2022_09_New_Jersey_Monthly
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A REAL CATCH<br />
Nate Burleson<br />
used to play for the<br />
Vikings, Seahawks<br />
and Lions. Now the<br />
former NFL wide<br />
receiver is a c0host<br />
on CBS Mornings.<br />
PEOPLE<br />
Bigger Than Football<br />
NJ resident Nate Burleson spent 11 years catching passes in the NFL. Now he’s enjoying a<br />
meteoric broadcasting career that’s transcended sports. By Gary Phillips<br />
PHOTOGRAPH: COURTESY OF MICHELE CROWE/CBS<br />
Peter Schrager remembers<br />
the research Nate<br />
Burleson put into his<br />
move to <strong>New</strong> <strong>Jersey</strong>.<br />
A former NFL wide<br />
receiver turned Emmy-winning broadcaster,<br />
Burleson lived in Arizona at the<br />
time. He had just accepted a job as a<br />
host on NFL Network’s Good Morning<br />
Football show, which debuted in 2016,<br />
and he was ready to take his family East.<br />
So Burleson leaned heavily on Schrager,<br />
an NFL Network teammate and Freehold<br />
native, in an effort to find the best<br />
high school for his three kids. The two<br />
talked about countless public and private<br />
schools, the state of their athletic<br />
programs, and famous alumni.<br />
“Tell me about Delbarton. Tell me<br />
about Don Bosco. Tell me about Bergen<br />
Catholic,” Schrager remembers Burleson<br />
saying as he took notes with pen<br />
and pad. Never mind that all three of<br />
Burleson’s children—sons Nathaniel II,<br />
18, and Nehemiah, 16, and daughter Mia,<br />
12—were all years away from attending<br />
high school at the time. Burleson was<br />
going to make an informed decision. “I<br />
was his encyclopedia,” Schrager says.<br />
“It was almost like a recruiting informational<br />
session based on something years<br />
down the line.”<br />
It’s no surprise that Burleson was<br />
thinking about the future in that moment,<br />
though, as he has gotten ahead by<br />
thinking ahead.<br />
Now a Franklin Lakes resident and<br />
a cohost on CBS Mornings, Burleson<br />
planted the seeds for his burgeoning<br />
media career while he was still corralling<br />
passes. The third-round pick spent<br />
11 years in the NFL, totaling 135 games,<br />
457 catches, 5,630 receiving yards and 39<br />
touchdowns—plus return duties—while<br />
suiting up for the Vikings, Seahawks and<br />
Lions between 2003 and 2013. But when<br />
Burleson wasn’t busy playing football,<br />
the Canadian native found himself<br />
learning how to talk about it in front of a<br />
camera or microphone.<br />
A communications major at the<br />
University of Reno, Nevada, Burleson<br />
started doing television and local radio<br />
while he was still an active player. The<br />
40-year-old also appeared in his teams’<br />
multimedia content and attended the<br />
NFL’s Broadcast Bootcamp, which prepares<br />
players for potential media gigs.<br />
But a creative job was the original<br />
goal for Burleson, who imagined life as<br />
SEPTEMBER <strong>2022</strong> NEW JERSEY MONTHLY 31