From South Sydney to the Super Bowl: Jordan Mailata no longer regarded as an NFL sideshow

Nearly five years into his NFL odyssey, Jordan Mailata is still full of surprises. The rugby-league convert from Bankstown in Sydney’s south-west, along with two Philadelphia Eagles teammates, were the stars of a seven-track Christmas charity album in December. The 6ft 8in, 165kg Australian had already appeared last March in the US version of The Masked Singer, but the beautiful, crisp falsetto he delivered on a version of White Christmas stunned listeners.

Now Mailata, 25, has moved onto a bigger stage: Super Bowl LVII in Arizona, where he will help the favoured Eagles in their bid to beat the Kansas City Chiefs. The left tackle said he used to skip school back home to watch the big game on Mondays, but the football was secondary. When asked who he enjoyed watching, he smiled and said: “Queen Bee: Beyonce.”

“I thought about being in one, but definitely not playing in it,” Mailata said last week of the Super Bowl. Singing in the half-time show? “Oh, I’m just playing with you guys,” he told a group of reporters in the Eagles’ locker room. “I never thought I’d be in the Super Bowl when I was watching it.”

Anthony Albanese and Caroline Kennedy speak to Jordan Mailata ahead of Super Bowl debut – video

He is large even by the standards of NFL offensive linemen – the Eagles’ other tackle, the 10-year veteran Lane Johnson, is two inches shorter and 18kg lighter – but Mailata was hardly a certainty to claim a spot on an NFL team, let alone become a first-team player on the Eagles offensive line, a fearsome unit that is one of the best in the NFL.

Mailata, who played for the South Sydney Rabbitohs Under-20s, was drafted by the Eagles in 2018 purely for his potential. He was a project. He did not even know how to put his pads on when he started – and did not appear in an NFL regular-season game until his third season. But he learned fast, and his teammates, he said, “embraced me”.

“I had no idea which positions they played, to be honest,” Mailata said in the build-up to the Super Bowl. “But I slowly learned when I started playing football who they are and what they do – and what they get paid for. It’s been a dream so far.

“I gotta count my lucky stars, man.”

He has a vital job: protecting the blind side of Jalen Hurts, the Eagles’ right-handed quarterback. Mailata allowed seven sacks in 1,024 offensive snaps in the regular season (he gave up three sacks on 914 snaps in 2021), but he has not given up a sack or been penalised in two post-season games in 2022, both of which the Eagles won easily.

Before Philadelphia played San Francisco in the NFC Championship game on 29 January, the 49ers’ all-pro defensive end, Nick Bosa, was asked if Mailata presented a unique challenge because of his rugby league background. “I don’t know about unique. He’s huge,” Bosa said.

Early in a game that the Eagles would win, 31-7, Mailata plowed into Bosa, knocking him off the line of scrimmage, then churning his legs to wrestle him down. Then Mailata flopped on top of Bosa as play continued, appearing to deliver a message to his opponent.

Mailata has benefitted from working with top players, including his singing partners, Johnson and the center Jason Kelce. Mailata’s position coach, Jeff Stoutland, has 39 years of experience, the last 10 with the Eagles, and Mailata is not shy about crediting Stoutland for his dramatic transformation from rugby league to NFL player. Mailata, who did not go to college, has said he attended “Jeff Stoutland University”.

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Mailata watches as Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts runs the ball at Soldier Field in December. Photograph: Tannen Maury/EPA

“The spot the Eagles pride themselves in is finding raw talent, especially in the later rounds [of the NFL Draft], and they have to develop cornerstones in that position and in the locker room for generations to come,” Mailata said. “They’ve put great people in power, such as Howie [Roseman, the general manager] to find those guys, with his scouting team and coaches.”

Mailata is no longer regarded as some sort of football sideshow. Before the 2021 season, Mailata signed a four-year, US$64m contract extension, which Pro Football Focus last June called the biggest bargain in the entire league, labelling him “a true dancing bear with tremendous footwork for his size and lack of experience”.

He has come a long way, literally and figuratively, from the Sydney suburb of Bankstown, where his family landed after emigrating from Samoa by way of New Zealand. In the Eagles’ 2022 media guide he listed as his greatest accomplishment winning a rugby league grand final when he was 14 years old, but he may have to edit that if the Eagles beat the Chiefs on Monday morning AEDT.

He has earned his place in Philadelphia in so many ways. Nick Sirianni, the Eagles’ brash second-year coach, has a framed photo in his office of Hurts, bent over and his elbows on his knees after a dismal loss in 2021 to the New York Giants. Mailata towers over Hurts, his big hand on Hurts’s back, attempting to soothe the sting of the loss.

“That picture means a lot to me,” Sirianni said on Monday. “Our greatest motivation is to play for each other.”