When the dust settles on Night 1 of the 2025 NFL Draft, it’s highly likely that Will Johnson will have been the first defensive player selected. The 6 foot 2, First-team All-American was a cornerstone of Jim Harbaugh’s national championship winning defence, with the 21-year-old being named the CFP National Championship Game Defensive MVP. 

With standout size, speed and ball skills, Johnson represents the ideal cornerback for the modern NFL. 

Why is that important to Arizona Cardinal fans? Well, when Michigan and Ohio State locked horns in November, Johnson engaged in a back-and-forth battle with the wide receiver that is now en route to the desert. One particular moment from that game puts the exhilaration every Cardinal fan felt last night when Marvin Harrison Jr. was selected with the team’s #4 pick into living colour. 

On 1st and 10 in the second quarter, Kyle McCord steps up into the pocket as he spots Harrison downfield and throws the ball. Johnson, a couple of steps behind the receiver, is forced to throw himself at Harrison’s hips in an effort to stop the Ohio man. There will be a flag coming for pass interference but at least he’s prevented the catch and a bigger gain of yards. 

Except, he hasn’t. As Harrison and Johnson come crashing to the turf, so does the ball, MHJ clutching it tightly against his body with his right hand. A one handed catch on the head of one of the best defensive players in the country, with that player hanging onto his hips like a toddler would to a parent. If you somehow didn’t already know it, you sure did now. 

Marvin Harrison Jr. is special. 

A player who often makes the spectacular look routine, the 21-year-old has been groomed for success since an early age by his Hall of Fame father and namesake, Harrison SR. encouraging his son to play a year or two above in youth football to hone his skills against older competition. 

While his lineage has been used as a stick to beat down the hype surrounding him, instead it speaks to the mentality of a man that Ohio State Head Coach Ryan Day said has “a tremendous amount of discipline”.

Rather than shrinking in the face of being compared to his father or coasting on his Hall of Fame legacy, MHJ walked into a crowded wide receiver room of future NFL starters in Ohio and earned the position of WR1. 

From predawn workout sessions as a freshman which were often bookended by return trips to the facility that would end past midnight to having a Jugs machine set up in the hotel lobby of a bowl site, Harrison’s work ethic has been unquestionable, something he takes immense pride in.

According to Dane Brugler’s outstanding draft guide “The Beast”, MHJ had to be convinced by his father and advisors to sign certain NIL deals because he viewed them as a “distraction”. 

In an interview with GQ, he said that his legacy in Columbus would be his work ethic, rather than his individual awards and touchdowns, of which he had plenty.

Of course, what Marvin Harrison Jr. wants most of all is to be remembered as “the greatest receiver to ever play” and while that is an incredibly lofty desire, he at least has the resume and ability to not come across as totally fucking delusional when saying that. 

In three years as a Buckeye, MHJ scored 31 touchdowns, recorded 2613 receiving yards, was a Heisman Trophy finalist and was also awarded the 2023 Biletnikoff Award as the most outstanding receiver in college football. He also received Unanimous All-American honours in 2022 and 2023 as well as being a two time First-team All-Big Ten and a Richter-Howard award winner. 

Displaying truly exquisite body control that’d be as suited to high-level gymnastics as the football field, with a frame that measures in just a shade under 6 foot 4, the former St. Joseph’s Prep School student possesses a catch radius, field awareness and ability to get his feet inbounds that will have Kyler Murray’s mouth watering. Get the ball somewhere in the same neighbourhood as MHJ and he will very likely bring it down. 

Don’t even worry about how Maserati Marv is going to get into that neighbourhood, just trust that he will be there. With ridiculously fluid hips, especially for a man of his size, Marvin Harrison is an uber-talented route runner whose bag of tricks and releases in pursuit of the ball rival many current NFL receivers. Route-running is an artform and he does it with the finesse of a Michelin star chef.

Whether it is with a flip of those snake hips, a stutter, a skip or a complete fake out that sends the corner to the stands for a hot dog, MHJ gets open. 

There are times when the ball is in the air that you’d be forgiven for suspecting that the 2023 Graham-George Offensive Player of the Year has a GPS tracker connected to the ball. The standout prospect faced an insane amount of double teams in 2023 as teams cottoned onto the fact that he is *QUITE GOOD* at this football stuff – his 16.8% double-covered route rate was the highest in Reception Perception history – and it didn’t seem to faze him. 

The number of times he plucked the ball out of the sky ahead of two defenders was comical. Again referencing Matt Harmon’s fantastic Reception Perception database, no receiver who had been doubled on more than 8.5% of his routes had ever hit a 70% success rate… until MHJ. 

Though his speed and explosiveness has been questioned especially when being compared to classmate Malik Nabers, the electric LSU alum who is now a New York Giant, Harrison can still fly within his own right.

His long strides continue to create momentum the further downfield he gets and according to Reel Analytics topped 22.2mph on a 71-yard touchdown against Youngstown. The in-game GPS data available to teams also recorded MHJ at a max speed of 21.7mph which was higher than Nabers’ max in 2023. 

That longspeed, combined with his ball-tracking, body control, safe hands and beautiful route running is a deadly mix for defences and led to 15 deep catches in 2023 (tied for 3rd amongst receivers) and SIXTY EIGHT plays of 15+ yards over the past two seasons. 

Whether Marvin Harrison Jr goes on to even sniff the upper echelons of NFL wide receivers remains to be seen. As over the moon as the Cardinals fan base surely is today, everyone can admit that there is no such thing as a perfect prospect. 

Though he isn’t a statue after the catch, being able to manipulate defenders with spins and fakes, he will never give opposing defensive coordinators sleepless nights as a YAC threat (just as everything else), averaging 6.4 YAC last year. That’s just not his game. 

There are tweaks he can make in other parts of his game. He’s a tad eager to push off of DBs and there will be fair question marks over his capabilities in the blocking game which is a non-negotiable in Jonathan Gannon’s team. Many will mention Larry Fitzgerald and MHJ in tandem over the coming months and he could do with taking a page out of the GOAT’s book when it comes to blocking. 

There was also a significant increase in his drops in 2023, with 8, over double the 3 he made in 2022. Those numbers were swollen by 3 drops in one game in the rain against Penn State, in a game that ironically he also made a career-best 11 receptions. 

Some of those drops are a direct consequence of the double teams he faced (he made 13 contested catches in 2023, a drop from 18 in 2022) and he will certainly be the recipient of a stratospheric improvement in quarterback play going from Kyle McCord to Kyler Murray but he must get back to his best in that regard. 

He is more than capable of it – in that game versus Penn State he was still making difficult catches in traffic against the then best ranked pass defence in the country. Kalen King has never been the same since. 

The comparisons to Larry may end up being completely unwarranted. Nobody can project whether Marvin Harrison Jr. will eventually join his father in the Hall of Fame. He might be a perennial Pro Bowler. He might never reach those heights or even come close to them.

There will be bumps along the way no matter what happens but besides that, nobody knows what is to come and that isn’t what matters right now. 

What matters now is that Monti Ossenfort held the line (big up PHNX, Damon Dawg and all you brave troops) and potentially supercharged a Cardinals offence that was ranked in the Top 10 in the NFL after Kyler Murray’s return from injury. Kyler Murray and the Cardinals have their WR1, their big dawg on the boundary and there is palpable excitement in the Valley once more after two and a half years of failure and recovery. 

The sun is shining in the desert again. When he does sign the required NFLPA papers, MHJ jerseys are going to sell like hotcakes. 

What matters now is that Marvin Harrison Jr. is an Arizona Cardinal.