ANY QUESTIONS?
At NFL scouting combine, interviews, team and league news usually rule over results
So much happens at the annual NFL Scouting Combine that, most days, prospect news takes a back seat to league news.
Sure, the primary purpose of the event, which began Tuesday in Indianapolis and runs through Monday, is to allow hundreds of NFL coaches, GMs, scouts and doctors to time, test, try out, greet, grill, poke, prod, X-Ray, examine, inspect, reject, summarize, scrutinize, psychoanalyze and otherwise familiarize themselves with 336 of the top college prospects leading up to the league’s entry draft, April 26-28 in Dallas.
Nothing against this year’s crop of rookies-to-be — led by several ballyhooed quarterbacks — but with the deadline for franchise-tagging free-agents-to-be coming next Tuesday, and freeagency frenzy kicking off just eight days after that, there’s so much more headline-grabbing news likely to spill this week.
Twenty-three GMs and 26 head coaches are scheduled to take questions for 15 minutes apiece from Wednesday to Friday — most on whirlwind Wednesday.
That includes four of the five new GMs — John Dorsey (Cleveland), Brian Gaine (Houston), Dave Gettleman (New York Giants), Chris Ballard (Indianapolis) and Brian Gutekunst (Green Bay) — and all seven new head coaches. Namely, Jon Gruden (Oakland), Pat Shurmur (Giants), Steve Wilks (Arizona), Matt Patricia (Detroit), Matt Nagy (Chicago), Mike Vrabel (Tennessee) and Frank Reich (Indianapolis).
Gruden alone could shake up the combine’s first full day. It has been a full decade since the 54-year-old appeared here as an NFL head coach.
Most head coaches and GMs haven’t spoken publicly since either getting their jobs, or last season ended. In addition to all the news sure to pour out of their sessions with the press, many will weigh in on pressing off-season league matters, such as how the competition committee might address the hated catch rule, among other potential rulebook game-changers.
What’s more, nearly every player agent in the business, north or south of the Canada/U.S. border, is here for their annual meeting, and also to quietly begin negotiations with NFL front-office folk on extending or reworking veteran player contracts.
All the while, college prospects will be put through the hoops in four waves of staggered four-day turns, grouped as follows: (1) 48 offensive linemen, 32 running backs, 11 kickers and one long-snapper; (2) 19 quarterbacks, 44 wide receivers and 17 tight ends; (3) 42 linebackers and 52 defensive linemen; and (4) 70 defensive backs.
If you miss watching super athletes race against a clock, what with the Winter Olympics having concluded on the weekend, you’re in luck. But be forewarned: No medals are given out and it’s as fastpaced and exciting as the opening hour of a Godfather movie.
NFL Network will exclusively televise 40-yard dash runs from Friday to Monday, live each morning. Each player healthy enough gets two cracks at the 40.
There are five other measurables: Bench press (reps of 225 pounds), vertical jump, broad jump, three-cone drill (to gauge high-speed direction changing) and short shuttle (to gauge lateral quickness).
The quarterbacks, of course, will again draw the most interest among players.
This year’s crop is seen by many draftniks as one of the most star-studded in years.
It’s led by Southern Cal’s Sam Darnold, UCLA’s Josh Rosen, Wyoming’s Josh Allen and Oklahoma’s Baker Mayfield. All are expected to be selected in the first round, with Darnold perhaps going to the Cleveland Browns No. 1 overall.
But, as always, questions envelop even the loftiest prospects. For instance, could Darnold and Rosen both be taken in the Top 5? Did Darnold (who played only two seasons of college ball) make a mistake in turning pro a year early?
“Tough questions,” Mike Mayock, the NFL Network’s premier draft analyst, told reporters Monday on a conference call, “especially when you look at what we do with the quarterback talent every year. We push it up crazy high.
“Last year I was really surprised at how quickly quarterbacks came off the board and I probably shouldn’t be, given the history of that position.”
Indeed, for the second straight year, all the teams that selected a quarterback in
the first round traded up to do so: Chicago to snag Mitchell Trubisky at No. 2, Kansas City to pick Patrick Mahomes at No. 10 and Houston to get Deshaun Watson at No. 12.
Mayock rates Darnold as this year’s No. 1 passer. The most quarterback-needy team in the league, the Browns, don’t need to trade up to get him after finishing dead last in 2017 with an 0-16 record.
Darnold, who doesn’t turn 21 until June, possesses all the physical attributes you’d want in a top-10 QB.
“He’s got plus size, plus arm strength, outstanding athlete, and I really like the way he extends plays inside and outside of the pocket,” Mayock said. “If he scrambles or moves, it’s with the intent of getting the ball down the field. His eyes are always up.
“Now, the flip side to Darnold are the turnovers, and not just interceptions, but fumbles ... But he can play in all 32 cities. He can play indoors, he can play outdoors.”
This week, at least, Darnold won’t be throwing either indoors or outdoors. ESPN’s Adam Schefter tweeted Tuesday afternoon that Darnold has decided to skip Saturday’s on-field passing drills at Lucas Oil Stadium — the only QB this year to do so.
Quarterbacks since 2012 who passed on passing include Andrew Luck, Teddy Bridgewater, Derek Carr and Johnny Manziel.
Does it even matter?
“It matters,” Atlanta Falcons GM Thomas Dimitroff Jr. told me at the combine four years ago. “We definitely want to see people work out here as much as possible, obviously.
“For a quarterback not to throw here, what they’re doing is they’re prolonging our evaluation until we actually see them in the spring ... I think it shows a great deal about the leadership and sort of the presence of that quarterback. That’s a big thing, and I’ve always felt very strongly about that.”
Darnold and his handlers clearly don’t think this is a big deal. Might he live to regret it? In hindsight, Luck and Carr probably don’t. Bridgewater and Manziel probably do.