8 minute read
How NFL Prospects Prepare For The Draft
Here’s the way it works for most players who declare for the draft: in the summer, agents begin reaching out, hoping to lock in their client lists ahead of the following year’s draft. Some players entertain these calls right away, keeping their program’s Compliance Office abreast of conversations and developments. Other players choose to focus on their season and put any looming decisions about representation on hold.
“I started looking into representation in mid-October,” says Joe Reed, wide receiver and special teams prospect out of Virginia who is on the Packers’ radar. “In the summer and early fall, I was just focused on being the best player I could be senior year, putting up numbers before I got to that point.”
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Reed’s former teammate Juan Thornhill, now a safety for the Kansas City Chiefs, is represented by Jon Perzley of SportStars. So when Perzley reached out to Reed, he asked Thornhill for some guidance and ultimately decided to go with the SportStars agent.
“Throughout the season agents kind of hit you up,” says Javon Leake, a running back out of Maryland whom the Packers may consider on Day 3. “Right after the last game is when agents really come at you, especially if you're a junior or a senior. It was kind of like recruiting again,” he recalls.
If a player thinks he’s ready to declare for the draft, and he’s the requisite three years removed from high school, he can apply for an evaluation through the College Advisory Committee, through which professional and team scouts can give him an accurate idea of where (or if) he is likely to be drafted. If players declare, and if they are invited, they can then participate in college All-Star games to show off their talent to scouts.
But it’s the next step in the process that looms large over everything top athletes in the pipeline do: preparing for the NFL combine. Players can train for the combine at their university, or they can elect, through their agents, to train at an outside facility. A popular facility is EXOS in Pensacola, Florida, where nearly half of the first-round draft picks in 2019 trained, including five of the top 10. Most of the training costs will be covered by the agent; some may fall on the player. Some facilities can charge up to $25,000 per player in preparation fees, according to the NFLPA.
The six-to-eight week combine preparation process is immersive. Prospects’ workouts, diet and sleep routines are completely overhauled to optimize their performance in Indianapolis. In terms of workouts, training for the combine is often different than players’ college regimens.
“It was more short-burst sprints, five or six seconds; in college we’d run 100-yard sprints,” says Reed, who prepared for the draft at XPE in Ft. Lauderdale. “Getting ready for the vert and the broad and the 40, we did a lot of lower weight reps; not nearly as heavy as I did in college.”
“They did change up the workouts probably two weeks out from the combine,” says Leake, who trained at EXOS. “A lot more stretching, stuff like that.”
As for the meal plan, while no one is excited to overhaul their diet to eat grilled fish and green beans every day, players can’t argue with the results. Reed gained four pounds and lost body fat, feeling stronger overall. A sample day on the plan might look like this: for breakfast, two eggs and gluten-free pancakes; for lunch, a turkey burger on wheat and sweet potato fries; and for dinner, grilled chicken, rice and broccoli.
The combine preparation program also includes media and interview training. While many college players have media experience, the stakes get a lot higher starting at the combine and moving forward. Scouts and executives confirm that players rise and fall on teams’ draft boards based on their combine interviews alone.
“I would have FaceTime interviews with people who would help me out a lot, give me some tips, give me sample questions,” says Reed. “Throughout my training, I was able to pick up on things to do and not to do, and that helped me a whole lot as well during the combine. I thought the interviews went really well. I wrote down everything that they told me, and when I have interviews in the future I can just go over my notes.”
Leake also credits his mom for the ways she has helped prepare him for the off-field elements of the NFL draft process. “In high school, my mother got me started on being professional when you talk to people, good eye contact in interviews,” he says. “Just doing that with my mom really helped me throughout
college. At the combine you have to talk to a lot of people. I was prepared for it.”
While both Reed and Leake were generally happy with their combine performances, they both stress the importance of pro days, the next step in the process, in sealing the deal with team scouts. Pro days also allow coaches to get a more in-depth sense for how players take coaching, follow instruction and respond to feedback.
K'Von Wallace runs the 40
In a normal draft year, players return to school to finish out classes (or continue training on their own, if they’ve already completed their course of study) ahead of their pro day.
“Now I’m doing my own thing. Naturally it’s not as intense, and so far I’m doing a really good job of keeping up what I started,” Reed says. “My lifts are a little different because I’m not jumping or running the 40. My diet is essentially the same, and when I shop I buy what I was eating in January and February.” “I got back from Florida, and I’m working in Maryland with a trainer to stay in shape leading up to my pro day and fix a couple things that I need to fix from the combine,” says Leake. Specifically, he’d like to run a faster 40 time than the 4.65 seconds he clocked in Indianapolis.
But this part of the process is a major question mark in 2020. UVA, Maryland and a host of other programs across the country canceled in-person classes, and pro days are mired in uncertainty. Some programs canceled theirs; others postponed. These hamstrung pro days hardly affect this year’s crop of top prospects, but the loss of opportunity could prove disastrous for bubble players trying to prove they’re worth a draft selection.
“Normally, there’s about 35 to 40 guys who don’t attend the combine and do get drafted. They kill it at their pro day and teams are like, ‘Goodness gracious,’” says NFL agent Evan Brennan of United Athlete Sports Agency.
“I represent a lot of those kinds of guys,” Brennan continued. “Do those guys get drafted this year, or does that number drop and these guys get signed as undrafted free agents? Typically a lot of those guys get drafted because there’s visibility at those workouts and visits. That leverage is disappearing; those workouts don’t exist, those visits don’t exist, that hype from the pro day doesn’t exist.”
Then there are the top-tier players who have medical concerns. Top 30 visits, combine medical re-checks and pro days could have provided clarity on those players teams feel they need to pull the trigger on draft day, and all are now left up in the air.
“Maryland canceled classes, but that would be crazy to cancel the pro day,” Leake says.
To try to mitigate the consequences of their clients’ canceled pro day, agents are getting creative. Brennan’s agency tapped partner facilities to set up height and weight measurements, position work, all the drills and have them filmed to send to scouts. To make sure everything’s legitimate, they have former NFL scouts like Brad Forsyth and Blake Beddingfield doing the timing. “Then teams are more inclined to believe it and put a lot of credence behind it,” Brennan says. “That’s one thing that we’ve been able to be proactive on.”
Preparing for the NFL draft, perhaps the single most important time in a college football player’s career, is stressful in a normal year, and has proven downright fraught in 2020. It’s no wonder. According to the NFLPA, only 1.6 percent of college players will ever play a down in the NFL. Of the players who declare early for the draft, nearly 30 percent go undrafted. Even when dreams come true and players get that coveted call, their career longevity, on average, is only 3.5 years.
And yet every year, more than 500 athletes still sign up for all of this and gamely jump through every hoop, forever in pursuit of the opportunity to don the Green and Gold or one of 31 other coveted uniforms.
SMAll SCHOOl HiDDEn GEMS
2020 DRAFT SLEEpERS
Rob Reger
In today’s NFL, it is important for teams to utilize many different avenues to achieve ultimate success. Long gone are the days when a franchise can simply rely on top draft choices or overspend for free agents. All the successful franchises look to Rounds 3 through 7 of the draft and take a shot on smaller school players to help fill in the gaps. You need to look no further than the Super Bowl MVP two years ago, Julian Edelman, for validation. Edelman played quarterback for Kent St. and was drafted in the seventh round of the draft. Now, he is one of the top receivers in the league and a Super Bowl MVP. We’ll break down several potential targets for the Packers at positions of need. The focus will be on non-Power 5 Conferences with players expected to be available in Rounds 3 through 7. Last year's profiles featured strong first year NFL contributors: Tytus Howard, Nate Davis, Jahlani Tavai, Oshane Ximines and Corey Ballentine. Also included is each player’s fit within Matt LaFleur’s or Mike Pettine’s scheme on offense or defense.
