2022_09_New_Jersey_Monthly

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