Emmanuel Ogbah

Emmanuel Ogbah was a highly-decorated draft prospect coming out of Oklahoma State.

(Brody Schmidt, Associated Press)

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Football was not a familiar sport to the Ogbah family when they came to the United States from Nigeria when their son, Emmanuel, was nine years old.

The feelings they had when their son discovered the game, however, are familiar to football parents everywhere.

"Initially we felt it was rough," Ogbah's mother, Regina, said of her son's interest in the game.

"We play soccer (in Nigeria)," his father, Dr. Richard Ogbah said on Saturday in the lobby of the Cleveland Browns training facility, moments after Emmanuel was introduced as one of the newest members of the team. "Soccer, the way it's played is that when you have a physical contact with somebody it's a penalty, but this one, you have to have physical contact with people for you to play."

So how does a nine-year-old who played soccer in a soccer-loving country grow up to be the pass-rushing force picked 32nd overall in the NFL Draft? That Ogbah was even there for the Browns to take at No. 32 was an unlikely development, not just because Ogbah was projected in some mock drafts -- and by the Browns -- to go in the middle of the first round. Ogbah didn't grow up with the game like many of his draft counterparts.

His journey started with the simple act of his father hoping to improve his family's situation.

"The reason why we immigrated is because my dad just wanted a better life for my family," Emmanuel said in a conference call on Friday after the Browns made him the first pick of the NFL Draft's second round. "There was a lot of corruption back in Nigeria."

Emmanuel Ogbah smiles during his introductory press conference in Berea on Saturday, April 30.

Emmanuel was born in Lagos. He moved along with his family to Texas and would eventually attend George Bush High School in Houston, the former high school of Denver offensive lineman Russell Okung, also of Nigerian descent.

"The real reason I came to this place was my family, my children," Richard told OColly.com last August. "I said early on that things in Nigeria are not really all that nice. When I look at my children, I wanted to give them a better education, a better life, to make sure they have everything that they need. That they do their best to be what God wants them to be."

Ogbah didn't start in football right away. It took him until junior high to get involved in the sport.

"In Nigeria, I played a lot of soccer growing up," Ogbah said Friday. "When I got here, I played basketball, too, before I transitioned to football."

"He never even knew what football was all about," Richard said. "What we know (in Nigeria) is soccer. That's what we play, so we never knew anything about football, but when he came here, he saw his mates and that was what most people were doing, so he decided to have a try. He tried it and it's a game he loved to play."

"I started playing football in seventh grade," Ogbah said. "The reason why I really tried football is because my friends were playing it. I've been in sports ever since I was young, so I just decided to give it a shot, and I ended up being really good at it."

Emerging concerns over concussions and the longterm impact of playing have made the fear of football as American as, well, playing football. Ogbah's parents were no different, especially due to the game's unfamiliarity.

"We felt it was a rough thing to do," Richard said, after admitting that he wasn't sure that he and his wife were 100 percent on board at first, "so he just kept at us, and then we discovered he had passion, we gave him our blessing, we gave him our support."

Ogbah at the NFL Scouting Combine.

One look at Ogbah makes that decision seem wise, except he hasn't always looked like like a perfect specimen of a football player.

"I was always tall and skinny, but I gained a lot of weight coming to college," he said. "I was not as big until I got to college."

Once that weight showed up, Ogbah became exactly the type of player the Browns were seeking in an edge rusher. As Browns head coach Hue Jackson put it on Friday night: "The guy is 6-4, 275 pounds and has 4.6 speed."

Freakish size and speed aside, though, going from curious seventh-grader to making a living playing the game is a big leap.

"The thing with him is naturally, when he decides to do something, he wants to do something, he goes all out to do it," Richard said. "That's how does it. So when he started playing the football, he had the passion for it. He began to develop that passion from one level to the other, and that's how he got into this stage, this level, where he is now."

Regina said the family started to understand the opportunities the game could offer as Emmanuel played during high school.

"From high school, after playing in high school he became more about the whole thing," Richard added, "knowing that through it he can get a scholarship, he can play, at the end of the day, maybe he can play as a professional."

Ogbah's next challenge in the game will be making the transtion from 4-3 end at Oklahoma State to 3-4 outside linebacker in Cleveland.

"I think that the defense we'll play here will be a little bit different for him," Browns executive vice president of football operations Sashi Brown said. "We'll ask him to do a little bit of different things, but we're confident the things that Oklahoma State asked him to do, he will be able to do here in our scheme under (defensive coordinator) Ray (Horton). All these guys are going to have to develop in time, but we absolutely anticipate that he'll be able to meet all of our expectations."

"We were a 4-3 defense (at Oklahoma State)." Ogbah said. "I was an end in the 4-3 defense, but I have rushed standing up and rushed with my hands on the ground."

Oklahoma State defensive end Emmanuel Ogbah, right, sacks Iowa State quarterback Joel Lanning.

"He's a candidate to be a linebacker in a three-down scheme," Jackson said when asked if Ogbah is a three-down linebacker or a situational pass rusher. "He has that kind of versatility and that kind of skillset. We drafted him because he can do both of those things well."

Ogbah fit right into one of the draft themes for the Browns as they navigated the three days: picking highly decorated players with gaudy college stats. Ogbah registered 13 sacks -- first in the Big 12 and fourth nationally -- to go along with 17.5 tackles for loss, good for second in the Big 12 last season, playing as a redshirt junior. He was a second team All-American, Big 12 Co-Defensive Player of the Year and First-Team-Big 12. During his redshirt sophomore season, he became the first Oklahoma State player to be recognized as Big 12 defensive lineman of the year.

"It worked out great for him," Richard said of his son's desire to play football.

Still, just like with every other football parent, there are those troublesome thoughts pushed somewhere in the back of Ogbah's parents' minds.

"Regardless of how rough and aggressive it is, he loves it," Regina said. "So as parents we have to back him."

"We pray for him for protection," said Richard, "and support him in every way."

If the Browns are right about the Nigerian immigrant who fell in love with the game on first sight, it will be quarterbacks who need protection from him.