This one’s always worth a throwback on Draft Day.
For NFL fans, there’s nothing better to get the football juices flowing – in April – than the NFL Draft. Tonight, three straight days of drafting will kick off in the springtime tradition that effectively sets the reset button and pushes the National Football League into a fresh, new season. If you think about it, it’s an event that’s specifically for the fans.
This year, the draft is being hosted in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and it’s there that some NFL fan bases (except for the New York Jets) will be given hope. We’ll find out which rookies will be playing where. We’ll hopefully witness some exciting, draft day trades. It’s truly a wonderful moment on the sports calendar, and it almost always provides some viral moments.
Remember when the NFL Draft happened in Nashville and it ruined bachelorette parties? Or how about when former Kentucky quarterback Will Levis slipped to the second round of the draft, and his now ex-girlfriend (Gia Duddy) stole the show? We’re virtually guaranteed to get a moment like that tonight, but none will ever top the cringey video of Russell Wilson getting drafted… and his wife (now ex-wife) thinking she was set for life.
During the 2012 NFL Draft, Russell Wilson had his name called in the third round, and was picked 75th overall by the Seattle Seahawks. Though Wilson is undoubtedly in the twilight of his career now (he’s actually still a free agent as of right now), he was effectively a steal for the Seahawks after putting up some impressive numbers at Wisconsin.
There’s no doubt that the pick worked out for Seattle, considered Wilson helped lead the team to a Super Bowl victory in 2014… and what arguably should have been another Lombardi Trophy in 2015. They should have gone back to back, without a doubt. If only they would have handed the ball off to Marshawn Lynch on the one yard line, eh?
And looking back on the night Russell Wilson was drafted, it was also a tragic night – with hindsight – for his now ex-wife Ashton Meem. It’s super unfortunate and ironic that Meem has become a “meme” over the years, and it was all because of how emphatically she reacted to her then husband getting drafted into the NFL. Which in the moment, you can’t blame her for how Meem celebrated. Ashton was supposed to be locked into being a WAG of an NFL star.
Here’s the clip in case you haven’t ever seen it:
To lay out the timeline of events for you, that draft took place in the spring of 2012. Meem and Wilson would go on to get divorced in April of 2014, only a couple of months after Russell Wilson won his first and only Super Bowl. The following summer, Wilson signed what was then a record breaking extension to his rookie contract – 4 years, $87 million dollars. Wilson also started dating the famous singer Ciara in early 2015, and the pair later tied the knot in 2016.
To be fair, Meem still got a lot of money in the divorce, but definitely not the bag that she would’ve received a year later. And she is certainly isn’t the famous WAG that she thought she was gonna be. Ciara on the other hand… everybody knows her name. They are still together actually, and have four kids (Wilson is the stepfather to one of Ciara’s children from another relationship).
