Meet the 'Tokyo Toe' -- the NFL draft's most interesting kicker prospect

WHEN KANSEI MATSUZAWA, a 19-year-old Japanese tourist, walked through the gates of the Oakland Coliseum in 2018, he did so out of curiosity. He knew little about the NFL or American football before watching the Raiders host the Los Angeles Rams that day, but by the time the game was over he knew he had found a new path in life.

"The enthusiasm, the stadium, atmosphere and everything was new to me," he said. "And I felt something: 'I want to be an NFL player.'"

Specifically, a kicker.

It was an audacious dream that anyone vaguely familiar with the sport would have dismissed as next to impossible. But for a naïve first-time visitor to the United States, the odds didn't matter.

He didn't care that no one from Japan had ever played in the NFL. He didn't comprehend the scale -- that tens of thousands of American kids grow up kicking a football, chasing the same dream, but only a select few get anywhere close to one of the 32 jobs available on any given Sunday.

Two years earlier, Matsuzawa twice failed a college entrance exam that derailed his plans in life. He figured he would go to college, where he could keep playing soccer, but with college in Japan off the table, he was left directionless.

"I was at rock bottom," Matsuzawa said. "I had nothing. I didn't want to do anything in Japan."

A trip to the United States was born from his father's concern. After seeing his son adrift for so long, he thought a two-week, solo trip to America and exposure to a world outside his comfort zone might spark something.

That something led Matsuzawa down a path that has turned him into one of the most improbable NFL prospects ever.

After returning to Japan, he leaned in. He studied kicking on YouTube, practiced on his own and started to teach himself English. Two years later, he found a junior college in Ohio to take a chance on him. Now, after an All-America season at Hawai'i in which the "Tokyo Toe" made 27 of 29 field goal attempts, Matsuzawa's NFL dream is within range.

MATSUZAWA'S FIRST STEP in his kicking journey was to visit an American football store, where he purchased two footballs and a kicking stick that would allow him to practice by himself. Online, he gravitated to current Seattle Seahawks kicker Jason Myers -- a Marist product who broke in through the Arena Football League -- studying his highlights, trying to replicate his form.

From about 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., Matsuzawa worked at a steakhouse, biding his time before he could get to work at night. There was a popular local park with some netting he determined would be a suitable practice location despite not having any grass. The main problem, he said, was that it was popular with kids, and he didn't want to interrupt their play as he repeatedly kicked this odd-shaped ball into a net for what would have appeared to be no good reason.

"So I would just go at night and sneak into the field and then started kicking," he said.

These sessions would last about 90 minutes, three or four days a week. And even if he had no real sense of his ability, it didn't stop him from growing more confident that his outlandish goal of reaching the NFL could be reality.

"Thinking back seven years ago, how did I have that confidence?" he said. "I don't know. I was really awful."

About a year into his kicking adventure, Matsuzawa reached out to the Fujitsu Frontiers, an American football team that plays in the X-League, the top-level professional football league in Japan, which was founded in 1971. He proposed a trade: He would work for them doing any tasks they wanted, and in exchange, he could practice on their field. The team agreed.

The deal allowed Matsuzawa to be around people who shared his passion for football. He got to see how the players practiced up close and felt part of the team. He got to know the team's kicker and received advice from some Americans on the coaching staff.

The experience helped clarify what would come next.

"I realized," Matsuzawa said, "'Oh, before going to the NFL, I have to go to college.'"

MATSUZAWA PUT TOGETHER a highlight video and sent it to about 50 junior colleges across the United States. Most of the coaches he reached out to didn't respond, but he got a few replies and, eventually, two schools expressed real interest: one in California and the other in Ohio, Hocking College.

Hocking's head coach at the time, Ted Egger, said he was made aware of Matsuzawa's interest by Kevin Cox, the program's special teams coach, and was immediately intrigued.

"That was kind of our thing where we took guys that looked for opportunities, and as long as they came in and wanted to work hard and do all the things we needed him to do, we were all about it," Egger said. "He was just a young man looking for an opportunity."

Matsuzawa's adjustment was jarring. For the first three months in Nelsonville, Ohio, he barely understood what anyone was saying. The cadence of spoken English felt nothing like what he had learned in Japan, leaving him to navigate daily life with little more than a smile and the ability to say "yes" or "no." He buried himself in the routine, moving from class to workouts to practice, then back home to study.

In Matsuzawa's first season, he handled kickoff duties, while sitting behind starter Jeri Velasquez, an All-American who converted 12 of 13 field goal attempts. The other kicker on the team was Cox's son, Caden, who converted all four of his extra point attempts that season, becoming the first known player with Down syndrome to play in a college football game.

By the start of his second season, he earned the full-time job. Egger said it was clear he had the talent to become a Division I kicker.

"He had a bomb of a leg," Egger said. "And he worked extremely hard at his craft."

But the results were a mixed bag. Matsuzawa made just 7 of his 12 field goal attempts, which -- despite a game-winning 50-yard field goal in the rain -- wasn't the type of production that had Division I programs knocking on his door.

Without much recruiting attention, Matsuzawa went searching for visibility. He reached out to Chris Sailer, the country's most prominent kicking instructor. Sailer pointed him toward his national showcase in Las Vegas, where he could be evaluated alongside other aspiring kickers, mostly from the high school level. He performed well in Vegas, which led to an invitation to Sailer's Top 12 camp -- for the most elite kicking prospects -- where, again, he impressed.

So Sailer did what he has done for more than 20 years. He started reaching out to college coaches, including Thomas Sheffield, the special teams coordinator at Hawai'i.

Sheffield didn't need much convincing once he watched the highlight tape.

"I clicked on it and immediately after I saw the first kick, I said, 'Oh, this kid's got the goods,'" Sheffield said.

The more Sheffield dug in, the more intrigued he became.

"I fell in love with the kid immediately, man," he said. "The story, the resolve, the grit, all the things that he had to do just to get to Hocking College."

Hawai'i offered him a walk-on spot, with the expectation they could redshirt him and help him develop.

At first, Matsuzawa was lukewarm about the idea of going to Hawai'i, but it was clear Sheffield believed in him in a way that he didn't necessarily feel from anyone else.

His first season at Hawai'i was a reset. Matsuzawa redshirted behind veteran kicker Matthew Shipley, spending the year adjusting to the structure of a Division I program. Hocking had been a small, bare-bones operation; this was something entirely different -- more meetings, more expectations, and it was overwhelming, at times.

Hawai'i played at Vanderbilt in the first week of the 2023 season. Matsuzawa hadn't been performing well in practice, and Sheffield sensed he needed a break. After delivering the news that Matsuzawa wouldn't be on the travel squad, he prescribed some R and R.

"I told him, 'I don't want you to touch the football field for a week. I want you to just go to the beach. I want you to do something that's going to bring you joy, bring you happiness, and I want you to take your mind off of football, and I just want you to regain your motivation, regain your focus,'" Sheffield said.

Matsuzawa returned rejuvenated and settled in over the course of the season, gradually finding his footing within the demands of the program and rediscovering the rhythm that had carried him that far. When Shipley announced at the end of the season he would enter the transfer portal, Matsuzawa was ready to compete for the starting job.

By the time the offseason competition arrived, something had shifted. Sheffield said he was more assertive, more accountable. And in 2024, the job was his.

The breakthrough, however, wasn't immediate.

Matsuzawa converted 12 of 16 field goal attempts, which was solid, but not the level he or the staff believed he could reach. And it certainly wasn't the type of stat line that would earn him an opportunity in the NFL.

"I didn't enjoy it," Matsuzawa said. "I put too much pressure on myself. I should have just enjoyed playing football, but my mindset was totally messed up."

The frustration lingered into the offseason, prompting a direct conversation. Sheffield called Matsuzawa into his office and laid it out plainly: His talent was undeniable, but something was getting in the way.

What followed was an honest exchange that brought clarity. Matsuzawa acknowledged what his coach had already sensed -- the pressure had turned into a mental block, a form of performance anxiety.

Rather than letting it fester, Sheffield pointed him toward a solution. Hawai'i had a sports performance specialist on staff, and Matsuzawa quickly bought in.

He began working regularly with the performance staff, building a mental framework to match his physical ability. He realized he was worried too much about results, when the focus should have been on the process. He filled notebooks with affirmations, and it carried over into the 2025 season.

"Before games, he's writing, 'I am the best. I am the greatest. I will make every kick over and over,'" Sheffield said. "It was like Bart Simpson writing on the chalkboard."

From there, everything clicked.

Freed from the weight he had carried the year before, Matsuzawa delivered one of the most remarkable seasons by a kicker in college football history. He made 27 of his 29 field goal attempts, finishing second nationally in makes.

He opened the season with 25 consecutive made field goals -- tying a 43-year-old FBS record for makes to begin a season -- and, dating back to 2024, his streak of 26 broke the Hawai'i school record and matched the Mountain West mark.

In the biggest moments, he was just as reliable. He drilled a game-winning field goal as time expired in a Week 0 win over Stanford and later connected on a career-long 52-yarder against Fresno State, the longest by a Hawai'i kicker in nearly a decade.

Matsuzawa became the first consensus All-American in program history and a finalist for the Lou Groza Award, given annually to the nation's top kicker.

THE DREAM THAT once felt abstract is tangible.

Matsuzawa earned an invitation to the NFL combine and was selected as part of the NFL's International Player Pathway program -- a direct pipeline for global prospects, offering opportunities to be signed as free agents or drafted, with roster exemptions in camp and a designated international practice squad spot as a fallback.

For someone who discovered football on a whim just a few years ago, it's an almost unthinkable ascent. But those who have watched his rise closely see something more than a novelty.

"I speak to basically every NFL team every year when it comes to the upcoming draft and free agency," Sailer said. "It's always going to be hard for any rookie to break in. There's only so many spots in the NFL that are going to come up and be available. But every coach I speak with, he's in that conversation of the top guys coming out. It's not like other guys are being valued above him. He's right there with them."

Sailer said he would be shocked if Matsuzawa doesn't wind up in an NFL camp -- and if he doesn't stick, he would be on the short list of guys who teams would be interested in bringing in to work out during the season, which is common in the NFL. ESPN NFL draft analyst Mel Kiper Jr. ranks Matsuzawa as the No. 5 kicker in this year's draft.

For Matsuzawa, the approach hasn't changed.

"I just think it doesn't matter how I get to the NFL," he said. "I just want to keep grinding. It's nothing different from what I did in college -- just be present and focus on myself."

Seven years removed from a dream that once bordered on delusion, Matsuzawa is on the doorstep of making it come true.