KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Kansei Matsuzawa grew up in Japan with zero football background — his first exposure was a 2018 Monday Night Football Rams-Raiders game in Oakland
• Taught himself to kick from YouTube videos while working at Morton’s Steakhouse in Tokyo for three years
• Nicknamed “The Tokyo Toe” by his long snapper at Hawaii over a lunch conversation — the Heisman Trust later featured him under that title on their podcast
• Became Hawaii’s first consensus All-American in football in 2025
• Signed with the Raiders as an undrafted free agent; goal: become the first Japanese-born player to appear in an NFL game

THE JOURNEY

Kansei Matsuzawa was born in Ichikawa, Chiba, Japan, in 1999. He planned to play college soccer. Then he failed the required exam.

The path he thought he was on closed. A different one opened — one he didn’t even know existed yet.

His father had played youth American football, and when the soccer dream fell apart, he sent his son to the United States in 2018. The plan: experience the country, figure it out. The moment that changed everything: a Monday Night Football game between the Rams and Raiders in Oakland. That was it. That was all it took.

Matsuzawa decided he wanted to play in the NFL. The problem: he had never kicked a football. He had no training, no program, no connections. So he did what any determined 19-year-old with a laptop and a dream does — he went to YouTube.

He taught himself to kick. While working at Morton’s Steakhouse in Tokyo. For three years. Saving money. Learning the mechanics from videos, practicing wherever he could, chasing something that had no clear entry point.

When he finally had footage to send to American colleges, the responses were quiet. Only one school answered: Hocking College in Nelsonville, Ohio. That was enough. He went.

At Hocking, he converted 12 field goals with a 50-yarder, learned English, and got himself to Hawaii. He didn’t play in 2023 — just practiced, waited, earned his scholarship after the season. In 2024 he played. And in 2025, he became something Hawaii football had never seen before.

He was a consensus All-American — the first in the school’s history. First team by the American Football Coaches Association, CBS Sports, the Associated Press, and the Walter Camp Football Foundation. He made 25 of 26 field goals, longest 52 yards, and 37 of 37 extra points. He won Mountain West Special Teams Player of the Year.

In the season opener, Stanford was in town. As time expired, he kicked the game-winner. The kind of moment that makes a fan base fall in love with a player overnight.

And somewhere over a lunch at Hawaii, his long snapper looked at him and said something that stuck. The nickname wasn’t planned. It wasn’t marketing. It was just what his teammate called him — and it spread so far that the Heisman Trust featured him as “The Tokyo Toe” on their podcast.

Now it’s who he is.

The 2026 draft came and went without his name called. But the Raiders signed him as an undrafted free agent shortly after — and on a team that has room for a kicker to compete, that matters. His goal isn’t hidden: become the first Japanese-born player to play in an NFL game.

He came to America because he saw the Raiders play on a Monday night. Now he wears Silver and Black.

CAPTAIN’S LOG: UNLOCKED

This one hits different.

Here’s a guy who watched his first NFL game in Oakland, taught himself to kick from YouTube while working at a steakhouse, and spent three years getting to a place where Division I coaches would even look at him. And now he’s in the NFL. With the Raiders. The team that started it all for him.

There’s a version of this story that’s just inspirational. And there’s the version where you watch him every Sunday and know what it cost to get there. The YouTube videos at midnight. The years of grinding without anyone watching. The moment his long snapper said “Tokyo Toe” over lunch and didn’t know he was naming the future.

The kid is 27 now. He’s not a typical rookie. He’s not a typical anything. And when he finally gets on a field in an NFL game — hopefully at Allegiant Stadium, in front of the crowd that watched his first football game ever — it’s going to mean something beyond the X’s and O’s.

This is the kind of story the game is supposed to be about. Nobody handed him anything. He just refused to stop.

Root for this one. Loudly.