https://theathletic.com/4278681/2023/03/06/nfl-scouting-combine-winners-losers/ […] Aside from Richardson, which players would you call the winners of combine week? Tice: Stroud and Jaxon Smith-Njigba were the stars of Saturday night. A lot of tight ends had big days, including Darnell Washington, who put on a show that will only help fans of his game build a case for his value and potential as a receiver. Sam LaPorta is an all-around football player that does a lot of things well and had a great day of testing. And even a prospect like Luke Schoonmaker continues to become more interesting because he’s a tight end who has shown he plays in-line and his testing numbers hinted there might be more to tap into as a receiver. In a draft not featuring a ton of size at the wide receiver position, A.T. Perry matching the downfield ability he showed on film with a good day of testing likely helped alleviate some concerns about his speed. Paris Johnson Jr. measured in with rare length that will tantalize teams, especially those that believe he can grow his game. And various front-seven players put up huge performances. To name a few: Nolan Smith, Lukas Van Ness and Adetomiwa Adebawore. Lee: Smith-Njigba needed this week after missing so much of the 2022 season. His movement skills and body control are still as fresh and strong as ever, and his production consistency over his college career (injury aside) speaks for itself. I was pleasantly surprised by how Bryan Bresee weighed in (a spry 298 pounds) and moved around during his positional drills. I also owe Dane and Nick a steak dinner for alerting me to Lukas Van Ness ahead of combine week, because the Iowa prospect was every bit the athlete they told me he was. He ran a 7.02 three cone, a 1.64 10-yard split and 4.32 short shuttle, at 272 pounds. Hercules, indeed. Baumgardner: Stroud and Smith-Njigba were phenomenal, to no one’s surprise. Smith-Njigba’s agility and movement skills are off the charts — we knew this. He reminds me of a more agile and slipperier version of Amon-Ra St. Brown, who is a first-down machine from the slot. Two other receivers who had outstanding testing days: Perry and Tennessee’s Jalin Hyatt. Cornerbacks Christian Gonzalez and Deonte Banks both looked terrific, and Georgia OT Broderick Jones (34 3/4-inch arm length, 1.75 10-second split, 30-inch vertical) matched his tape. Jones is a great prospect. Flip side, which prospects hurt — or at least missed an opportunity to help — their stock in Indianapolis? Baumgardner: I don’t know if Bryce Young hurt his stock by opting out of testing/workouts, but it was a missed opportunity. We know how big he is, in terms of his size, so I would have liked to see him display his competitive nature in front of the country the way Stroud (and others) did. Sitting out everything in Indy while your top competitors killed it, only to eventually do the exact same things later at your pro day — quite possibly at a much lower weight than Young’s 204-pound combine number — is something teams are going to notice. It just is. Lee: With everyone else throwing, Young needed to be out there, and there’s nothing that can walk me off that opinion. Even after bulking up to clear the 200-pound threshold, Young didn’t do enough to change the narratives about his size. His competition, meanwhile, all showed well enough to climb or solidify their place in the draft ranks. Another one: Kelee Ringo. I’m still a believer in the Georgia cornerback, and his speed (4.36 seconds in the 40-yard dash) is legitimate. His vertical jump (33 1/2 inches) and hip mobility aren’t where I need them to be, however, to consider him at the top of the corners class — especially with guys like Gonzalez and Devon Witherspoon as his competition. Tice: There were so many receivers who weighed in under 180 pounds and put up fine, but not overwhelming, testing numbers. The player whose stock really continued on a downward trend, though, was LSU’s Kayshon Boutte. He is still a skillful player and his 40-yard time (4.5) ended up being more than fine, but his lack of explosion numbers will cause teams to keep squinting about how he’ll translate to the professional ranks. Are there any prospects you need to circle back on after seeing them this weekend? Anyone you weren’t expecting to test the way they did? Lee: I’m going back to Bresee’s 2021 tape again. He tested well enough to merit another look, especially given how much I cooled on him during the 2022 season. Schoonmaker is someone else I want to spend some time on. He weighed in just above 250 pounds and ran a 4.63 40 and a 4.27 short shuttle. I need to lock into how well he blocks, but he can be a serious steal given how deep the TE class already is. Tice: West Virginia’s Bryce Ford-Wheaton. He never posted huge numbers in college and will enter the NFL as an older player, but his combination of size (6-foot-4, 221 pounds) and tools is worth a second look. Old Dominion tight end Zack Kuntz had a monster day, too. His game tape is more that of a player who’s a glorified wide receiver (think Mike Gesicki), but his testing numbers will have me rewatching to see if there are any glimpses of him moving in-line. On the opposite end of things, I thought Jordan Addison would test a bit better. Addison is a skilled player who was tremendously productive at his two college spots (USC and Pitt), and he tested fine — I am not knocking his stock because of it. He just plays much faster on film. Baumgardner: South Carolina defensive lineman Zacch Pickens continues to be impressive with just about everything he does, from talking to working out. There’s a lot of versatility there. Pickens is an interesting athlete who played around a lot of really good players in Columbia. I went back over the game of Illinois safety Sydney Brown (40 1/2-inch vertical, 10-foot-10 broad jump, 4.47 40) after the Senior Bowl, and I’m going to have to do it again. He was absolutely outstanding at the combine.
https://theathletic.com/4277367/2023/03/06/anthony-richardson-quarterback-nfl-draft/ […] Richardson also will join a small group when he gets chosen in April. In the past 10 drafts, only three quarterbacks who completed fewer than 55 percent of their passes have been selected. Trey Lance, the 49ers’ first-round pick in 2021, is only in the group because North Dakota State’s 2020 consisted of just one game because of the pandemic. The other two are a pair of physically dissimilar former Penn State QBs: Christian Hackenberg (a second-round pick of the Jets in 2016) and Trace McSorley (a sixth-round pick of the Ravens in 2019). Hackenberg completed 53.5 percent of his throws in 2015, and his stat line for a 7-6 team was similar to Richardson’s for the Gators last year. Hackenberg completed 192 of 359 passes for 2,525 yards with 16 touchdowns and six interceptions in 2015. In 2022, Richardson completed 176 of 327 for 2,549 yards with 17 TDs and nine interceptions. The 6-4, 233-pound Hackenberg was a serviceable athlete (4.78-second 40, 31-inch vertical jump) by NFL standards, but he didn’t set any records at the combine. He also didn’t last long in the league. He spent time with the Jets, the Raiders and the Eagles but never appeared in an NFL game. McSorley, who completed 53.2 percent of his passes for the Nittany Lions in 2018, has been more successful. He has backed up Lamar Jackson on the Ravens and backed up Kyler Murray on the Cardinals in 2022. But Richardson isn’t being evaluated as a backup — at least not long-term. While he still has work to do if he wants to be the No. 1 pick, the general consensus is that some team will choose him in the top half of the first round because his combination of arm strength and athleticism is simply too tantalizing with so many quarterback-needy teams. The best outcome might be getting chosen by a team such as the Lions or the Seahawks, where he could serve an apprenticeship behind Jared Goff or Geno Smith in the same way Mahomes learned for a year behind Alex Smith before taking over in Kansas City. But it’s also possible a team such as the Panthers, Colts or Falcons decides Richardson is worth the gamble. In those situations, he might be thrust into a starting role sooner rather than later. Another QB lives just north of that 55 percent completion cutline for his final college season. Check out this statline: 56.3 percent completions, 152 of 270 for 1,812 yards, 16 TDs, 6 INTs. Those are Josh Allen’s numbers from his final season at Wyoming. A general manager looking for positive affirmation for choosing Richardson will fall back on that comparison. Like Richardson, Allen came out of college as a superior athlete with a rocket-launcher arm. But unlike the vast majority of QBs who came before him, Allen became a more accurate passer in the NFL. He only completed 52.8 percent of his throws as a rookie in 2018, but that percentage rose to 58.8 percent in 2019 and 69.2 percent in 2020 before settling at 63.3 percent the past two seasons. The comparison Richardson drew after the combine was Cam Newton, the childhood hero of Richardson’s who went No. 1 in the 2011. But Newton was coming off one of the most dominant seasons in college football history. Despite playing with an starting offense that produced a grand total of one career NFL start besides himself, Newton dragged Auburn to a national title. Richardson didn’t have a similar effect at Florida, which certainly lacked a supporting cast the caliber of the ones Stroud and Young enjoyed at Ohio State and Alabama. As a junior at Gainesville’s Eastside High, Richardson began referring to himself as “Cam Jackson,” mashing up Newton and 2016 Heisman winner Jackson. Saturday, in Spandex, Richardson looked like a combination of the best traits of those two NFL MVPs. Now he has to show a team that he can play like those two when Autumn arrives. Because unlike those two — who were selected at opposite ends of the first round — Richardson does not have dominant college tape to rely upon. The prospect too young to dine at the 21-and-up restaurant has to convince a team that he can grow in the same way Allen did after reaching the NFL. At the place that served all ages, a hostess called out to let Richardson’s party know its table was ready. As he sat down to a late dinner following a hell of a day when he needed to have a hell of a day, Richardson looked at the TVs overhead. They all bore the same question. Which QB will be drafted first?
https://theathletic.com/4279427/2023/03/06/anthony-richardson-scouting-report-combine-nfl/ Florida quarterback Anthony Richardson ran a 4.43 40-yard dash, set position records in the vertical and broad jumps and then effortlessly threw the ball 50 yards down the field Saturday. It concluded what he called a “life-changing” week at the NFL Scouting Combine. He looked back on the time in Indianapolis with senior writer Vic Tafur. Being around the all great players and meeting all the great coaches that I watched on TV all these years was life-changing. I had a lot of fun, even though the schedule is crazy. You get up super early every day and go to bed super late after formal meetings with teams, but it’s all part of the process and I didn’t sweat it one bit. I signed up for this, so I had no choice but to love it — and I definitely did. I met with over over 20 teams, and it seemed like every team was trying to really get to know me as a person in a very short amount of time. I am a private person and am not as out there as the other quarterbacks, but I feel I was able to get across who I was. Normally, I prefer to keep things confidential within my own circle, but this isn’t a normal situation. I had heard there might be some silly, off-the-wall questions from teams, but there weren’t, so that was a little surprising. My favorite question was whenever they asked me about my family. I love talking about my family — they are why I was even able to be at the combine — and bragging about them is the best. My mom worked two to three jobs, so I got my younger brother dressed and took him to school every day. He is like my son. I think teams were surprised to hear that since I am only 20 years old. But I am pretty mature for my age. Everything was leading up to taking the field Saturday night, and while I am not going to say I wasn’t nervous, I was a little anxious to get out there and show what I could do. I feel like my team and I prepared the right way and I was able to just go out there and have fun. Richardson, at 6-foot-4 and 244 pounds, ran the 40-yard dash in 4.43 seconds, cleared 40.5 inches in the vertical jump and 10 feet, 9 inches in the broad jump. The jumps were NFL combine records for a quarterback. As for the 40, I know I have a great second gear so it’s all about the start for me. Once I felt like I had started down in the warmups, I knew it was going to be a good run. I am a powerful person and I knew I was going to get momentum and energy going. I started training on Dec. 26, took a couple of weeks off after the season ended to clear my head, and then I was right back at it. Tork (Sports Performance in St. Augustine, Fla.) helped me get my body and mind right and helped me with my mechanics. I am using my hips more rather than just relying on my strong arm. Muscle can only get you so far. When it came down to the two jumps, I was actually disappointed with my numbers. I have been jumping over and off fences and doing backflips off of swings since I was a kid, plus always seeing how high I could get. We used to take my mom’s mattress out of her room and put it in the living room and go crazy with backflips and everything else. I thought I would get 41 (inches) and 11 feet, but hey, I can’t complain too much. They were records. I am not sure if I will try it all again at my Pro Day. I will talk about it with my team. It’s been fun competing against these other quarterbacks, some I have known for four or five years and some even longer than that. To go through this past week together, at the point where we are about to live out our dreams, is very cool. We love each other but we know what’s on the table and we are grinding and want to beat each other. I think any quarterback, when he sees his brother slinging it and ripping it out there, it makes us all feel good. And that was the case Saturday night. We were all congratulating each other. A reporter the other day said something about me being a project, but I don’t feel like I have anything to prove to anyone but to myself. Believe in myself, keep having faith and keep grinding every day. I can throw the ball, I can run, I can jump high and I am smart. Everybody knows that. It’s all about keeping the momentum going.
I don’t care if he taught him. As long as he is not coaching him for my team in the NFL. hell, a lot of coaches have proven to be good at one level and terrible at another. BOB seems to be one of those that gets worse the higher up the food chain he gets..
I'll laugh if the Texans draft Richardson. 95% of the time drafting the best athlete to play QB is an unmitigated disaster. The other 5% of the time, its just a confusing mess. The "meat market" approach of chosing best physical attributes works over the long haul at every draftable position except QB.
Exactly! It's because its the one position that requires the *LEAST* amount of athleticism to be successful. This isn't to say that being a great athlete hurts, most times it doesn't, but being able to make accurate throws and good decisions easily trumps everything else. I read it on here somewhere, but I HOPE someone falls in love with A-Rich and takes that decision out of our hands. And we can just take who's best on our board. I think he'll for sure show flashes, but he would do best somewhere he could sit, learn, and not be called upon to be the savior. And here none of that would be the case. No thanks...
Imagine Davis Mills and Anthony Richardson in at the same time to confuse everyone! I kid just pick Bryce Young - lol -
The shortest qb to win a super bowl was 5'11 The lightest qb to win a super bowl was 209 lbs Bryce is neither of those
And that outstanding qb is going to make a great qb coach/offensive coordinator in a couple of years because he's not going to last very long in the league as a player.
