It's the 2010 NFL Scouting Combine. It runs from today through Tuesday, and its purpose is to invite every football player who is expected to be drafted down to Indianapolis for a real prodding by NFL coaches and General Managers. And while it's true that nothing that happens over the next 7 days changes anything on tape or defines how good a football player is, it does have significant effects on how a team views a player, and anyone who thinks it doesn't has never gone through a job interview process.
Yes, references and work history are what qualify you for the job, but if the hiring manager just doesn't like you, he's not going to hire you, and that's why they hold the interviews in the first place, otherwise they'd just look at your resume, then call you up and give you the job.
Below is the official Invite List (organized by player ID number), as well as the official schedule. As you can see, the actual drills/workouts don't start until Saturday but the lead up until then is full of interviews, medical exams, the glorious Wonderlic and the all important measurements. The numbers obtained here will be considered the OFFICIAL numbers, as opposed to those shown in the All-Star games or on College documents.
The game tape on these players is important but it's not the entire picture. Pat White looked great on game tape. So did Vernon Gholston. So did Michael Johnson. So did a lot of players. But the psychological aspect of the player can only be seen up close and personally, which is why the Combine interviews and testing are so paramount to a player cementing his status. And performing well in the drills will usually cement a top 10 player's status as well as move a late round player into a higher round. A defensive back who was ranked as a 7th Rd/FA could move up to the late 6th/early 7th with a good showing here.
I have obtained a Wonderlic test but am having some issues integrating it into the site so that one can take it live and get results. I hope to have this figured out by tomorrow.
So, who do you think will really blow up the combine? Personally, I'm expecting big things from CJ Spiller as well as little Trindon Holliday.
I have obtained a Wonderlic test but am having some issues integrating it into the site so that one can take it live and get results. I hope to have this figured out by tomorrow.
So, who do you think will really blow up the combine? Personally, I'm expecting big things from CJ Spiller as well as little Trindon Holliday.
Cody will clearly lead in the man-boobs area.
ReplyDeleteI thought Vernon Gholston looked great at the combine but not on game tape?
you're right, but he must have looked decent on tape or he wouldn't have
ReplyDeletemade a name for himself before the combine.
Cody with his man boob action was pretty nasty looking. Don't think he can hold up with that much weight for long in the NFL. I thought Gholston was supposed to thrive under Rex's D. Looks like greek gods body wise don't always work out. What do you guys think about Mayock having us pick Sergio Kindle? Sounds like he can be something special at OLB.
ReplyDeleteLike everyone I'd like to see all the holes filled that need filling, let me clarify that (I'm talking about on the field holes) not the other ones.. With the play of the defense last year and in particular down the middle of the field, I feel we need that addressed first no matter what the experts think. Yet passing on the best availible player may not be the smartest thing to do. What I'm mostly hoping for is the gurus don't mess up like they did last year with half of the early picks that contributed nothing to the team.
ReplyDeleteI like Kindle and thought he was a possibility before these Mayock reports. He has the size at 6-4 255 and athletic ability yet I keep hearing some bloggers insist that he's closer to the 235. Just about every site on the draft has him listed at 255. Anyone have any thoughts?
ReplyDeleteI've always been a fan of filling holes.
ReplyDeleteRB is a soon to be hole. RW & RB are up there in years. RB might have 2 to 3 years and RW might have 1 to 2. Think they might pick one up in the later rounds? Is'nt Wake supposed to be 28 this year? So might only get 4 years out of him. Akin I think is 30 so not much left there.
ReplyDeleteGholston showed flashes of greatness as a pass rusher at Ohio State but there were concerns with his consistency.
ReplyDeleteHow did Ronnie Brown get this old tag? The guy was drafted in 2005 not 1999. LOL
ReplyDeleteRT, you seem to think 30 is the end. You might want to look around the league, some of the best players in the game are 30+.
Mayock didn't do very well last year. He just says things with a tremendous
ReplyDeleteamount of confidence and everyone falls in line. The guy thinks Jason
Pierre Paul is the 3rd best player in the draft and thinks Suh ranks below
McCoy. I think JPP is great but if I said on this forum that he was the 3rd
best player in the entire draft and the no. 1 DE, you all would've stopped
reading this blog.
We don't read it anyway you know that.
ReplyDeleteKnight,
ReplyDeleteI'm a fan of Kindle as well. ESPN has Kindle listed at 235 but you're right about every other site having him listed as 255. BTW--Mayock is not the first analyst that has said that Kindle is even more polished than Orakpo was last year. I'd be very happy with an OLB like Kindle but that would also mean that Taylor is not coming back to Miami & then what do you do with Wake???
Bottom line--our LB corp is a mess & we still have a ton of needs. I'm still hoping that Fujita will be one of starting ILB next year.
With the amount of time RB has been on the field in his last 4 or 5 years he should have an extra year or so left over the length of his career. Even though he's not the type of runner to avoid contact. We do need to add to the pack though there are to many question marks because of the injuries and RW saying this is his last year. This time I believe him when he says this year is it.
ReplyDeleteRT,
ReplyDeleteI'd be extremely surprised if either Ronnie (free agent) or Ricky (going to retire) is a Dolphin after this season.
Forget about Mayock. I've seen Kindle play & he really stands out in a pretty good defense. I'm not sure if I'd take him over McClain if he's still available but if he's as good as Orakpo as a rookie then we could regret passing on him.
ReplyDeleteRonnie is going to be 29 in December & he's coming off another season ending injury. If he was super durable like Curtis Martin then it might be a different story. I'm willing to bet the ranch that this is his last year as a Dolphin.
ReplyDeleteNot RB's.
ReplyDeletewalked right into that one....
ReplyDeleteAnd his overall football instincts in general.
ReplyDeleteLOL
ReplyDeleteYes he's going to be 29 years old at the end of next season. I think too much is being made about his age.
ReplyDeleteI think WHP has a point about RB not being here after this year. If he is going to command a big contract I think he will be gone because of all his injuries. I hope not because I like him, but if he can't stay on the field and he hasn't then how long will the team put up with that ? I think we may find out with Ronnie.
ReplyDeleteI don't think age is a issue for resigning him or not. As he is not banged up like LT or Westbrook.
I do believe Ronnie has to stay relatively healthy this season to stick around in 2011. If you look at his injury history, it's the knee and foot injury that forced him to miss a total of 16 games, 9 in 07 and 7 in 09. He only missed 4 other games.
ReplyDeleteThat said, he can't have another season ending season or he will lose a lot of value and become a backup 2nd tier type player.
WHP, Kindle could very well be on our radar. As much as you like to hit on an immediate impact player, the draft is about finding players with the talent and upside to play in the NFL. The draft is not just to fill immediate needs, not in the 1st and 2nd round. It's a 4-6 year investment and hopefully a lifetime relationship. Those players become the face of the team and part of the community.
ReplyDeleteKindle may not start or be a monster his first year, but he will take someone on the roster's job and be given every opportunity to succeed. He has the football skills, size and athleticism to be a very good OLB.
In two years if he's a top LB no one will be going back to 2010 saying we should have done this or that. Too many fans have short-term views for their team. The trifecta is doing exactly what you're suppose to do after a 1-15 season. Rebuild the entire program. Not many left from the 2007 team. No QBs. That says a lot right there.
WHP I like your play on words here. So your saying RB is not a playmaker ? If that is what you're saying I will agree. Ronnie is not going to run away and make that big play we would like to see. That was done by Patrick Cobbs. I think he was as much a reason of the teams record this past year as the injury to Ronnie Brown was. Once he was injured teams could defend the offense easier. We couldn't run the screen pass properly for most of the year, and that was a big part of the offenses game plan every week. Yet it was missing when he went down.
ReplyDeleteI have no idea why Henning continued to run the sceen pass time and time again when it wasn't working. That's one of the reasons I wonder why he is still with the team. His play calling was as moronic as the DC was. These coach's need to pick it up this year. All of them.
What about Kindle's off-field run ins?
ReplyDeleteWhat about them? I'm not up to speed on them.
ReplyDeleteRonnie doesn't make big plays but Cobbs does? Huh?
ReplyDeleteRonnie has two 60+ yard TD runs in his career and he has a few 50, 40 and 30 yard runs. He's also had some big plays on receptions.
Yes Cobbs makes big plays for the amount of plays he gets in a game. His averages in both Rushing and Receptions is more than Browns. I'm not saying RB isn't good. This is about will Brown get another contract. I don't think so and I'm not alone on this as we can see from WHP. It's not a popular stand to take I can tell you that much.
ReplyDeleteOne 80 yard play can skew the numbers on limited touches. I like Cobbs but he's a role player.
ReplyDeleteClicked on the BOB link, and this came up instead:
ReplyDeleteReported Attack Page!
This web page at www.sun-sentinel2.com has been reported as an attack page and has been blocked based on your security preferences.
Attack pages try to install programs that steal private information, use your computer to attack others, or damage your system.
Some attack pages intentionally distribute harmful software, but many are compromised without the knowledge or permission of their owners.
hmm, herdfan had the same issue, but it works fine for me. The SS was
ReplyDeleteapparently hit by a malware attack but says its all been fixed now. There
maybe some sort of artifacts that certain security programs are picking up
on.
Yeah you can't really judge a RBs average on fewer than 100 carries, and I'm
ReplyDeletesure he had far fewer than that.
I cleared my cache and I still get it too. If you use this link, it works OK:
ReplyDelete<span><span></span></span><span>http://SunSentinel.com/bob</span>
yes I have posted a new blog post with the BOB link in it
ReplyDeleteKindle... Let's see, DUI when he was a 19 year old sophmore. Drove his car through an apartment wall at 2:00AM in 2009 and then left the scene before he could be tested. Somehow the second offense was brushed under the carpet. What I find more interesting though, is that "his people" came up with $8700.00 to repair the damages to the building. I think we may want to be careful turning this guy loose on South Beach. He is a good player but it doesn't do us much good if he is in a jail cell. I'm sure the trifecta will take a very close look at Kindle before they pull that trigger. As I was saying to Tin in a previous blog, Maylock and the NFL channel are the biggest homies on the planet. A guy could be snorting blow on the table next to them and they would say it's a powdered sinus remedy... I take zero stock in their opinion.
ReplyDeleteYeah Kindle was texting while driving and ran into an apartment building.
ReplyDeleteConsidering an apartment building would be a considerable distance from the
road, one can only assume he was sending a long text message. Either that
or he wastexting 'where should I park?' and the other person texted back,
'right in front of the apartment', but predictive text took over and the
message said 'right inSIDE the apartment.'
I wonder if the texting defense would have worked for Danta Stallworth?
ReplyDeleteNot if he was texting, 'Boy am I drunk!'
ReplyDeleteI suppose when I was 21 I was not what you would call an angel... We do hold these guys to a higher standard than we did ourselves. I remember a cop pulling me over and then driving me home and that was the end of it. I think the lawyers have made it so nothing is an accident any longer and no matter what happens someone has to pay. It's sad really...
ReplyDeleteWhen I was in my early 20s I used to work in a bar downtown and would leave
ReplyDeletework around 3am every shift completely sober but extremely tired and of
course reeking of alcohol, cigarettes, and occasionally weed and/or
disinfectant.
I lived in a place called Tigard, Oregon, which was about a 20 min drive
from downtown Portland (probably still is), and not a single day went by
that I wouldn't be pulled over by the cops about 3 minutes from my
apartment.
I got pulled over by the same cop at least 20 times and he gave me all kinds
of tickets in lieu of not being able to get me on DUI. One time in the
middle of winter he made me get out of the car and do the sobriety battery
of tests. I said right at the beginning I wanted to do a breathalyzer but
he refused to give me one and so, on the side of a steep hill, in the middle
of winter with ice on the ground he made me do the toe to toe thing and I
thought I did pretty well (I should mention I was damp with sweat from
working and wasn't wearing a jacket for the 30 minutes we stood outside in
the freezing cold - the two cops were well bundled up of course) but the cop
claimed I failed it (somehow I could say my alphabet backwards, touch the
tip of my nose, and all the rest but because my toe didn't touch my heel
perfectly on one step I was a drunk driver) and tried to arrest me. In an
uncannily timely moment, they got called out to something more important
while they were making arrangements, and I got to drive home.
The next day I went to the police station and told them not to stop me
anymore or I would sue them.
Never got stopped again.
small world. I went to beaverton high school(lived in tigard)... How long has it been since you were there? tigard to portland is an hour drive with traffic now...
ReplyDeletephins fan, there was no traffic at 3am, lol
ReplyDeleteI left Portland in 2003 and moved to London. I moved back to the states in
2007. I've been back to visit once a year. I'm good buds with someone who
went to beaverton high. Where in Tigard did you live? I lived in about 6
different locations around Portland, but in Tigard I lived up on the hill
across from Bull Mountain. You're probably well aware of the Tigard
police's affinity for pulling people over though I heard they kind of
mellowed out after they received tons of complaints of harassment. Don't
know if that's actually true or not but I know they received at least one..
Anyway, I notice on all the blogs that there are several Portland Dolfans.
i guess @ 3am it would only be 20min :) . I lived in probably 3-4 diff places as well but they where all close to washington square mall. I don't think i ever lived anywhere (I've lived in 8 diff states) that has more cops, then portland area. I had a few run-ins with them but never actually got into trouble. Actually going there next month to see some friends. Every time i go back i'm amazed @ how much it keeps growing...
ReplyDeleteYeah, I worked in Sherwood for a while and the last time I drove through
ReplyDeletethere it was at least 4 times as populated/built up as it was 5 years
earlier.
You guys are correct Cobbs is no more than a role player, but he is a explosive role player. In his 3 years with the dolphins he has 54 touches and 3 or 4 tds. Ronnie has about 1075 touches and 31 rushing tds and I can't remember how many in the passing game, but I think it's 10 in 4 years. I'm working from my memory on those numbers but they are close.
ReplyDeleteI view Ronnie Brown as a banger not a break away threat. He is exactly the type of back I love, a guy that punishes the defender. If he could only stay on the field every team would fear him when it comes game day. Taking the ball out of hands by limiting his touches in a game is a mistake by the coaching staff, but that is a different story.
Tin I hope you address this coaching staff one day in the future. That would be an intersesting read.
Fang, I think I spent most of the 2009 season giving the coaching staff a
ReplyDeletehard time on this blog.