Oba Femi, a WWE Superstar, had the opportunity to learn the game of football against one of the greatest coaches of all time. And yet, it still didn't seem appealing enough.
When you see a man the size of Isaac Odugbesan, also known as WWE superstar Oba Femi, it’s incredibly fair to assume that he’s built like a defensive lineman in football.
It’s even more so, when you learn that Odugbesan went to the University of Alabama from 2019 to 2022.
With a build like that, and Nick Saban as the head coach at Alabama at the time, it seemed destined for Odugbesan to become a defensive lineman.
But Odugbesan had other plans, and that was shot put, in which he set a school record, bench pressed 500 pounds and had a 775 pound traditional squat.
“This is just a part of my legacy of all the great recruits that I didn’t recruit,” Saban said with a grin. “Someone this strong, this powerful, this explosive, this athletic that was right on our campus and we missed him; this shows you what a great coach I was.”
Saban knew someone with that build was as intriguing as it got, but the Lagos, Nigeria native didn’t have the love for the game like he did for shot put.
“They were like, ‘Oh, who is this guy?'” Femi said. “‘This specimen, freak.’ And you know, they definitely wanted a piece of me, but it could never materialize because I was in love with the shot put.”
WWE had already started a NIL program, where they can sign athletes while they’re still in college, and then end up training to be superstars, and Odugbesan was one of the first signees.
Fast forward a few years and Odugbesan transformed into Femi, where he won over the fans in NXT, WWE’s developmental brand, with his signature strut to the ring in his entrance and his otherworldly physique.
And in NXT, Femi dominated the competition, where he began his professional wrestling career with a 30-match winning streak, and became the NXT North American Champion, holding it for 273 days. He also was the NXT Champion for 30 days before vacating it to transition to the main roster.
Additionally, he also won the 2023 NXT Breakout Tournament and the 2024 Men’s Iron Survivor Challenge.
Quickly he was one of WWE’s fastest rising superstars, a company that had struggled to find new stars of the caliber of John Cena, Roman Reigns, and Stone Cold Steve Austin. And when he made his main roster debut at the Royal Rumble on January 31, 2026, he skyrocketed, eliminating five wrestlers in the Royal Rumble match, before being eliminated by legend Brock Lesnar.
That eventually turned into a two-month long feud with Lesnar where they both would ensue in many encounters where Femi would overpower Lesnar — something that would rarely happen to the legend.
It’s a feud that has spanned for two months, and it has built up to a highly anticipated matchup between Femi and Lesnar at Wrestlemania, a premium live event that is equivalent to WWE’s Super Bowl.
Femi may not have become what Saban had envisioned, but he became something bigger.
From setting records in shot put to performing under the bright lights of Allegiant Stadium and professional wrestling’s grandest stage.
He may be Isaac Odugbesan to those who know him personally, but to the world, he’s Oba Femi, global superstar.
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