Local players draft into the NFL

Several football players from the south Kansas City area were added to NFL rosters as draft picks and undrafted free agents.

Aireontae Ersery

From Ruskin High School to the NFL. Ersery was drafted by the Houston Texans in the second round, with the 48th overall pick. He is expected to play left tackle and have the opportunity to protect C.J. Stroud’s blind side for years to come.

He didn’t play football until William Perkins, Ruskin’s head coach at the time, convinced Ersery to try out for the team when he saw him waiting for a ride with a relative who played football there. He ended up being pretty good. He became a starter for Ruskin on the offensive and defensive lines. He focused on the weight room and added muscle.

Ersery earned a scholarship to the University of Minnesota and became a starter at left tackle in his third season for the Gophers. He was First-Team All-Big Ten last season. He developed into an NFL prospect by starting for 38 straight games at Minnesota.

The Telegraph will have a full feature story about Ersery in the next issue.

Luke Grimm

Grimm graduated from Raymore-Peculiar in 2020 and played five seasons as a wide receiver at the University of Kansas.

The Los Angeles Chargers signed Grimm as an undrafted free agent. The Chargers took two wide receivers in the draft. Grimm is the only receiver of the 19 players they brought in. He has a chance to make the final roster, but has a crowded receiver group ahead of him in LA.

He had 23 touchdowns and just under 2,500 receiving yards in his career at Kansas. He was the Jayhawks leading receiver last season with 690 yards and six touchdowns.

Armond Membou

The New York Jets drafted Armand Membou seventh overall in the first round. Membou joins a young offensive line that the Jets have built through the draft in recent years.

Membou graduated from Lee’s Summit North in 2022 and started at the University of Missouri for three seasons before entering the draft. He was mostly unknown until his senior year of high school when he committed to Mizzou and then developed quickly.

Membou’s family emigrated to the United States from Cameroon. He participated in football, wrestling, track and field, and tennis in high school. After his sophomore year, he nearly quit football, but the head coach at Lee’s Summit North, Jamar Mozee, convinced him that he could make varsity the following year, so he kept playing.

He started for Missouri halfway through his freshman year and then started 25 straight games from his sophomore through junior season. In his junior season, he was Second-Team All-SEC.

He is 6 feet 4 inches, 332 pounds, and at the combine he ran a faster 40-yard dash than anybody that size while entering the draft in more than 20 years. He had the longest broad jump of any player in the draft this year.

Graham Mertz

In 2017, Mertz led Blue Valley North to a Kansas 6A state championship in his junior season. He was one of the highest ranked quarterbacks of his class when he came out of high school in 2019. He went to the University of Wisconsin before finishing his career at Florida.

Mertz was drafted in the sixth round with the 197th overall pick by the Houston Texans. His career at the University of Florida ended when he tore his ACL in a loss to Tennessee in October.

He will now be a backup for C.J. Stroud on the Texans depth chart. Mertz had plenty of college experience to prepare him for the NFL. He’s known as a game manager. He likely doesn’t have a high ceiling as an NFL quarterback, but he could make a career as a good backup quarterback.