Do or Die Time
http://www.atomicsportsmedia.com/articles/195/1/Do-or-Die-Time.html
Phil Mattingly
By Phil Mattingly
Published on 03/2/2006
Just like many other college students, the players at the NFL Combine are basically interviewing for jobs. Except at the combine the interview includes intense drills and a poor performance might cost you a lot more than a job opportunity. Phil Mattingly explains.
This week marks one of the biggest cattle-shows in professional sports. This week marks the NFL combine. While All-Star games immediately following the season give scouts and experts some indication of the players they will be looking at come draft time, games such as the Shrine Bowl and the North-South Game excluded underclassman. These players typically comprise some of the most talented entries into the two-day, seven-round event known as the NFL Draft. This makes the combine the most important event for both players and NFL teams in the time leading up to the big day on April 29th.
For the combine, more than 300 college juniors and seniors are brought together under the watchful eyes of every scout, GM and coach in the business. They watch players run the ever important 40 yard dash, see how many reps of 225 lbs. they can put up on the bench, see how high they can jump, and what kind of agility they have in cone and shuttle drills. Oh sorry, that’s just one day. The players also have to do position specific drills, throwing for the quarterbacks, catching balls for the receivers and practicing different cuts and reads for running backs etc. Each position is run through drills tailored to shed light on their ability to transfer their collegiate skills to the Big Show one day. Don’t forget that each player will go through interviews, aptitude tests, and press conferences as well.
While this is a great event for the analysts, “experts,” and coaches, I cannot begin to imagine the type of strain this must put on the players. They have just a few chances over a few days to validate or improve their expected draft status. One bad sprint (See: Maurice Clarrett), one bad day catching the ball (See: Derek Hagan), or one bad day mentally (See: Vince Young’s much maligned Wonderlic Test Score) and a player could conceivably lose millions of dollars in draft position.
While it can be said that this event is just a typical interview process for those looking for a job, I somehow find it hard to put the NFL combine in the same context as an interview with say, J.P. Morgan.
It seems quite unfair that so much can be determined in just a seven-day event. There are those who use the combine to skyrocket up the draft charts, like Ohio State’s Michael Jenkins and current combine participant, University of Virginia lineman D’Brickashaw Ferguson. On the flip side, it can be devastating to those who have mediocre days like former Arizona State linebacker Terrell Suggs. A bad combine performance was responsible for Suggs dropping from a top-5 prospect to his eventual 10th selection overall. While a five spot might not seem like much, it can be huge in terms of money. By the way, Suggs has gone on to an extremely impressive first few years in the league, something combine superstars Tony Mandarich and Mike Mamula cannot quite claim.
Chalk up another vote to the unfair due mainly to the high profile prospects in each season’s draft. Matt Leinart, Reggie Bush, and Vince Young, a group widely thought of as the top three prospects in the 2006 draft, are not even participating in the majority of the drills. While this is a smart move on their part, as they are fairly set in their draft positions and would not want to ruin anything by a bad performance, it kind of gives the combine a bad name. Allowing big prospects and prima donnas the freedom to choose which events they would like to perform in, while simply average prospects must put their careers on the line each day doesn’t exactly reek of fairness.
Overall, the combine is a great event…. for fans and speculators. It is great to get an update each day on who ran a great 40 or who put up the most reps on the bench, but how much should a one week even truly affect a player’s draft status? I will be the first to admit the fact that Vince Young scoring a six on his Wonderlic Test (which by the way is lower than the 10 that is recognized as literate on the official scale) is very newsworthy and intriguing, it simply does not scratch the super-human performance he had in this year’s Rose Bowl. This is precisely my point, as it is the performance over an entire collegiate career that should validate one’s draft standing, not a sprint that lasts just over four seconds.
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Just like many other college students, the players at the NFL Combine are basically interviewing for jobs. Except at the combine the interview includes intense drills and a poor performance might cost you a lot more than a job opportunity. Phil Mattingly explains.
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This week marks one of the biggest cattle-shows in professional sports. This week marks the NFL combine. While All-Star games immediately following the season give scouts and experts some indication of the players they will be looking at come draft time, games such as the Shrine Bowl and the North-South Game excluded underclassman. These players typically comprise some of the most talented entries into the two-day, seven-round event known as the NFL Draft. This makes the combine the most important event for both players and NFL teams in the time leading up to the big day on April 29th.
For the combine, more than 300 college juniors and seniors are brought together under the watchful eyes of every scout, GM and coach in the business. They watch players run the ever important 40 yard dash, see how many reps of 225 lbs. they can put up on the bench, see how high they can jump, and what kind of agility they have in cone and shuttle drills. Oh sorry, that’s just one day. The players also have to do position specific drills, throwing for the quarterbacks, catching balls for the receivers and practicing different cuts and reads for running backs etc. Each position is run through drills tailored to shed light on their ability to transfer their collegiate skills to the Big Show one day. Don’t forget that each player will go through interviews, aptitude tests, and press conferences as well.
While this is a great event for the analysts, “experts,” and coaches, I cannot begin to imagine the type of strain this must put on the players. They have just a few chances over a few days to validate or improve their expected draft status. One bad sprint (See: Maurice Clarrett), one bad day catching the ball (See: Derek Hagan), or one bad day mentally (See: Vince Young’s much maligned Wonderlic Test Score) and a player could conceivably lose millions of dollars in draft position.
While it can be said that this event is just a typical interview process for those looking for a job, I somehow find it hard to put the NFL combine in the same context as an interview with say, J.P. Morgan.
It seems quite unfair that so much can be determined in just a seven-day event. There are those who use the combine to skyrocket up the draft charts, like Ohio State’s Michael Jenkins and current combine participant, University of Virginia lineman D’Brickashaw Ferguson. On the flip side, it can be devastating to those who have mediocre days like former Arizona State linebacker Terrell Suggs. A bad combine performance was responsible for Suggs dropping from a top-5 prospect to his eventual 10th selection overall. While a five spot might not seem like much, it can be huge in terms of money. By the way, Suggs has gone on to an extremely impressive first few years in the league, something combine superstars Tony Mandarich and Mike Mamula cannot quite claim.
Chalk up another vote to the unfair due mainly to the high profile prospects in each season’s draft. Matt Leinart, Reggie Bush, and Vince Young, a group widely thought of as the top three prospects in the 2006 draft, are not even participating in the majority of the drills. While this is a smart move on their part, as they are fairly set in their draft positions and would not want to ruin anything by a bad performance, it kind of gives the combine a bad name. Allowing big prospects and prima donnas the freedom to choose which events they would like to perform in, while simply average prospects must put their careers on the line each day doesn’t exactly reek of fairness.
Overall, the combine is a great event…. for fans and speculators. It is great to get an update each day on who ran a great 40 or who put up the most reps on the bench, but how much should a one week even truly affect a player’s draft status? I will be the first to admit the fact that Vince Young scoring a six on his Wonderlic Test (which by the way is lower than the 10 that is recognized as literate on the official scale) is very newsworthy and intriguing, it simply does not scratch the super-human performance he had in this year’s Rose Bowl. This is precisely my point, as it is the performance over an entire collegiate career that should validate one’s draft standing, not a sprint that lasts just over four seconds.
Phil Mattingly can be reached via email at phil.mattingly@atomicsportsmedia.com.