After two years at Chabot college in California, Stevie Johnson headed for Kentucky to play WR in 2006.
In his Senior campaign, he had 60 catches for 1041 yards and 13 TDs.
Both his yards and receiving TDs led the SEC.
Selected in the 7th round of the 2008 NFL Draft by the Buffalo Bills.
Caught first TD from JP Losman against the Jets late in his rookie year.
Sidelined for most of 2009 with a rib injury.
Burst onto the scene in 2010 with 82 catches for 1073 yards and 10 TDs.
Followed that up in 2011 with 76 catches for 1004 yards and 7 TDs, playing much of the season injured.
Another solid campaign followed in ’12 with 79 catches for 1046 yards and 6 TDs.
First receiver in franchise history to record 3 back to back to back 1,000+ yard seasons.
As the team struggled with a change in QB to EJ Manuel, Stevie’s numbers slipped.
Traded to the 49ers in 2014 and caught 35 passes for 435 yards and 3 TDs.
Signed with Chargers in ’15, but battled with injuries throughout the remainder of his playing career and was released in early 2017.
Is a big fan of Buffalo and has returned to his roots in the community.
Owns the trademark to the Buffalo Destroyers arena football team and is trying to revive the brand.
NOTES:
Probably the only time you’ll see ‘surrogate’ instead of ‘home’ or ‘work’ on my returns, because some sleuths figured out that Stevie’s mail was going to a different address owned by a different guy. Well the people on sportscollectors.net got suspicious and I figured I’d get to the bottom of it. So I reached out to both the surrogate and Stevie to figure out if this was legit or not.
Turns out that the surrogate is one of Stevie’s close friends going back to high school. He explained that Stevie wanted to sign autographs for fans TTM but didn’t want to give out his home or foundation’s address- which I totally understand.
The surrogate did a great job keeping me abreast of where the cards where when I sent them to him, and that Stevie would be a bit delayed since he was on vacation. I further verified this to make sure. Frankly, if someone went to this much trouble to fake this, he could just take my money and be done with it. Still it was one of my more odder TTM situations but who cares? It all worked out in the end.
In 51 contests he had 437 total tackles, 34 tackles for loss, 8.5 sacks, 7 interceptions, and 2 forced fumbles.
He’d be selected in the 2nd round of the 2013 NFL Draft by the San Diego Chargers.
Although injured early on his rookie year, he managed to finish with a respectable 61 tackles and 4 pass breakups.
Again injured early on in 2014, Te’o played well, finishing with 60 tackles, 1 sack, his first interception (-Tom Brady) and 3 pass breakups.
In 2015, Manti finished with 83 combined tackles, a pick and a forced fumble, despite missing 4 games mid season due to a lingering ankle injury.
Te’o appeared on the up and up, but tore his Achilles, ending his 2016 campaign just after 3 games.
He signed with New Orleans in 2017.
There in 10 starts he posted 62 combined tackles and a career high 7 tackles for loss.
In the playoffs he saw action in 2 games posting 15 combined tackles, a sack, and a tackle for loss.
He spent the next two years in New Orleans playing in 8 games.
Signed by the Chicago Bears in October of 2020.
Saw his only action of the season in the playoffs posting 6 tackles.
As of 2025 works as an analyst for NFL Network.
ACCOLADES:
Nagurski Award 2012
Lott Award 2012
Butkus Award 2012
Maxwell Award 2012
Walter Camp Award 2012
Bednarik Award 2012
Lombardi Award 2012
Unanimous All-American 2012
NOTES:
I think that if Manti had played at another school other than Notre Dame, he wouldn’t have faced the scrutiny that he did- despite his monster college output and fame that surrounded him. ND at the time was going through a renaissance of sorts, and it was popular again to hate on the school- so why not take it out on the school’s golden boy?
I wasn’t really sure what to make of what happened with everything that occurred. I think that it made for ‘better theater’ to unfortunately watch him get eviscerated and torn down.
I really feel for Manti. As a kid before it was a thing, I pretty much got catfished by a girl over the phone- and this was before the internet! It left me scarred with PTSD about girls, my confidence was completely shot and then I became dangerously depressed. I wasn’t equipped for that at 14- and it took me a lot of therapy to work through it. So yeah I get it- and that’s why I didn’t talk about it. Though his catfishing incident was part of his career, to me, it didn’t define him and he’s not letting it define him- despite his struggles with what happened.
After watching the Netflix documentary about him, I began spying out certified autographs of him through EBay. With the market showing signs of weakness, I was able to snatch up this patch autograph of him for under $8.00.
So this event was at Dick’s Sporting Goods out in the middle of nowhere near a toll road and I got little notice. I called and a gentleman over the phone quickly volunteered that we could bring outside items, and that it wasn’t like their other events. After deciding the best course of action was to pick up my daughter and take her with me to the event, I was further pleased to find out that women from the volleyball team and basketball team would be there as well. It was an agonizingly long wait.
I waited for my friend Jeff and his kids to come out, and we waited in line together behind another guy and his family. The gatekeeper told us that we were unable to bring outside items. Both Jeff, myself and the gentleman in front of me bristled at their last second change of policy- that even the general manager refused to change. When they told us that the items had to be from the store- I just told them I bought the cards there- which I obviously didn’t.
I skipped ahead and watched other people in line. A guy further up had a Chiefs jersey signed by Jamaal. At this point, I knew it was on and there wasn’t going to be a problem. The problem was… there was a problem.
Jamaal was obviously the prize, and the guy in front of me had like 3 photo edits for him. Things moved so quickly, that I’m really unsure what happened- other than Jamaal refused to sign the photo edits at least for him. To which the guy got gruff with Jamaal and called him rude as he left the line. I swear right then right there that Jamaal seriously was thinking about how ungrateful that dude was- and was thinking about getting up and leaving. Ugh.
Anyway, I said to Jamaal, uh I hope you don’t mind signing cards for us.. And he quickly said, “Nah no problem man. I just don’t sign photo edits. Those things all end up being sold on Ebay.” He signed a card for me and a card for my kid. I sent one of them to Joe for future considerations and kept the Panini Rookies and Stars. I didn’t want to get back in line and ask for more. We counted this as a win and left.
That being said, Jamaal is right. Absolutely right. There are a few people out there who have frankly, ruined the hobby for many of us. They get in line, bring like a whole bunch of people. They get custom inscriptions… and take a bunch of time- just for them to go pawn off the player’s autograph on Ebay.
Celebrating the game, the players, the cards, and the autographs for over 25 years.
