Say you visit a local fast food restaurant. You place your order, and during your time there you notice an employee who flips a burger patty right onto the ground. After that he sets the French fries on fire, and accidentally puts your order in a kid’s meal box instead of a regular order bag. He hands you the food, and meanwhile you can’t help but think, “All I even ordered was a salad.
If asked whether this employee should get a large promotion, you would answer with a resounding, “No.” Yet, what if this employee did really well on a personality test a manager gave him? That wouldn’t give him any reason to be promoted to a better job would it? Still the answer is no.
Are you thinking you should stop reading because it is a ridiculous scenario? This exact thing happens in football every year. It’s known as the NFL Combine.
The Combine is a event during the offseason, where the top eligible draft prospects come together in what is affectionately known as the “underwear Olympics” and perform drills in front of coaches such as running a 40 yard dash, a gauntlet drill or a three-cone exercise.
This event showcases a player’s physical, and tangible abilities. It can even add to your study of a player as they come into the NFL. What it shouldn’t do is reign supreme over the games they played during their years in college.
Players such as Teddy Bridgewater, an amazing college quarterback who was picked to be the next first overall selection back in 2014, end up falling far beyond their talent bracket because of how they performed without pads on in a controlled, no stress situation.
Yet players such as infamous Jamarcus Russell, Sooner great Brian Bozworth, or former Arkansas quarterback Matt Jones end up getting picked far before their talent dictates they be selected, and they end up out of the league in just a few short years.
Nine times out of ten, when a player is talked about being a surprising talent for a team because they were picked so late, they had phenomenal tape during the season. They were just lowered by teams and the media for turning in an under-par performance at the Underwear Olympics.
Players such as Jerry Rice, Anquan Boldin, Drew Brees and, yes, even highly regarded quarterback Tom Brady performed well under the standard at the Combine. Yet they are talked about as some of the best to ever play the game.
Let me restate, the combine is important. It can tell a team some important numbers on a player, but if it ever takes the place of their actual performance once the lights are on and 300 lb. lineman, with a lust for blood, are barreling towards them, then teams are doing this wrong.
So instead of giving a job to the employee who gives you a empty bun when you ask for a plain burger, give it to the one who doesn’t even have to ask “do you want fries with that?” because they already know the answer is a “heck yes.”
By Ian Craft
