Why they’re both so misleading.
Successful dating at Harvard may be an arduous task (I know, it’s like finding out there’s no Santa Claus), but attracting a babe in elementary school was impossible. The best girls flocked to the boy that ran the fastest, leaving slower (though I would argue better-looking and more qualified) boys like me to experiment with Pokemon cards and POGs.
Unfortunately, these acts of injustice aren’t quarantined to the playground, as the annual NFL Scouting Combine encourages burly men — college football players entering the NFL Draft — to run the fastest, jump the highest, and lift the most to attract their version of the elementary school babe: the overweight and beer-bellied NFL scout.
Every year in late February, about two months before the NFL Draft, the top college players from across the nation are invited to showcase their physical and mental talents to NFL scouts at the Indianapolis RCA Dome. Like some highly prized lab rats, these players go through a series of tests that evaluate skills such as speed (40-yard dash), agility (20-yard shuttle), strength (225-pound bench), and explosiveness (vertical jump) — all meant to evaluate their chances of succeeding in professional football. Players also must face challenging mental evaluations in the form of an “anything goes” 15-minute interview and the daunting intelligence Wonderlic Test where the average score for the everyday person is less than 50 percent.
The results of the weeklong event are too important for a prospect to not emphasize; with scouts literally drooling over players who run 40 yards under 4.4 seconds and bench 225 pounds more than 30 times, favorable results can catapult an average college football player from a late-round pick to a potential first-round pick. Yet year after year, teams spend their top picks on a player who impressed during the Combine only to watch in pain as their prized possession quickly deteriorates into a not-so-exclusive member of the “NFL Mediocrity Club.” Much like falling for a girl after just seeing her picture-perfect smile, the NFL Combine can be awfully misleading — luring scouts to ignore hours on hours of a player’s actual game film in favor of skills displayed in under five seconds.
The list of prospects who have fooled professional teams into overvaluing their talent is plentiful, but perhaps the most notorious player to do so was Mike Mamula in 1995. As an average defensive end out of Boston College, Mamula used a godly performance at the Combine to rocket himself from a potential fifth- to seventh-round pick into the prestigious and money-worthy top ten of the first round. Mamula’s 40-yard dash time of 4.58 seconds was lightning fast for the position he played, and he benched as much as the top offensive tackle, Tony Boselli, did at the Combine. In fact, the Philadelphia Eagles were so captivated by Mamula’s display of strength and size that they traded their first round pick (12th) and two second round picks to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers just to draft Mamula with the 7th pick of the first round. After five mediocre years with the Eagles, Mamula was cut, and with no other teams interested in a one-time wonder, he was forced to retire with the pitiful legacy as just a “Workout Warrior.” Ironically enough, the Buccaneers used the 12th pick they received from the Eagles to draft Warren Sapp, a seven time Pro Bowler who owns the second most total sacks for a defensive tackle in NFL history.
Every year, NFL General Managers fear being stuck with the next Mike Mamula. In recent years, the trend of Combine marvels who never live up to their physical showing has continued. Adam Archuleta, a current safety for the Chicago Bears, was selected by the St. Louis Rams in the 20th pick of the first round in the 2001 draft as a result of some of the best Combine numbers ever put up by a safety. As a 6-foot, 211-pound freak of nature, Archuleta ran a 4.37 40, had a 39-inch vertical jump and bench-pressed 225 pounds 31 times at the Combine…and now, he’s merely a backup. Somebody obviously forgot to remind the scouts that a successful safety needs to know how to cover the pass — something that Archuleta’s numbers concealed, but game film would have revealed. After seven seasons, Archuleta has only compiled four interceptions, while Pro Bowl Safety Ed Reed had seven interceptions just last season. To kick Archuleta (and the Rams, for making the terrible pick) while they’re down, I might add that five pro bowlers were selected after him in the first round, as well as pro-bowlers Drew Brees, Alge Crumpler, and Chad Johnson in the second round.
Other recent letdowns include wide receivers like Matt Jones and Chad Jackson, who drastically improved their draft position by running sub 4.5 40 yard times. With their incredible performances at the Combine, both receivers were drafted in the first round; yet neither has become a stand-out wide receiver in the NFL, as Jones has seen his production slowly decline since his rookie season, while Jackson has a mere 13 total receptions in his entire career.
So why has the NFL Combine produced so many talented posers? None of the test events at the Combine can truly simulate real game-time situations. After all, winning in football is not measured by how fast one runs or how high one can jump; if that were the case, Olympic track medalists would dominate the sport (and football might actually become more popular worldwide). Winning is about having receivers who run routes and catch passes in a disciplined manner, defensive backs who can read coverage to step in front of a pass, and running backs who can not only run fast, but can also block the weak-side blitz on a crucial third-down play. And the last I checked, football isn’t just played in sexy, tight Under Armour and gym shorts; it requires full pads and an aggressive thing called tackling. A linebacker who can run faster than a cornerback but can’t tackle is about as useful as a Yale graduate in the real world.
You might recognize someone who has become “pretty” useful in the NFL. He was selected as an afterthought in the 7th round due to his weak bench numbers and “grandma-slow” 40 yard time, and consequently, scouts complained that he wasn’t mobile enough and didn’t possess a strong enough arm to succeed as a quarterback. What he did possess was a knack for winning, and now, he has three Super Bowl rings, an MVP award, and a dating record that has nearly as many wins as his football record. He’s the one and only Tom Brady — someone whom NFL scouts should consider a cautionary example as they learn to not overvalue the results of the NFL Combine. Elementary school girls should probably do the same and finally give those slower but better looking-guys a chance. After all, Bridget Moynahan and Gisele Bundchen did, and I’d say they were pretty happy to be with Tom Brady.
Hao Meng ’11 (haomeng@fas) is a just a little bit insecure from elementary school.