessler from [Southern Cal] be selected by the Broncos,” Fitch said. “That would be fun for us because Cody Kessler is from out here. I think Jacobi Green, a running back from Richmond — I think they might go for a running back. They’re not telling me.”

Fitch is the CEO of Irrelevant Week and the daughter of former NFL player Paul Salata, a Southern Cal legend and genius behind Irrelevant Week who turns 90 this year. Formed in 1976 to make the last player selected in the draft feel like the first, Irrelevant Week champions stories of perseverance, and through the years, Fitch said, has raised more than $1 million for a variety of organizations including Special Olympics and Disabled Sports USA.

There’s just one glitch to this whole irrelevancy thing. Over the years, people have come to interpret Mr. Irrelevant as referring to the last pick in the draft as being irrelevant — as in who cares, he’ll never make the team — when, in fact, it’s just the opposite.

“Unfortunately,” Fitch said of her dad, “he called it Mr. Irrelevant because he thought it’s irrelevant that you’re drafted last, that it’s an honor to be drafted.

“We’ve had to deal with that for 41 years because it says it’s Mr. Irrelevant. What dad’s idea is, is that everybody’s equal on the team, that the first guy is as important as the last guy.”

It has become a weeklong vacation to Newport Beach for Mr. Irrelevant and a companion (at one time he could bring his entire family, but 2001 Mr. Irrelevant Tevita Ofahengaue, from BYU via Tonga, showed up with 62 family members).

“I’m actually very proud of it,” said 2012 Mr. Irrelevant Chandler Harnish, a four-year star quarterback for Northern Illinois who served as Andrew Luck’s backup with the Indianapolis Colts for a couple seasons and now tutors young quarterbacks along with working a 9-to-5 in suburban Chicago. “To get drafted was something that was my dream. I have the Lowsman Trophy, I have the Mr. Irrelevant jersey; I actually had it framed. At the end of the day, it’s kind of a joke, it’s kind of funny, but it’s a great conversation starter.”

In 2015, Harnish, signed by the Arizona Cardinals, joined Fitch on the NFL draft stage to hand the No. 256 jersey to new frat brother, Cardinals pick and latest Mr. Irrelevant, Gerald Christian out of Louisville.

In Southern California, Irrelevant Week has become ritual. Several hundred people show up for each event during the weeklong party. They come to shower Mr. Irrelevant with love and acceptance, and he’s given the key to the Newport Beach. Mr. Irrelevant has the option to tailor the week’s events to his own interests, something of a personalized fantasy camp.

Some Mr. Irrelevants want to go surfing in the Pacific. Some want to go Hollywood, so the Undefeated foundation books the likes of Will Ferrell. Others, such as 2008 Mr. Irrelevant David Vobora, picked by the St. Louis Rams, planned a more exotic agenda, like a pit stop at the Playboy Mansion. Yes, all requests are granted.

“The guy to feel bad for is the second-to-last one drafted,” said Vobora, who now resides in Dallas with his wife and two young daughters. He’s the owner of Adaptive Training Foundation, a gym where he specializes workouts for amputee soldiers. “He’s not going to get much more than a signing bonus, and he doesn’t get all the parades and all the fun.”

Mr. Irrelevants don’t typically have long careers in the NFL, if a career at all. There’s a handful who lasted a few seasons and even some in the league now, including the greatest Mr. Irrelevant success story, Mr. 2009, Tennessee Titans kicker Ryan Succop, who was drafted by the Kansas City Chiefs with the very last pick.

With just seven rounds these days, the last pick has a much better shot at sticking than did the original Mr. Irrelevant in 1976, Dayton wide receiver Kelvin Kirk, taken by the Pittsburgh Steelers with the 487th pick in the 17th round.

Since the inception of Mr. Irrelevant, the Dallas Cowboys have had one, guard Lee Washburn of Montana State, taken with the 334th pick in 1978. He was cut in training camp, but as he told the South Florida Sun Sentinel in 1991, he didn’t see much of a future for himself in the NFL anyway: “I never hung around with the jocks or that kind of crowd. I ruptured two disks in rookie camp, so I figured I’d better quit right there.”

Fitch says she’s attended some 35 NFL drafts, and she’ll soon be in Chicago for the draft, patiently waiting through three days and 252 picks until it’s her time to take the stage to announce the newest Mr. Irrelevant and present him with a Broncos No. 253 jersey.

She’s known NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell since the early days when he was public relations intern with the league. Over the decades, the NFL and its teams have embraced the Mr. Irrelevant concept. And why not? It’s the kind of feel-good story the league can always use. Media from the player’s hometown, his college, his new NFL team and even national outlets cover Mr. Irrelevant as if he wasn’t last, but first.

Yet there’s always that one stick in the mud who just doesn’t know how to have fun.

“The New England Patriots are the only team I’ve had problems with,” Fitch said. “I know, that surprises you, [Bill] Belichick, right?

“He’s like, ‘No, I’m not sending him out.’ I’m like, ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa.’ He said Irrelevant Week, it’s a farce.”

Fitch had to get on the phone with her old pal Goodell to twist Belichick’s arm. Mr. Irrelevant 2005, tight end Andy Stokes of William Penn, did get to enjoy his week of frivolity, but it came with one condition.

“Belichick said he had to be back for Friday practices, he had to be back at 7:30 in the morning on Friday,” Fitch said. “The Lowsman Banquet was Thursday night, the big banquet. The media out there (in New England) said there’s not a practice on Friday. So I checked back with Belichick ... yep, yep, OK. So we did the dinner, moved it up, kind of went too fast, like a speed dinner, got a police escort because we had to get him to LAX, got clearance to get him through security, got him on a plane, flew him out, had a driver waiting for him at the airport on the East Coast, drove him in a car, got him to the practice field.”

Just in time for that early Friday morning Patriots practice, right?

“As one person put it,” Fitch said, “all that was there was trash blowing on the field and a padlock.”

This story was originally published April 26, 2016 at 5:37 PM with the headline "Mr. Irrelevant always has the last laugh in the NFL Draft."