Chris Maragos' twisting road to the NFL

The roads least traveled to the NFL always make for the most interesting stories. And when you study the map that details Chris Maragos' ascent to the top of his profession, you just shake your head and wonder how he never got lost or too discouraged to continue on the trail that now has him playing a leading role on Eagles special teams and a supporting one on defense.

Stop signs went up before Maragos ever left his hometown of Racine, Wis. With an assist from Bucky Badger, he went through a red light at Western Michigan and bypassed a sure thing at Grand Valley State to pursue his dream of playing at the University of Wisconsin. Uninvited to the scouting combine and undrafted after that, the converted wide receiver and undersized safety kept going toward the NFL even as the GPS kept resetting the route.

Undaunted, Maragos crashed through walls of doubters and defenders and started to make a name for himself as a special teams superstar in Seattle, where he also picked up a Super Bowl ring. Finally, as a free agent, he landed with the Eagles last season and beat down the odds again, becoming a significant contributor on defense this season.

The story starts in Racine, where Maragos was a good enough wide receiver at William Horlick High School to earn scholarship consideration to some Division I-AA and Division II schools. He had bigger aspirations, so when Western Michigan of the Mid-American Conference offered him the opportunity to walk on, he jumped at it.

He met a girl on his first day on the Kalamazoo campus, developed a lot of friendships, including current Eagles teammate E.J. Biggers, and was pretty happy with his first season on the field. As a redshirt freshman in 2006, he caught 25 passes for 222 yards and felt he had done enough to cash in on a promise that he'd receive a scholarship if he played well.

The coaches at Western Michigan felt otherwise.

"When I came in, the deal was if I was a major contributor that they would put me on scholarship . . . but when I went in and talked to the coach during the spring I was kind of getting the runaround about things," Maragos said. "My whole thing as a person . . . is that I go a hundred percent and I leave my heart and soul out on the field, but if I can't trust you, I can't do that. For me, that was the deciding factor in my decision to leave.

"I was extremely discouraged because you invest so much into it. I didn't want to leave. I loved my teammates and I was dating this girl that I met the first day of my freshman year. It was really hard to leave."

The girl's name was Sarah. She is Maragos' wife and the mother of his two children, Micah and Mason. All was obviously not lost at Western Michigan and Maragos actually had an attractive alternative upon his departure from the school.

Grand Valley State, 61 miles to the northwest of Western Michigan, offered Maragos scholarship money and a promise that he would immediately start at wide receiver. It was a Division II school, but one that was coming off its fourth NCAA championship in five years and he would not have to sit out a season as a college transfer.

Maragos wanted something more. He wanted to play for the Badgers at Wisconsin. As a kid, his family went to every home game and his brother Troy was not only already attending the picturesque campus in Madison, he was also playing the part of the team mascot, Bucky Badger.

"It's actually a pretty elaborate process to become Bucky Badger," Maragos said. "They go through a three or four-day process where you have to do all this stuff. You have to ice skate, go through an interview process and then they pick a few Buckys and he was picked as one of them. He's still kind of the famous one in the family. They think it's cooler to be Bucky Badger than it is to actually play for the Badgers."

Brother Troy also happened to be friends with Luke Swan, a wide receiver for the Badgers who had made the team as a walk-on and gone on to be a captain.

"They were both involved in Campus Crusade for Christ and my brother knew Luke's story, so he asked him if he would be willing to help me go through the process," Maragos said.

Swan was willing. After exchanging messages on Facebook, Maragos mailed film from Western Michigan to Swan.

"He said, 'Hey, I think you can play here,' " Maragos recalled. "He kind of double-checked it with the starting quarterback, who was Tyler Donovan at the time, and he said, 'Yeah, I like it.' I think that allowed him to have the courage to take it to Bret Bielema."

Bielema, the Wisconsin head coach at the time and a former walk-on at Iowa, invited Maragos to join the team as a walk-on in the fall of 2007. Since he was transferring to another Division I school, it meant he had to sit out a semester while also paying tuition.

A lot of people deemed Chris Maragos' decision crazy.

"Family members, friends, media, pretty much everybody," Maragos said. "They all wanted to know why I'd waste a year of eligibility. Why wouldn't I transfer down, take a scholarship and go play right away? Everybody was dumbfounded. But, to me, it was always very clear where I wanted to go and I knew if I put the work in, I'd put myself in a good position to have success."

Putting the work in had never been a problem. When his friends wanted him to go to the beach in high school, he ran hills. When football practices were scheduled in the fall of 2007, Maragos was there even though there was zero opportunity for him to dress for the games.

"They really liked my work ethic," Maragos said. "I ran up and down on full-cover kicks. I tried to make every play on kickoffs. At receiver, I was blocking safeties and corners and trying to make as many plays as I could. I was trying to play fast and physical."

It was sort of his internship for becoming a special-teams demon, but the defensive coaches also took notice and told him that he might be better equipped as a safety. That deal got sealed during spring practice.

"I was playing wide receiver and one of the quarterbacks threw an interception," Maragos said. "The linebacker was running it back and I came from the other side of the field and jumped from five yards away and stripped the ball. I wasn't supposed to hit him, so looking back it probably wasn't good that I did that, but the ball popped out, he went flying and we recovered the ball."

Summoned to Bielema's office after that practice, Maragos was told he was moving to safety.

In the fall of 2008, Biggers became reacquainted with Chris Margos from afar.

"I remember our whole team being upset when he didn't get the scholarship," Biggers said. "We felt like we were getting ready to take control of the MAC and we needed him to be part of that. Then one day a year or two later, we get on a bus after a game and they have the Wisconsin game on and we see Maragos playing safety. I was happy for him."

The next spring, after Maragos had emerged as a starting safety and captain for the Badgers, Bielema got his team together in a meeting room for an announcement. Maragos and another walk-on from Central Michigan were being awarded scholarships. The other kid was J.J. Watt, the two-time NFL defensive player of the year with the Houston Texans.

"I don't think you can really describe what that moment was like," Maragos said. "It wasn't about the money. For me, it was about the validation of all the work I put in and how they respected that."

Maragos, 28, believes that work ethic is what got him a look as an undrafted free agent with San Francisco in 2010 and then with Seattle after being cut by the 49ers when Jim Harbaugh took over from Mike Singletary.

That's probably true, but there's quite a bit of talent and intelligence that also went unnoticed as Maragos made his unlikely journey to the top of his profession. His teammates, especially the ones on special teams, are all well aware of it.

"Oh, there's no doubt he's our leader," Biggers said.

Defensive coordinator Bill Davis decided in training camp that he saw enough of the talent and intelligence to give Maragos a shot at playing safety in the Eagles' nickel defense this season. Now we are halfway through the season, and Maragos is still playing that role, having been on the field for 42 percent of the team's defensive snaps. That's an indication he knows what he's doing and he's doing it well.

If you're surprised, you shouldn't be. Stopping Chris Maragos from where he wants to go is pretty much impossible.

bbrookover@phillynews.com

@brookob