NFL lineman Tom Johnson returns to repay Moss Point community in a big way

Tom Johnson almost didn’t wear a Moss Point football uniform at all. Monday, though, the Minnesota Vikings defensive tackle was on hand as the Tigers unveiled new uniforms.

Johnson said he wanted to give back to the community and school that gave him his start in football, so he purchased the team’s new uniforms.

“This is where I am from and made me who I am,” he said. “This city is a blue collar city and the people in the city have to work for anything they get.”

Moss Point coach Willie Brown said Johnson’s generation was unusual.

“You don’t get too many folks to give back to the school,” he said. “This doesn’t happen every day.”

Brown said he hoped the new uniforms remind his players of the legacy left by previous Moss Point teams.

“This school has a lot of tradition and is one of the best programs in the state,” Brown said. “This will help us instill a legacy in the players. This lets them know they have a lot of people who care for them, who left a lot of sweat on the football field.”

Johnson is set to begin his third year as a Viking, but he almost didn’t play football in high school. As a sophomore, Johnson wasn’t even on the football team.

“I was a stubby, pudgy kid,” said Johnson.

One of Johnson’s friends persuaded him to go out for football, however, and after a few weeks of hitting the weights and running, Moss Point coaches and teammates started seeing a difference in Johnson’s body. By the end of his junior year, when the Tigers won the Class 5A title, he was a regular part of the Tigers’ defensive line rotation and started his senior year, when they lost the championship game to Starkville.

“I fell in love with football,” he said.

Although he recorded eight sacks as a senior, major schools did not come calling. So, instead of settling for the SWAC or another smaller school, Johnson signed with Mississippi Gulf Coast.

Johnson intended to sign with West Virginia coming out of Perkinston, but with his mother was recovering from back surgery, so he signed with Southern Miss instead.

Stardom didn’t come calling right away, however. Despite a strong career with the Eagles, Johnson went undrafted..

“I was disappointed I wasn’t drafted,” he said. “But, my parents didn’t go to college. The NFL was my least concern. I had to graduate from college.”

The Colts, though, signed him as an undrafted free agent in 2006. It took him five years, four teams, and playing in NFL Europe, the Arena Football League, and the Canadian Football League before was able to catch on with New Orleans in 2011. After playing for the Saints for two years, Johnson signed with the Vikings in 2014 and has recorded 12 sacks over the last two years, the fifth-best output for an interior defensive lineman over that period.

“Football has opened so many doors for me,” Johnson said, adding the struggle to make the NFL has made him enjoy the last two years more. The struggle to make the NFL started in Moss Point, which he said gave him the grind and grit to endure his journey to the Vikings.

“That’s where I feel I really started my NFL career,” Johnson said.

Now that Johnson is in the NFL, he said he wanted to give back to the community that gave him his start — which brought him back to Moss Point on Monday.

This story was originally published July 25, 2016 at 7:50 PM with the headline "NFL lineman Tom Johnson returns to repay Moss Point community in a big way."