NFL Combine winners and losers are stupid

Let's have a conversation about why I won't be doing them

NFL combine standout and top NFL Draft prospect Shemar Stewart

We are through the first night of testing at the NFL combine as the defensive linemen and linebackers took to the turf at Lucas Oil Stadium.

Well, like 60 percent of them did.

Over the last half-decade, more and more players have opted out of testing at the NFL combine and are holding their cards close to the vest until they get on home turf at their pro days. Most of the combine testing has been compromised because we aren’t seeing the best of the best take to the turf, perceiving they have nothing to gain from the process.

Even both of the top quarterbacks, Colorado’s Shedeur Sanders and Miami’s Cam Ward aren’t going to throw during workouts. The NFL combine is changing, and it’s time to shift our eyes appropriately to what this event is all about.

It’s cool to see when a top-10 prospect like Texas A&M’s Shemar Stewart chooses to go out and compete, but these cases have become rare. But that doesn’t make Stewart a combine winner. There is no such thing as a combine winner.

And that’s why I won’t write the article. Instead, I’m going to tell you when combine winners and losers are stupid.

Teams already know how athletic these guys are

NFL teams have GPS tracking data for the full season. They know how athletic each player is, and if you’ve watched their tape, you know, too.

So when Stewart went out and leaped to the tune of a 40-inch vertical, a massive 10-foot-11 broad jump, and ran a 4.59 40-yard dash, the resounding answer should have been “Well, duh.” It tracked when James Pearce Jr. ran a sub 4.5 40-yard dash.

Now, if a player who has been severely underrated goes out and puts on a show, it should force you to go back to the tape. But if the tape is still bad? Then the combine performance means very little.

In this regard, hopefully, the world will now have their eyes open to Indiana defensive tackle C.J. West after he leaped to a 33-inch vertical and ran a sub-5-second 40-yard dash. West has always been a fringe top-100 player and now he should be seen as such universally.

But again, only because now people will go back to the tape and see it translate in pads.

About that tracking data…

Even with the tracking data, more can be learned from how the players move and look in the on-field portion of the combine than from how they look during the three-cone drill.

How quickly does a defensive lineman run the hoop drill? That’s a much better indication of how their live hip flexibility will translate when the pads come on.

How well does a wide receiver, especially one who ran a limited route tree at the college level *cough* Brian Thomas Jr. *cough*, sink their hips running routes they weren’t asked to run? How well can that receiver stay in line during the gauntlet while maintaining focus to reel in the football?

How quickly can a running back get through the bag drill and how decisive are their eyes doing so? A 4.5 back getting through the drill decisively has a faster play speed than a 4.3 burner who is unsure about what is mucking up their aiming point when the pads come on.

NFL’s Next Gen Stats has done a great job of providing that data publicly, and the new Combine IQ function on the website is a beautiful touch. It’s the first year of the Combine IQ so the data could be fidgety, but pay attention to those numbers.

But again, if something catches your eye live at the combine that you did not see on tape, do not override it. Go back to the tape and check again. At the end of the day it still doesn’t translate on the field with the pads on then the workout means very little in the long haul.

There are NFL combine losers though

However, testing numbers can reveal how a player prepares.

This is why it is frustrating when guys we have heard murmurs about work ethic and character issues opt not to test.

However, if a player who is perceived as a top-tier athlete goes out and flounders, there is some evidence that perhaps the work they have been putting in as they prepare to take their game to the next level has been less than sufficient.

We hear a ton about players who “don’t know what it takes to be a pro.” How one prepares for the combine is the bare minimum foot in the door to that next level. Of course, guys can get into an NFL locker room a veteran can give them a wake-up call, but that could come after millions of dollars in losses incurred if they come to Indianapolis ill-prepared for their biggest job interview.

Then what is the purpose of the NFL combine!?

So much of what matters at the NFL combine is what happens behind the scenes. The issue is the NFL has done an excellent job of marketing the combine, televising it and building it up so that we have our attention tuned in to the least important part of the process: the testing.

What the players are doing behind closed doors in meetings with NFL teams, how their medical checks are coming back, and how they answer for themselves in the media room is why every team comes to a centralized location with the majority of draft-eligible players.

The testing is important for the reasons above if teams have questions about a player’s preparation and willingness to put in the work. But again, NFL teams are coming to Indianapolis with most of the answers they need about a player already, and the ones they don’t have answers to typically get answered behind closed doors.

Then why travel to Indianapolis, Indiana?

To be honest from a media perspective? The best part of the NFL combine is the ability to meet up with colleagues, network with new ones, and continue to build up a Rolodex of agents and scouts to talk to and get intel from.

Sure, there is work to be done, and that work runs from 8 am to 3 pm every day. You can find us in the media room churning out content and covering quotes, news, and more from the day at the convention center where the media workroom is.

So maybe that makes me an NFL combine loser for not caring too much about what is happening at Lucas Oil Stadium. For the most part, I won’t even watch the workouts live until quarterbacks and wide receivers day so I can see how the ball pops out of the hands of the gunslingers and how the wideouts move on the turf.

But the conversations and the people you meet at the bars late at night tend to be the most valuable part of the week and have been for my career.