There's a version of this story where Soloman Williams is just another name in a draft class. Two national championships, back-to-back First Team All-American honors, a Rudy Scholz Award on the mantle. The résumé alone would carry him. But résumés don't capture what it actually felt like to hear his name called, and that's exactly the gap our newest series is built to close.

Inside MLR is back with a new mini-series: Meet The Drafted. Host Will Hooley is sitting down with the Top 5 picks from the MLR Collegiate Draft to get their stories in their own words. The nerves, the phone calls, the ambitions, as each of them takes the first real step into professional rugby.

First up is the player who went #2 overall: Solomon Williams, straight out of Cal Rugby, now heading to the Seattle Seawolves.

Why Williams, and why now

Williams didn't just play at Cal - he defined a run there. Two national championships. Multiple First Team All-American selections. The Rudy Scholz Award, given to college rugby's most outstanding player. Then came Draft Day, and a franchise that clearly saw a player worth building around: Seattle took him at #2.

In this episode, Williams walks Hooley - and now, you - through the full arc of that day and everything that led to it, including:

• His honest, in-the-moment reaction to hearing "Seattle Seawolves" and the number 2
• How Draft Day actually unfolded, and which teams were circling before the pick was made
• What he believes he brings to the Seawolves roster
• The full story of his run at Cal Rugby, and what made those teams click
• The MLR players he's watched and hopes to learn from as a pro
• How he found his way into rugby in the first place, coming up in the American system
• His ambitions to wear the Eagles jersey, in both 15s and 7s
• The long view: the 2028 LA Olympics and the 2031 Rugby World Cup

It's a rare, unfiltered look at the jump from college standout to professional rugby player, from someone who just made that jump himself.

Soloman Williams is just the beginning. Over the coming weeks, Meet The Drafted will bring you the rest of the Top 5, each with their own path and their own version of Draft Day.