It's a bit surprising, but surprising is par for the course for Shepherd's tale, who has taken a winding, unorthodox path to achieve his NFL dream. "After that I was like, 'Yo, I gotta play football.'" "Absolutely," Shepherd said with a warm smile and a laugh. I mean, really? "The Bernie Mac Show" influenced his playing career? It's hard envisioning a man the size of Shepherd - listed at 6-4, 315 pounds (jokingly powered by "poutine and Canadian bacon") - relating to a pencil-thin, mouth-breathing, pocket-protector-wearing geek. MORE: NFL 25 Under 25 Team - The best young players by positionīut, really. "It was a great episode, funny, love the show, and ever since then, I've been interested in football." He tried to put some nerdy science project in it, and his uncle said, 'Absolutely not.' So he joins the football team, and long story short, ends up becoming a starter and helps bring them to the finals, and they lose. "Jordan didn't have anything to put in the 'Mac Hall of Fame,' they called it. And the older brother Jordan, skinny guy, asthma, kind of nerdy - at the time, I could see myself in him a little bit. "Bernie Mac's niece got an award for excellence.
"I had watched an episode of 'Bernie Mac,'" the massive Shepherd said with a grin, recanting the plot line of the episode line-for-line. In a one-on-one interview with Sporting News, the hulking defensive lineman out of Toronto remembered a time when he was not so big - both in name and stature - and revealed that his football career didn't start with a favorite player or a ball or a pair of cleats.
SIGN UP to watch every NFL game LIVE and ON DEMAND with DAZN this season For Nathan Shepherd, "TV Guide" has a whole different meeting.īecause rather than referring to the channel that tells you when the next episode of "The Bachelorette" is on, Shepherd was steered by an unlikely source towards lacing up football cleats in his youth.