-
Senior Bowl Practice Wrap: Defense – 2017 NFL Draft Prospects
The week of Senior Bowl practices is a worthwhile evaluation period. NFL coaches take teaching drills seriously and are encouraging but demand improvement. Many of these players are facing the best competition they’ve seen all season. However, it’s important to understand the limitations of the week. Practices are non-contact and repetitions are limited. This year’s […]
-
Senior Bowl Practice Wrap: Offense – 2017 NFL Draft Prospects
Conclusions from this week of practices. As someone who studies film yearlong, the Senior Bowl has a different purpose for me than those in the media who are just getting acquainted with prospects. While I haven’t studied every player before traveling to Mobile, I’ve usually seen 85-95 percent of them. The Senior Bowl offers a […]
-
RSP Boiler Room NO.75: Christian McCaffery (Stanford) – Runner
I value plays that go off script when studying prospects. Here’s one with Stanford’s star runner. Christian McCaffery is growing on me. In terms of ranking, I don’t know exactly what that means yet. What I can tell you is that I like him and if subsequent viewings help me answer remaining questions in a […]
-
RSP Boiler Room No.76: QB Alek Torgersen
Then Penn Quaker’s film reveals that the “easy” passes are sometimes the most difficult. One of the old-school tenets of scouting quarterbacks is completion percentage. If a quarterback completes at least 62 percent of his passes, he gets to ride the scouting rollercoaster with NFL personnel men trained in the ways of Parcells. It’s a […]
-
Senior Bowl Day 2: Offense – 2017 NFL Draft Prospects
It was an action-packed day for both teams. Continuing the theme that players are on different development tracks and coaches recognize it, there’s no better place to begin on Day 2 than with the South wide receivers and Al Saunders.The work that the venerable receiving coach of the Browns revealed great intel on each of […]
-
Senior Bowl Day 2: Defensive Practice Report – 2017 NFL Draft Prospects
The second day of Senior Bowl practice confirms first impressions and highlights the players who quickly grow comfortable with newer concepts and better competition. We’re still seeing limited repetitions in non-contact situations but, many players take a day to understand a drill they haven’t seen in college or fully assimilate the alignments and schemes they’ll […]
-
A Senior Bowl Practice FAQ
Matt Waldman answers common questions posed to him by writers and readers about the practices and player development. At the tail end of practice, a draft writer approached me with questions about the sessions, player performance, and player development. He wanted my thoughts on what he observed. His observations and subsequent questions were similar to […]
-
RSP Boiler Room No.74: Christian McCaffery (Stanford) – Blocker
It’s a play like this that illustrates how promising a rookie RB’s chances will be to make an early impact in the NFL. Want to know if a rookie runner will see the field? After you determine he has the basic skills to contribute with the ball in his hands, you better examine what he […]
-
RSP Film Room No.95: QB Deshaun Watson (Clemson) – Reading the Field
The idea that Watson doesn’t read the field is bunk. An NFL employee that I have an opportunity to talk with frequently asked me what I thought about Deshaun Watson after his National Championship Performance. The bottom-line verdict: While I’m still studying him, I haven’t seen any major flaws with his game that should make […]
-
Senior Bowl Day 1: First Impressions, Defense
Prologue In reality, college players turned aspiring NFL athletes get many chances to make a positive impression. Teams evaluate multiple games on film and get access to players for interviews here in Mobile, at the combine, and at Pro Days. But Senior Bowl Week is the first time the NFL calendar and news cycle turns […]