The draft was stretching into its 30th hour, and his name had not been called, so BYU's Tevita Ofahengaue stopped watching the television at his home in Provo, Utah. Instead, he grabbed something to eat, sat down on the floor and went back to playing with his four kids. But he didn't turn the set off. As the picks moved into the 240s, the volume was down but the screen was still on. You see, if Ofahengaue, 25, has learned anything during his long, crazy, journey from lawn boy to NFL tight end, it's that just hanging in there is half the battle.

The fantasy-football-gambling-addicted-yell-at-your-kids'-Little-League-coach-WHYLOs say we went way overboard with all the Mr. Irrelevant stuff this past week. But the value of this whole series became obvious after five minutes on the phone with Mr. Irrelevant XXVI.

Ofahengaue, the 6'2", 250-pound tight end selected with pick No. 246 by the Arizona Cardinals, is someone we can all cheer. And the underdog spirit that all Mr. Irrelevants represent is the untouchable soul of sports.

"The first shall be last and the last shall be first," said T.O., his kids cackling with laughter in the background, excited about their weeklong trip to Cali for Mr. Irrelevant Week in June. "It's right there in the Bible. This Mr. Irrelevant thing is perfect for me because it totally fits where I've come from."

Born and raised on the North Shore of Hawaii, Ofahengaue (pronounced o-fa-hay-NOW-way) was married and the father of a baby boy by the time he graduated high school in 1991. (Tre is now 9, Moana is 7, Teilissa is 3 and Teisa is 1.) The only football he played was of the rec league, two-hand-touch variety. To make ends meet, he painted curbs, sold vacuum cleaners and mowed lawns.

In 1994 he moved his family to Dallas and started working for American Airlines for $12 an hour. "I thought I was the luckiest guy in the world making that kind of money," says T.O. "I thought I had found the job I was going to retire from."

Out of the BYU blue, though, his brother and another friend convinced him to enroll and walk on to the Cougars' football team. A few years later, T.O. had his degree in social work and was working on his masters in special education (he wants to counsel troubled youth), while at the same time gaining a reputation as one of the best blocking tight ends in college football. The next thing he knew it was draft day and the phone was ringing. He thought it might be a friend or a cousin calling to console him, or maybe it was the Titans with a rookie free agent offer. Instead it was the Cardinals. The draft isn't over yet, they said. Go back and look at the TV.

"Everything just went crazy after that," says T.O. "At least 100 people have called me -- radio, TV, newspapers, family, friends, it has been so incredibly sweet. I've gotten more hype than the No. 1 pick. The Cardinals have no idea what they just got. I'm going to the Pro Bowl this year."

Then there was a brief, but noticeable, pause on the other end of the line. I was going to use that moment to remind T.O. he had been drafted by the -- ugh -- Cardinals; who had then summarily ignored him on the front of their Web site. I also wanted to point out that even though he had snagged 62 catches for 853 yards and four TDs while at BYU, he still probably had only a 50 percent chance of becoming the fifth Mr. I in the last seven years to make an NFL roster.

But overcome by the joy of it all, T.O. seemed to be in the middle of an uncensored, glorious, 15-second fit of fist pumping and family hugging that nothing in the world would have been worth interrupting.

"I'm just so excited, I guess you can tell, huh?" he said. "But this Mr. Irrelevant thing, it just perfectly tops off everything. I'm gonna put it on my license plate, I'm gonna put it all over the place. From now on this is my motto:

"Mr. Irrelevant, The Last Shall Be First."

David Fleming, a senior writer for The Magazine, shares his perspective each week on ESPNMAG.com. E-mail flemfile@aol.com.