NEW ORLEANS — When it was all over Sunday night in the Big Easy, Super Bowl 2025 closing in a 40-22 Eagles dismantling of the two-time defending champion Chiefs, the biggest player in uniform, whose social media handle is “Big Ticket,” wept on the winner’s sideline.
Mekhi Becton was having difficulty comprehending the moment, considering the seeming black hole from which he escaped.
There were times in his first four years in the NFL when Becton surely wanted to cry but for much different reasons than Sunday night.
And maybe he did that in quiet moments alone as he was being ridiculed as one of the most massive first-round draft busts in a Jets history already littered with them.
“This is the happiest and most emotional I’ve ever been other than my son being born,’’ Becton told The Post after the game. “As a player, this is something you dream about.”
What was going through his mind on that sideline?
“Just life,” Becton said. “Thinking about all the trials and tribulations I’ve been through, all the doubters, everybody who told me I couldn’t do it.
“I’m a kid from Richmond, Virginia,” Becton went on, getting emotional again. “People don’t make it out of Richmond from where I’m from. I’m not supposed to be here right now. I was thinking about that and thinking about all the people watching me back home. I was doing it for them, man.”
Becton, a left tackle selected by the Jets with the 11th-overall pick in 2020, battled weight problems and knee injuries — the first issue likely leading to the other — and finally was released after the 2023 season.
The Jets finally admitted their mistake and moved on.
Becton moved on, too, signing a one-year, prove-it contract with the Eagles before this season and joining highly regarded offensive line coach Jeff Stoutland.
Stoutland, an old-school, tough-love coach, moved Becton from left tackle to right guard and rescued his career.
Becton, who played only one game in the 2021 season and didn’t play at all in ’22, started 15 regular-season games for Philadelphia and all four in the Super Bowl run this postseason.
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His prove-it season turned into not only a Super Bowl ring for him but maybe a lucrative long-term contract this coming offseason.
Those are two things Becton never could have imagined just nine months ago, when the team that drafted him finally gave up on him.
“There were definitely dark days, for sure,” Becton said. “I was in those dark days for a good little minute. It just feels good to actually cry tears to joy.”
Becton admitted that while standing on that sideline as the final seconds burned off the clock and later when the confetti showered the field, it was difficult to believe the position he’s in.
“I’m one of those guys that’s going to work no matter what,” he said. “I’m just going to keep my head down no matter what anybody says. I just work. Good things come to people who do good things. I’ve put the work in, and now I’m being rewarded for it.”
