During his rookie year with the San Francisco 49ers, Mike Person spent many days watching Justin Smith perform super-human feats in the weight room and on the practice field.
Person was a seventh round draft pick trying to stick on the 49ers’ active roster. Smith was in the midst of a first-team All-Pro season, one of five All-Pro campaigns for the outstanding defensive lineman who rolled up 87 sacks over 14 NFL seasons.
During one stretch of that 2011 NFL season, the 49ers had back-to-back East Coast games. So rather than going back to California, the team stayed and trained for a week in Youngstown, Ohio.
On the Monday after playing the Philadelphia Eagles, the offensive and defensive linemen were at Youngstown State for a post-game lift to flush out their lower bodies.
“I remember Justin comes in. And he’s this big human from southern Missouri and he walks in yells at the Youngstown State strength coaches. ‘Hey, what’s your squat record in here? ‘
“The strength coach says, it’s 675 pounds. And Justin says, ‘All right. Let me warm up and then we are putting that on the bar.
“And sure enough, I mean, he could have probably done it five or six times. This is the day after playing an NFL football game where most guys don’t even want to move out of bed. All I could think was, ‘How am I ever going to block that man?’”
Person often wondered during his early days. But he never quit. That helped his storybrook career end almost a decade later with a start in the Super Bowl.
A total of 15 players from Glendive, Montana have played for Montana State. But Person is the best, the pride of the Eastern Montana outpost that holds the distinction as the smallest media market in America.
Person starred for his father for the Dawson County High School Red Devils. His MSU legacy was forever solidified when he captained the Bobcats to a 21-16 win over Montana in Missoula in 2010 to simultaneously clinch a Big Sky Conference title for the ‘Cats and end a 17-year streak qualifying for the FCS Playoffs by the Griz.
When Person became the first Bobcat drafted in seven years when he was picked in the 7th round in 2011, it seemed like he would have more of an inside track than most Montanans of his generation who were getting shots in the NFL.
Yet he had to ride a wave of instability for most of his first three seasons in the NFL. After getting cut twice in the span of 10 days in 2012, Person wondered if he had a long-term future in professional football.
Thanks to mental fortitude and a pride in where he came from, plus the toughness that has defined each step of his football career, Person emerged out of uncertainty to etch a career defined by its longevity.
Once Person played his way off the practice squad to make the Seahawks active roster, he took advantage of every opportunity in front of him. The offensive lineman earned contracts with the St. Louis Rams, Atlanta Falcons and Kansas City Chiefs before earning a second chance in San Francisco.
In his eighth season in the NFL, Person won the starting right guard position for the 49ers and started 16 games. And in 2019, his ninth and final in the NFL, Person was a starter again, this time for a team that won the NFC title and made a run all the way to the Super Bowl.
By the time his professional career ended, Person played more NFL seasons than any other Bobcat save three former Montana State stars; Jan Stenerud played 19 seasons in the NFL and is the only placekicker in the NFL Hall of Fame; wide receiver Sam McCullum played 10 seasons in the NFL between stints with the Minnesota Vikings and the Seattle Seahawks; and long snapper linebacker Ken Amato played 10 seasons in the NFL, nine with the Tennessee Titans.
Jon Borchardt, himself an MSU All-American offensive lineman, played nine seasons NFL seasons like Person.
Person played longer in the NFL than MSU legend Bill Kollar, the first player ever to become a first-round draft pick out of the Big Sky Conference. Person played longer than former Bobcat linebacker Corey Widmer, a Bozeman native who was a starter for the majority of his eight-year career with the New York Giants. And Person played longer than Dane Fletcher, one of Bozeman and Montana State’s favorite sons, a walk-on turned conference MVP linebacker who ended up starting in the Super Bowl for the New England Patriots.
“When he first got to San Francisco, I thought he was a decent back-up offensive lineman and you get biased based on a player’s history and that’s what he had been. But he completely changed my mind the day we signed him in San Francisco,” said John Benton, a veteran offensive line coach that spent four seasons with the 49ers, including coaching Person his final two in the NFL.
“Mike would tell you as an athlete, he wasn’t maybe the best athlete in the pool but damn he was so smart and so damn tough. There’s no substitute for that. That’s how you play a decade in the NFL.”
Person’s legacy at Montana State is certainly unforgettable and warrants Hall of Fame consideration all by itself. But his ability to forge such a long NFL career that culminated with him playing in the biggest football game in the world January of 2020 for the 49ers is why he’s one of the headlining members of the Montana Football Hall of Fame Class of 2023.
“If you have the baseline size and strength, as an offensive linemen, you can make yourself into a player if you want it bad enough,” said Benton, a Colorado State alum who coached under former Bobcat head coach and longtime CSU head man Sonny Lubick from 1995-2002 before embarking on an NFL journey that’s at 20 seasons and counting. “That’s Mike Person. He wanted it more than almost any player I’ve ever coached.”
The high school coaching in Montana is exceptional because people from the Treasure State take so much pride in where they come from. A great many of the best football players to ever come out of the Treasure State are the sons and relatives of many of the stalwart coaches walking the sidelines during fall Friday nights across the Last Best Place.
Person is one of those coaches’ sons. The early evening practices in eastern Montana were a part of his daily life since he can remember. His father, Jim, was the head coach at Dawson County High School from 1979 until 1995, then again from 2001 until 2007.
“I was around it from day one, watching my older brother (John Pereson) play football as he was growing up,” Person remembers. “Some of my favorite memories of growing up were going to practice with dad, just being down there, being a fly on the wall, hitting attack on dummies when I was six…I’m sure I was getting in the way but I was having the time of my life.
“I knew from the time I started playing football, I wanted to be an offensive lineman. And that’s what I wanted to do, wanted to be like my dad, like my brother. It was just something that was always a part of me.”
But most kids want to be a quarterback…
“I couldn’t throw a baseball very well so I figured I couldn’t throw a football very well either,” Person said with a laugh. “I was always the big kid, and I knew that the big kids, they play o-line and that’s what I wanted to do.”
Although Jim Person has lived a life of football and sports, Mike remembers his dad balancing football life and home life perfectly. Football stayed at school. If Mike ever brought up football during dinnertime with the family (Person also has two sisters, Sara and Katie), Jim would stop him dead in his tracks and redirect the conversation.
Person stood out during the fall, winter and spring during his junior and senior years at Dawson County. He was a three-time all-league selection in football and an All-State honoree as a junior and a senior. He was the two-time Class A Offensive Lineman of the Year and was regarded as one of the top prospects in the state, fielding offers from Montana State and Wyoming along with interest from the Grizzlies.
Person was also a two-time track and field discus state champion and a two-year letterman in basketball under Doug Selvig, a former University of Montana standout who also happens to be the younger brother of the legendary Robin Selvig, the iconic head coach of the University of Montana women’s basketball team for 38 successful seasons.
“I remember him as a skinny rail of a frame but I remember watching his junior year track meet and he threw the disc more than 170 feet so you could see how explosive he could be once he filled out,” said Jason McEndoo, who was the offensive line coach at Montana State from 2003 until 2014. “He had the long levers, rangy kid and we instantly loved the way he played the game. His dad, a football coach, so he got it. He had that tenacity, that chip on your shoulder that you want.
“And that’s been a hallmark of his all the way from high school, college and through his pro career. He was that nasty, edgy player. And that’s what stood out to me in the beginning.”
Person had huge upside in track as a thrower and thought basketball was fun. But football was in Person’s blood. His father played offensive line at Montana Tech in Butte, where Mike’s late mother, Shelley, grew up. Her brother, Dennis Lowney, played at Montana Western while Jim’s brother, Jerry Person, played at San Diego State.
When Mike was in seventh grade, he remembers running into Montana State head football coach Mike Kramer while the man known as “the Big Human” was on MSU’s annual Eastside Swing Tour through the Eastern part of Montana.
Person and his father just happened to be out to lunch the day the Bobcats were in town — Mike still doesn’t know if Jim planned it that way, or not — but Kramer left a lasting impression.
“He started telling stories and he had me hook line and sinker,” Person said. “Then he says, ‘I guess we will see you in about six years. That really stuck with me.”
Like so many towns in Montana, Glendive is one founded upon and build around industry. The unique topography of the area caters to farming and ranching. Dawson County is also a railroad community. And there’s oil in that part of eastern Montana.
Growing up, Person noticed from a young age “seeing people who put their nose in the dirt and just do what they need to do every single day.”
During his high school days, Mike didn’t just play three sports. He was also expected to work any time he wasn’t practicing or playing. That set the tone for knowing how to wake up early, knowing how to manage his time and knowing the value of an honest hard day’s work.
“In high school during the summers, I worked with my dad and our shop teacher and we would roof houses and frame, all things construction,” Person said. “My dad kicked me out of bed at 5 a.m. in the morning in the summers so that we can go work and then we would get done with the day at 4 o’clock and we would go get the lift in for the day.”
Although Montana and Wyoming entered the mix — “those are the three schools a kid from small-town eastern Montana dream about getting recruited by,” Person said — the prospect never forgot that initial meeting with Kramer when he had just turned into a teenager.
And Person knew he had a mentor for life when he first developed a relationship with McEndoo, Montana State’s cornerstone offensive line coach who spent 2003 until 2014 at MSU, making him the longest-tenured assistant in Bobcat football history.
When the Bobcats beat the Grizzlies 16-6 in the 2005 rivalry game in Bozeman — the victory marked MSU’s third rivalry win in four seasons after losing 16 in a row to Montana — Person knew his future would play out in Bozeman.
“Right after that 2005 rivalry game, I distinctly remember telling my dad I was going to the Bobcats,” Person said. “We didn’t’ beat the Griz again until my senior year, but still definitely one of the best decisions of my life.”
As a full scholarship player, Person was certainly expected to compete for a place in the rotation. But his development was accelerated more than most offensive lineman.
When he first arrived on the Montana State campus in the fall of 2006, he rolled with the second string at right tackle despite intending to maintain his redshirt. It was a common tactic of McEndoo’s, having his most promising lineman getting practice reps against varsity players while still hoping to preserve a fifth season for later on in their careers.
“Small-school guys do everything, football, basketball, track, so he was always busy and he was always in the weight room,” McEndoo said. “I love those small-town kids who check all those boxes and then when you are a coach’s kid, that’s whole other element as well because he gets it and he knows what to do, how to do it.
“I knew Mike had all the potential in the world to be a great player.”
Person remembers the butt whippings given out in practice by a variety of veteran MSU defensive linemen, particularly Reshawn Bobo and the late Brandon Hoffenbacher. Person also remembers one day when veteran offensive lineman Peder Jensen told senior defensive end Aaron Papich that “Mike wants to go one on one and he said he was going to whip you,” which the redshirt right tackle had not said. Person got whipped.
“Those first few weeks were absolutely a nightmare,” Person said with a reflective chuckle. “That’s what introduced me to pass blocking in the Big Sky Conference.”
By the opening game of the 2007 season, Person was a starter getting ready to go up against Texas A&M. The Aggies defensive line featured Jonathan Jolly, Red Bryant and Michael Bennett, all who went on to have successful NFL careers.
If that wasn’t nerve racking enough…
“First career start, starting at one of the most intimidating stadiums in college football, going against an entire NFL defensive line….and I forget my helmet,” Person said. “Luckily, they brought another one.”
Person’s steady improvement throughout his Montana State career received decoration every year he was in Bozeman. He was the top offensive scout as a redshirt in 2006. That award came at the end of a very hard year for Person on a personal level. His mother Shelley passed away Mike’s second year away for college in 2007.
The heartache did not deter his consistent and constant improvements. Person won the Cliff Hysell Award for Bobcat Spirit and Courage in 2008. He was the Tom Parac Most Improved Offensive Player in in 2009 and a first-team All-Big Sky nod for the first time after earning honorable mention honors the season before.
In 2010, he won the Chuck Karnop Award for toughness and the Dennis Erickson Offensive Coaches’ Choice honor. He also shared the D’Agostino Family Strength award with Steven Foster and Jordan Craney.
“I would be a liar if I told you when we got to Montana State, he was ready to go,” said former Montana State safety Mike Rider, a Billings native who was co-captain of the 2010 Bobcats alongside Person. “When we were at the Shrine Game and the Mon-Dak game, here was this full scholarship guy. And I wouldn’t say he dominated.
“That redshirt year, he knew he had some ground to make up and that’s what set him apart. He never stopped working in the weight room and every single day, nobody worked harder than him. He had such high expectations for himself and other people had such high expectations for him.
“He took his lumps as a freshman, starting his first game against Texas A&M. That’s a pretty big jump from Class A Glendive. I think he willed himself into it. He worked his tail off and you saw that exact same thing translate into the NFL.”
Person’s final season with the Bobcats finished with a crescendo. The team captain was one of 30 Bobcats ever to earn first-team All-American honors after leading MSU to a Big Sky title by winning against archrival Montana in Missoula.
“The Montana State program is built on the backs of Montana kids. It always was, always has been while I was there and still is,” McEndoo said. “My whole time there, I was the in-state recruiter in Montana and I loved traveling the state.
“Mike had that Montana dude toughness, was a great leader, a vocal leader who grew into his own. He personifies everything about being a Montana kid playing for Montana State.”
Person came to Montana State as a 6-foot-5, 240-pound lanky teenager. By the time 2010 finished, he’d started 34 consecutive games and more than 40 games overall. He was one of the central pieces of the ascension of the Bobcats.
”He’s blue collar and he’s had a ton of adversity in his life, from losing his mom really young to trying to always live up to the hype as a prized recruit in the state of Montana,” Rider said. “There was always that chip on his shoulder and it carried on to the NFL.
“He was incredibly talented and when you couple that with hard work and toughness, that’s how you have that sort of success in college and the NFL.”
That Cat-Griz win in 2010 solidified Person as a Bobcat legend and also helped form the foundation for a last decade-plus that have seen Montana State inch past Montana in the hierarchy of the Big Sky Conference.
That game is embedded in McEndoo’s mind (and his ear) to this day.
Both McEndoo and Person remember it pretty much identically. McEndoo had a rule that the offensive line would not wear sleeves during games where the temperature was below freezing. And the coach would also not wear sleeves in an act of solidarity.
In the hours before the ‘Cats took on the Griz in Washington-Grizzly Stadium in 2010, the Hellgate wind was ripping and the meteorologists were warning of record-setting cold temperatures. So McEndoo thought he might wear a coat or some sort of sleeves.
“I would be layered up underneath but I wouldn’t have sleeves,” McEndoo said. “That Brawl of the Wild in 2010, that was the coldest game I have ever been a part of. I got out in pre-game and I had a jacket on, but it wasn’t game time yet.
“I came out in a jacket and Person looks at me and says, ‘What the hell are you doing?’ And I ignored him. And then he told me I wasn’t allowed to wear sleeves. I walked back in the locker room, took all that stuff off.
“I had gloves on and a ball cap and that’s it. I still, to this day, have frostbite on the tips of my ears. When it gets cold, the tips of my ears start to hurt and I think of Person and that offensive line and that win every single time.”
During his playing days, McEndoo was a standout offensive lineman at Washington State. Like Person, he was a seventh round draft pick. McEndoo was selected by the Seattle Seahawks.
And like Person, McEndoo had to overcome the heartbreak of tragedy. McEndoo and his late wife, Michelle, were in a roll-over accident when McEndoo was 21. Michelle did not survive.
Person wasn’t McEndoo’s first protégé but he was certainly the one that reminded the coach most of himself, from a sharp tragedy early in life to a long shot at the next level to a love of the game.
McEndoo only lasted the one year in the NFL, but he vowed to help any pupil who was trying to fight his way onto an NFL roster. So he and Person have been in contact pretty consistently for the last decade-plus.
“At the end of the day, you have to keep a great mental state of mind, not get too low, not get too high and that’s what I would tell him,” McEndoo said. “For him to be with six, seven different teams and then his career to culminate with starting in the Super Bowl with the Niners, I think that’s a testament to him and the fortitude and the work ethic and drive and determination to keep pushing through it.
“No matter what is thrown at you, keep your head down and stay in your lane and that’s the epitome of Mike. He had all those things. Most guys would’ve packed it up. Most guys would’ve gotten discouraged, gotten down, folded the tent. I think a lot of players are missing nowadays is grit. Mike was just a gritty, gritty player and that’s from his background, Butte ties to Glendive, Montana (laughs)… Glendive is not Butte, but Glendive is the Butte of eastern Montana.”
Person first started riding the roller coaster of NFL uncertainty following his rookie year when the 49ers cut him. The Colts signed him a few days later only to cut him following the weekend.
“I think I’m fine when the Colts claim me,” Person said. “Then the following Monday, they cut me. That’s really when it hit me, this NFL thing might not work out.”
But things did work out. Person caught on with, like McEndoo, the Seahawks. After playing his way on to the active roster, he spent two seasons in Seattle.
He signed with the Rams in 2013 and the Falcons in 2015 before spending 2016 in Kansas City. He earned redemption (and half a dozen starts) for the Colts in 2017. And he played his final two seasons as a full-time starter for the 49ers in 2018 and 2019.
“There were some dark days early on in my NFL career, and there was a handful people that I knew who, whenever I called, they would pick up and coach Mac was one of them,” Person said. “And he always gave me the best advice. And when he had to kick me in the rear, he would get my act together.
“Being able to pick his brain because he went through it was such a great resource for a young player. You don’t usually get the same offensive line coach for all five years at your school, but him being there for all five years that I was there.
“We still talk at least once a month, to this day. And you know, I always called Mac and Ruth, they were my second family in Bozeman. So just having someone like that, that you can lean on who is invested in you, who has walked the path that you are trying to walk? You can’t really put it into words what it means.”
The 2014 season in St. Louis proved to be a turning point in Person’s career. That season, he dressed for every game and played in most. He had film to show teams his talents. In the summer of 2015, Person signed a three-year contract with the Atlanta Falcons.
“It’s absolutely affirmation,” Person said to Skyline Sports in 2015. “That’s what you want to do: you want to play. I didn’t play at all my first three years and then sparingly last year. Now it’s just making that push to get over that hump and become a starter in this league.”
A few years later, the goal of becoming a reality. And it culminated with Person playing in the Super Bowl.
“One of my favorite memories, period, was the 2019 NFC Championship game,” Person reflected in an interview with ESPN MT Radio in April of 2023. “We ran it down Green Bay’s throats, threw the ball eight times the entire game.”
Earlier in the year, San Francisco center Weston Richburg (a second-round draft pick Colorado State in 2014), tore his patella tendon.
“He was my best friend on the team and he was kind of our general out there,” Person said. “It’s the same thing that we had in San Francisco as we had at Montana State. It’s a really tight knit group of guys, especially that o-line.
“I’ll never forget, we’re taking our final knee to win that NFC championship and Weston hobbles himself down to the sidelines on his crutches. And all five of us went over to Weston instead of celebrating with the team, the five offensive linemen, we went over to Weston and gave him a big bear hug. He was kind of our rock that year and unfortunately had his year end early but that moment will remind me of that NFC Championship night. That’s was something that I’ll cherish for a very long time.”
San Francisco’s offensive line was one of the stalwart units in the league, even before adding future first ballot Hall of Famer Trent Williams in 2020. The 2019 line, coached by Benton, was bookended and anchored by left tackle Joe Staley and right tackle Mike McGlinchey. Richburg and Laken Tomlinson were the other starters along with Person.
“McGlinchey was still a young guy and really Mike had a lot to do with McGlinchey’s success,” Benton said. “Person took the role on of the tough guy, the grunt, getting in the mud, down and dirty, tough guy. He really played that well.
“That’s really when you have your best offensive line: when each guy plays a role and you run with it. And you have to have that tough guy. He was always in a good mood but he would keep people in line.”
Person met his wife, Kelly, during his rookie year in San Francisco in 2012.
“And I somehow kept her, even though we were moving all the time and living out of a suitcase those early years,” Person said with a laugh.
Through all the moves, the family has finally found a spot to settle down. In June, the Person clan will have lived in Dublin, Ohio for four years. That’s the longest by far Mike and Kelly have lived in a single place since first meeting.
The same summer Mike signed with Atlanta, the couple welcomed son Sean (8) into the world. Daughter Nora (6) and son Eli (4) followed.
“Kelly is definitely the head coach of the family,” Person said.
After retiring from the NFL, Person started volunteer coaching at a local high school in Dublin and also started Five Dot Offensive Line Academy to help area teenagers develop in techniques, drills work and studying film.
In 2021, Person started thinking about getting into college or NFL coaching. Last season, he served as the assistant offensive line coach at Mike McDaniel’s staff with the Miami Dolphins.
Person is quick to acknowledge how much he enjoyed the experience of working for McDaniel but also said he realized that moving his family to South Beach wasn’t ideal.
So this fall, for the first time in close to three decades, Person might just be a football fan. And how could you blame him?
Regardless of what his football future might hold, the impact the game has had on his life is indelible.
“Football has been huge for my life,” Person said. “Football has brought me so many things, not just learning experiences good and bad. If I didn’t play in the NFL, I never would have met my wife. We met in San Francisco my rookie year. I wouldn’t have this family that I have right now.
“Football has been an ever present part of my life and my wife’s life as long as I’ve known her. So the things that the game brings you, the possibilities are endless. It’s tough to put it into words, but I’m living in a beautiful neighborhood in Dublin, Ohio. And that that wouldn’t have been possible without football.
“The lessons that it teaches you, that’s the most important thing. That’s the beauty behind any sport, is the lessons that it teaches you on and off the field. But the things that it provides you in your life, that what makes it special. You meet all of these people, who would have ever thought that my best friend would be from Amarillo, Texas. Had I not played football, I never would have met some of my best friends. It’s been one of the most important parts of my life.”
