A look inside the expansive Exos training center in Phoenix, which serves as a one-stop shop for NFL Draft hopefuls. (Photo courtesy of Durell Thomas Jr.)
PHOENIX – Along East Rose Garden Lane in North Phoenix, a discount skatewear store, a sign shop and a pool service outlet are housed within rows of unremarkable businesses.
However, hidden amid these mundane warehouses, the future of the NFL is grinding away in relative obscurity.
High-level athletes toil away in a weight room while others utilize state-of-the-art recovery rooms. Some order custom-to-order recovery smoothies at a fuel bar while others nap on lounge couches in a full-function cafeteria.
This is Exos, a human performance company with locations in Georgia, Texas and Phoenix, its founding location.
Exos has become a go-to for many top NFL Draft prospects preparing for the NFL Scouting Combine each year. Created by Mark Verstegen in 1999 in the Valley, it’s an athletic paradise.
This spring, a trio of former Michigan Wolverines who are projected to be selected in the first round of the 2025 NFL Draft – defensive tackle Mason Graham, defensive back Will Johnson and tight end Coleston Loveland – left their lives behind in Ann Arbor, Michigan to prepare at Exos.
They moved into a Scottsdale Airbnb, not for a vacation but for two months of grueling work. They go from two to three workouts a day, stretching the limits of endurance, all to prepare for the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis, where players can make or break their draft position.
Johnson said the three are just “locking in” as the draft approaches in April.
“You are out here for one purpose, and that’s to get faster, get stronger, and get our bodies in the best shape,” Johnson said. “Fully locking in on the nutrition, fully locking in on your sleep and your rest and how you recover. We have eight weeks to get our bodies in the best shape of our lives.”
The combine, known as the “ultimate four-day job interview” starting Thursday at Lucas Oil Stadium, is the gateway through which almost every aspiring player must enter. For most, it is not just the toughest job interview they’ll ever face, but one that will matter the most for their football career.
Will Johnson focuses on lower-body strength at Exos’ Phoenix location in hopes of turning in an explosive performance at his NFL pro day. (Photo courtesy of Durell Thomas Jr.)
That’s why so many top prospects willingly uproot their lives for months, leaving behind the comfort of familiarity to prepare in a program like Exos offers.
While Johnson and Graham opted to forgo the combine workout drills, they will test in the same drills at Michigan’s pro day for NFL scouts on March 18. It has been a recent trend for top NFL prospects to opt for workouts at their team’s mini-scouting combines, which offer a more controlled environment as opposed to the league-wide combine.
They will still run the all-important 40-yard dash and complete the same quickness and strength tests that they would have at this week’s combine. The location changes, but the specific drills and the NFL eyes watching do not.
Johnson’s NFL future is likely already secured. Barring the unexpected, he will be drafted. In his three years at Michigan, he tallied 66 total tackles, 10 passes defended, nine interceptions and three defensive touchdowns. If there’s any doubt about his numbers, it’s important to remember that he was widely regarded as the best shutdown corner in the country for the past two seasons – so opponents avoided challenging him.
He was a key figure in the resurgence of Michigan football. After the advent of the playoff era, Michigan spent seven years on the outside looking in. But since 2022, with Johnson locking down an entire side of the field, the Wolverines have made two of the last three College Football Playoffs, including a 15-0 national championship-winning season in 2023.
Johnson was named a freshman All-American in 2022, followed that campaign by earning first-team All-American honors in 2023, and was a second-team selection in 2024. He’s also a two-time All-Big Ten member.
One of the most decorated players in this year’s draft class, Johnson doesn’t need to sacrifice a lot – such as moving across the country for two months – to hear his name called early in April’s draft that will be held in Green Bay, Wisconsin.
He decided to do it, anyway.
He and the other Wolverines left behind friends, home and their familiar routines for a self-imposed isolation – just teammates, grueling workouts and a dream.
If there’s any silver lining in this solitude, it’s the complete absence of distractions. For eight weeks, almost nothing else exists except preparation for what could be the most important day of their career to date.
Exos, a destination for elite athletic training, exists as a world apart from the normal football grind. While traditional training focuses on bulk and brute force, the approach here is more specific – tailored to meet the demands of the NFL Combine’s particulars. This level of precision demands a different kind of dedication, one where every rep, every stretch and every sprint is calculated.
It’s designed to refine the abilities that the Combine demands of prospects.
“College football training is more just strength-based,” Johnson said. “Out here, I’m trying to get faster to get prepared to run the 40 (-yard dash), so that’s what Exos focuses on. That’s my focus.”
Exos isn’t just a training facility. It’s a sanctuary. A second home for players who often find themselves living out of a suitcase, yearning for a sense of stability amidst the grind for prosperity.
At Exos, located in Phoenix, every rep is tracked and analyzed to maximize an athlete’s potential for NFL workouts and the draft. (Photo courtesy of Durell Thomas Jr.)
The first thing one notices when stepping inside the North Phoenix facility is how different it feels. Visitors are not immediately met with a view of cold steel but a grand entrance that doesn’t smell like sweat or antiseptic but of burgeoning promise. A short hallway leads to a fully functioning cafeteria, where players mingle over meals – some pulling pre-made dishes from the fridge, others ordering fresh food at the counter, each tailored to the specific demands of their training. Around the cafeteria is a lounge area where it is common to see any number of future millionaires napping on the leather couches between sessions.
Walk further down the hall, scanning left to right, and every recovery practice under the sun is provided. There is a dimly lit massage room next to a sports science room exuding the steady vibrating hum of electric stim chairs and other testing equipment. There is a locker room with shaving equipment and other body-cleaning necessities provided, and right at the end of the hall is a bustling juice bar akin to Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory in its creative possibilities of recovery drinks. Make the final turn into the weight room, and directly to the right is a row of tables with full physical therapy staff running the second recovery/pre-workout massage apparatus of the facility.
All this before ever seeing a rack of weights.
Walk beyond the expansive gym area and through a set of coiling doors, and an over 50-yard manicured grass field equipped with catching machines, tackle dummies, bags, and any other training equipment used in the combine sits brimming with opportunity. Continuing around the corner, there is a small track used for sprint training outside yet another grassy area.
Every room or area is intended to aid in the maintenance of peak athletes already pushing their bodies to the edges of their potential. Every training area is meant to simulate what’s expected in Indianapolis, the home of the combine, or in Johnson’s case, his pro day. It’s everything a player would ever need, all in one facility.
The entire ecosystem is provided with nothing shorted. The intention is to create a home away from home.
“Just a one-stop shop,” skills trainer Will Brown said. “You get your physical therapy, your performance training, your nutrition, and your recovery, all in the same building.”
The training programs are all personalized and research-based. Players do initial testing that informs the on-staff sports science team of hundreds of data points, such as force output, time in the air on verticals and acceleration times. The goal, under the facilities’ Director of Sports Performance Rich Pruett, is finding the specific weak points to target for improvement.
“Our primary role is to find opportunities for us to collect information and data that can better inform our coaches on decisions they’re making on the fly,” Pruett said. “(We’re asking,) ‘Does this specific key performance indicator correlate to anything else? Does the speed of leg press have a correlation to flying 10 (How fast a player accelerates over the first 10 yards of a sprint)?’
“Those types of things. Then we build out athlete management systems so our coaches can output data and then they can visualize this data in a meaningful way and have a meaningful relationship with the data that they can then use to inform their decision-making for the program.”
After years as a quality control coach and running back assistant at Georgia State and longtime strength and conditioning coordinator at the University of North Georgia, Preutt arrived at Exos in February 2023, armed with a singular ideology: velocity-based training.
VBT is the foundation of everything at this athletic building ground. Developed by the Russian scientist Dr. Yuri Verkhoshansky in the 1980s, VBT gained prominence in the West under the more familiar name of plyometrics. At its core is the idea that the force exerted on the ground directly correlates to strength, power, and fatigue.
It’s not just theory. It’s data-driven precision. Every movement, every jump and every sprint is measured with surgical accuracy to assess where the force comes from and how it affects the athlete.
Given the ticking clock of combine preparation, accuracy is paramount. While eight weeks is a long time to be away from home, it’s not a great amount of training time.
Combine training isn’t general football preparation – it’s an intense focus on the specific tests players will face. Every second counts, and to make the most of it, the trainers must operate with the precision of marksmen, ensuring that every movement is calculated, intentional and maximized.
“Combine training is a niche,” Prueet said. “You got to take these lifelong football players, and you have to turn them into track athletes within a matter of 8-10 weeks. We have to be snipers. We have to know exactly what we’re looking for, whether that’s from a technical standpoint or tactical standpoint.”
As for the cafeteria and juice bar, nutritional needs are tested with the same fervor as the athlete’s velocity. Hydration levels, muscle fatigue and mental sharpness are all evaluated and relayed to the nutrition and physical therapy team. The staff knows exactly when and what is needed – fuel and recovery wise – to keep the athletes running at peak efficiency through their training.
Michigan’s Will Johnson puts in the work at Phoenix’s Exos training facility in preparation for the 2025 NFL Draft. (Photo courtesy of Durell Thomas Jr.)
One might expect the sharp sting of competition to cut through the walls of Exos, especially with NFL hopefuls like Johnson, Graham, Loveland, fellow Michigan teammate Donovan Edwards and Arizona star wide receiver Tetairoa McMillan all training together in Phoenix. These are athletes who have committed their lives to being better than everyone else.
But inside, the mood is different. Positivity permeates every corner. Hip-hop music pulses through the gym and the faces of trainers and athletes alike are lit with genuine smiles.
Each position group works separately: McMillan battles the catching machine, Johnson fine-tunes his acceleration on the track, and Graham pushes through the bags with forceful determination. The motivation here isn’t about competition. There are no scouts and no television cameras. Judgment day has not yet arrived.
That atmosphere is carefully cultivated by the facility’s staff. Every person, from physical therapists to the front desk team, has been chosen by Pruett to build an environment that feels welcoming and purposeful. It’s a space where athletes can push themselves to the brink, yet always feel at home.
“It’s about finding the right people for the job,” Pruett said. “Finding good, genuine, authentic coaches who have found their purpose – who understand that their fulfillment comes from giving their all to an athlete to help them achieve their objective.”
Each of them has carved out a name for themselves in college, now looking to join the long line of NFL stars who owe their combine performances to the training at Exos. Players like Cincinnati Bengals receiver and NFL Offensive Player of the Year finalist Ja’Marr Chase, Denver Broncos linebacker Nik Bonitto and Seattle Seahawks cornerback Coby Bryant have all spent time in Exos facilities. San Francisco 49ers receiver Deebo Samuel made an appearance, hugging all the staff during this late spring training day.
These athletes, hailing from across the country, have come together to refine themselves within the hallowed walls of Exos. The cluster of Power 5 athletes in Phoenix is unique – a series of one-offs, each with their own path to this point. While Johnson hopes to add his name to that list of NFL alumni, he has the added advantage of not being here entirely alone. He’s joined by three of his Michigan teammates, and their shared bond strengthens their training. It’s a camaraderie that brings an extra layer of support to an already demanding eight weeks.
“It’s cool because not a lot of people get the opportunity to come out here and train with their college teammates,” Johnson said. “It’s cool just to have that family environment.”
Exos doesn’t change that outcome. It doesn’t replace the hard work the players have already put in. They know where they stand when they arrive. They come to Exos because in this place, everything else fades away – distractions, competition and the need for any other facility.
In this business park tucked in North Phoenix, they’ve found a sanctuary. Here, under the watchful eyes of their trainers, the NFL’s future refines its final preparation for the most pivotal interview of their lives.
Motivation shouldn’t be necessary. The impending realization of lifelong dreams, the promise of change for themselves and their families – this is enough.
Everything begins here.
“You’re gonna have everything that you need right at your hands,” Brown said. “The motivation is knowing that you put yourself in a position to have all of this. It’s like ‘I’ve already done enough work to earn where I’m at right now.’ So that should be the motivating factor to know that you’re on the right path to end up in the NFL.”