We asked several scouts in the business this question: "What player, if any, will be 'overdrafted' based on his performance at the combine?" 

 

Here are the responses we got.

• "(Mississippi WO) D.K. (Metcalf), (Auburn DC) Jamel

  	Can Ole Miss WO D.K. Metcalf convert an impressive combine performance into a draft-day boost?

  Dean come to mind."  

• "Jamel Dean, (Texas OB) Gary Johnson, (Massachusetts WO) Andy Isabella, (LSU TE) Foster Moreau, (Kansas St. OH) Alex Barnes."

• "I don't know if he'll get overdrafted, but the Dean kid from Auburn will probably go higher than he should. He ran great, but he's really stiff and is raw as a player. He has also had three separate ACL tears. He also had a concussion this year and had a screw put in his hand this summer." 

• "DK Metcalf is a good possibility."

• "Isabella. For me, he is more of a fifth-round guy, but I bet he goes top 70. There are several who will. That was the first one who came to mind for me."

• "Metcalf."

• "I really can't think of anyone except maybe Metcalf, the wide out."

• "Probably a guy like Tyree Jackson, the QB from Buffalo. Talent is undeniable, big strong arm, but tested so well that people will start to consider him in the first two rounds, similar to (Buffalo QB) Josh Allen. He's also young, so some will bet on the upside, and they can potentially be right."

• "I really can't think of anyone except maybe Metcalf, the wide out." 

So if excellent workouts must be taken with a generous grain of salt, why is so much attention paid to them? It's not that simple, of course, even though  a popular article written last week about the ambivalence some feel about the combine has gotten plenty of traction. 

 

At the end of the day, athleticism counts, said one scout. You just have to know how much it truly matters. 

 

"Speed gets average players on tape drafted," he said, "and it is not the players' fault but the team that drafts him's fault."

 

Here's a look at what else we saw, heard, read and said in the first week of pro days. 

 

ITL Indy recap: Last week's  special edition of the Friday Wrap ran on Thursday, so let's catch up a bit on our big day in Room 125 of the Indiana Convention Center. We kicked off the day with the  Franklin Capital Strategies  ITL Coaches Agent Seminar Presented by  Texas Interventional Orthopedics. Representatives of

	The Palm Beach Post's Joe Schad (left) and the XFL's Doug Whaley were two members of our morning seminar panel last week.

10 top agencies attended and heard our three panelists talk about the game behind the game when it comes to getting coaches jobs with NCAA schools and NFL teams. We had several takeaways from our first event of the day, which we ran down in  last week's edition of our Succeed in Football blog.  Next, we turned the room over to  Doug Whaley and his staff at the XFL. Agents from several top firms stopped in to ask questions, recommend clients, grab a sandwich or just say hi. Among those visiting Whaley at the XFL Hospitality Room were longtime NFL writer  Howard Balzer, SMU great  Ramon Flanigan, College Gridiron Showcase co-founder  Craig Redd, new XFL Washington head coach  Pep Hamilton and XFL CEO  Oliver Luck. A few hours later it was prime time. We kicked off the TEST Football Academy ITL Combine Seminar Presented by the XFL at 6 p.m. sharp by presenting the Indianapolis Colts with the  Best NFL Draft 2018 Awardas voted on by active NFL scouts. Colts GM  Chris Ballard accepted the award on behalf of his staff ( video here), which he called to the front of the room shortly after he took the lectern.  "I want to make sure that everybody understands that all I do is pull the card," Ballard said in crediting his scouts. All 22 members of his staff surrounded Ballard, along with TEST's  Kevin Dunn and  Geir Gudmundsen and ITL's Stratton, in  the Colts' feature on the award presentation. "It's a great honor,"  he told the Indy Star. "I'm humbled by it." From there, it was on to the next presentation, the

Ralph Cindrich accepted the first ever Eugene E. Parker Lifetime Achievement Award last Thursday.

awarding of the Eugene E. Parker Lifetime Achievement Award. Parker's son,  Brandon (an agent in his own right with Vayner Sports), was on hand to deliver the award to its inaugural honoree, Ralph Cindrich.  "I'm honored to be here and to be recognized by anything in the name of Eugene Parker," said Cindrich, a former NFL player in his own right who spent more than three decades representing players. From there, Denver-based Peter Schaffer of Authentic Athletix took over. He led a discussion with the 200-plus agents on hand and was joined by turns by Adisa Bakari of The Sports and Entertainment Group; SportsTrust Advisors' Pat Dye, Jr.; attorney Peter Ginsburg; and Select Sports Group's Vann McElroy. Several contract advisors took the microphone to express dissatisfaction or offer ideas, though there was a tone of unity and hope throughout the evening. Fingers crossed, it was a turning point for the industry and the first step in solving problems that have dogged the agent community for years. Finally, Whaley wrapped the evening with an exhaustive look at the XFL and how it will operate from a business perspective, explaining salaries, player procurement, rosters and many other topics of interest to player reps. For another look at the evening, check out  our Rep Rumblings post from last week. Also, check out a full stream of the evening on the ITL Facebook page  here.

 

ITL on FTW: As you know, among the many services Inside the League provides is interview prep for some of the top NFL Draft prospects each year, including Tennessee's  Rashaan Evans, Denver's  Courtland Sutton, Minnesota's  Dalvin Cook and dozens of others. Last week,  Charles Curtis of For The Win checked in with ITL's  Neil Stratton to get a sense of how interview prep works and what our former instructors (among them,  Jeff Ireland, Phil Emery, Ray Farmer, Morocco Brown and now  Jerry Angelo) try to teach prospects before those critical four days in Indianapolis.  Read all about it here.

 

The ITL Rising Contract Advisors Newsletter: March is when our series is most on point and most needed by rookie agents. On Monday, we'll have an overview of NFL local pro days; a note about where pro day info comes from; how to have a conversation with your client about playing football somewhere other than the NFL; and what 'a draftable grade' really means. While we're working with most new contract advisors, we're not working with all of them yet. If you're not on the list,  please join us.

 

Percolating: We've got a few ideas and we'd like your feedback. One is an instructional session for college position and assistant coaches hoping to climb the ladder. We'll host it in Houston and/or Florida and have it in late summer, shortly before camps start. The other is a potential new program for agencies trying to show their clients, many of whom wonder why they aren't receiving marketing opportunities, a little more off-field attention. Good ideas? Bad ideas? Need more information?Let us know.

 

Combine (Part II): Actually, we're not totally finished with combine season. The NFL's Regional Combine in Kansas City kicks off tomorrow, and courtesy of NFL Draft Diamonds, we've got  a partial list of the 75 invitees. We've filled in most of the blanks on agents, training facilities and all-star games and  posted them today on the site. 

 

Rep Rumblings: This week, we had four reports, with plenty left over from Indy. On  Monday, we had the latest lead on a coaching name to watch in the XFL, an Indy invitee who has eluded us, a combine rumor and more.  Tuesday, we announced a cleanup on the ITL 250, dispelled a rumor and more.  Wednesday, we had movement in football administration posts; a couple firms we've heard are hiring; a look at a member of the ITL 250; and more.  Thursday, we had an agent change, a few vacancies in the Spring League that need to be filled, our first local pro day date and more buzz. Take a look at this week's reports (and all of our reports from 2019) by clicking  here.

 

Next week: Week 2 of March is an interesting time. Most of the heavy lifting of the evaluation process has taken place, especially for the top 100-150 prospects next month. Pro days are just starting, and there's plenty for scouts to do as they canvas the nation, but much of the football world becomes a bit more static. New signings essentially end, training begins to slow down, and while scouts are furiously traveling from school to school, the draft board isn't shifting dramatically by the day. Meanwhile, the work of retooling scouting staffs is still at least a month away. That's good, because it gives us a little more time to work on a few things. One, we'll have the December  Agent Changes report next week. Hopefully, we can even get to the January and February reports, as well. We'll see. We'll also have complete 2019 NFL Combine 40 times sorted by position and listing each training facility.  It might not make Deion Sanders happy, but our annual report ( here's last year's for offense,  here's defense) has become a good way to check which facilities are getting results and which ones aren't. It's also time to put the hammer down on our  Profile Reports, which start in just over three weeks. We've already posted our cleaned-up and updated  ITL 250 for 2020as well as our  ITL 100 for 2021, but we've got plenty more to do to get ready for our daily walk through the FBS division. In addition, for those people planning to join the agent ranks this summer, we have  the ITL Study Guide and two practice exams. Also coming in the next few weeks, we'll have our  Agencies by Total Clientsupdate for the spring. Of course, we'll continue to monitor pro days on  our big board; we'll have a new post in our weekly blog,  Succeed in Football; we'll have four more of our signature reports,  Rep Rumblings; we'll begin to compile our NFL Local Pro Days list ( here's last year's); we'll continue to provide instruction and counsel to new agents in the  ITL Rising Contract Advisors Newsletter; and we'll keep an eye out for any updates on our  2019 NIC Grid, our  2019 Scouting Changes Grid, and anything else we can find for our clients. If you're not one yet,  we'd sure like to change that.