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Buckeyes in the draft/NFL Combine

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BuckeyeNation27 said:
Early reports had the Bengals drafting him. I didn't know they needed offensive help for the first round. :huh:
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A safety or DT would be a better pick than most TE's, but if Vernon Davis is still around, I would be disappointed if they didn't pick him. TE is the one position on offense where the Bengals aren't very good (pretty bad, IMO) and I would love to add a pass-catching stud like this guy.
 
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TE is reported as one of the 3 positions of need for the Bengals in this draft.

The official Bengal site projects a later round pick to fill the need - because of the obvious roster improvement on D and the need to fill the spot likely vacated by Henry's off-field issues. Their eyes are on Leonard Pope out of Georgia.

LINK
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INDIANAPOLIS - Jon Hayes, who saw a lot of tight ends come and go in 12 NFL seasons playing the position, saw enough of them Saturday here at the NFL scouting combine that he thinks the Bengals can find one on the first day of the draft that can help.

Who and when and how soon won’t be known until about Christmas. But Hayes, the Bengals tight ends coach, calls it a gifted class. These guys are comfortable catching the ball. How comfortable? As he watched UCLA’s Marcedes Lewis toss the 225-pound weight toward 25 reps, he noticed the kid was wearing slippers.
“Imagine if he was wearing shoes,” Hayes said. “There are a lot of good ones. Everyone can find something they need in this class.”
Don’t kid yourself. Yes, the Bengals have two 1,000-yard wide receivers, a 1,500-yard running back and another running back that could do both one day. But believe that there is plenty of room in this offense for a stretch-the-field tight end.
“If you can get a difference-maker, if you can get such a weapon, why not use him?” Hayes asked. “It would take a lot of pressure off the outside receivers. They’d have to play so honest.”
The Bengals are going to have to get someone because it’s doubtful they’ll re-sign their top pass catching tight end of the last three seasons in Matt Schobel. Yet because of the importance of their running game, they also need a guy that can block.
Hayes sees two tight ends going in the first round and possibly three, with Maryland’s Vernon Davis leading the class. The 6-6, 258-pound Lewis, who almost came to Cincinnati four years before the University of Cincinnati was taking its football players to help bail out the basketball team, figures to be the other first-rounder, although there is some debate on it.
Georgia’s giantish Leonard Pope could become the fourth Bulldog to be drafted by the Bengals in the last three years, but probably not in the first round when the Bengals pick at No. 24. The unique, distinguishing trait is speed and the ability to separate from linebackers and safeties in exploiting mismatches.
Hayes thinks Lewis has the potential to do it, and could be playing by Week 3. He is talented enough athletically to have been offered a basketball scholarship by Big East power Connecticut as well as Cincinnati and many Pac-10 schools, and says that blocking is now just as important to him as making a big catch.
Although the 6-7 Pope comes from Athens’ recent tradition of Ben Watson and Randy McMichael, Hayes sees him as a raw player who is going to need more time to break in that first season.
“He might not go the first day,” said Rob Rang, a draft analyst for Pro Football Xchange. “A lot of it is going to depend how he runs (in the 40-yard dash). Georgia kids have a history of running well, but I’m not sure he’s going to do it and I think the deep class is going to hurt him.”
Rang isn’t even sure Lewis is a first-rounder, putting only Davis in that class. But he says Lewis is one of five good ones on a list that also has Pope, Colorado’s Joe Klopfenstein, and David Thomas of Texas.
“Myself and some teams have about five guys with second-round grades, but five won’t go in the second round,” Rang said. “A couple are going to go in the third even though they have second-round talent.”
Tight end is truly a strange stepchild of a position. Not tackle. Not wide receiver. A lot of players come to it after playing different spots and even different sports. Kevin Colbert, the Steelers director of football operations, got the first and best one last year when Virginia’s Heath Miller slid to No. 30, and he calls it one of the toughest positions to learn for a rookie.
“Plus, college teams are playing a lot of spread offenses now," said Colbert of the difficulty of trying to find guys than can fit into a running game.
Miller, who was here this week as part of a Reebok event, came out of school with a reputation as a passing threat. But he knew in Pittsburgh he would have to do more.
“I wasn’t going to get on the field if I didn’t block,” Miller said. “I had to get in there right away in the minicamps and get the trust of the quarterback and the linemen playing next to you. Next to quarterback, it’s the hardest position to pick up on offense because you have to know what both the receivers and the line are doing.”
But Miller emerged as the starter early in the season and it was primarily because of his pass-catching abilities. He’s proof that breakaway speed isn't necessary to separate from defenders. Miller slid in last year’s draft because his sports hernia surgery prevented him from running for scouts before the draft.
Colbert suspects a limping Miller might have turned in a five-second 40 to drop his stock even more, but he still wouldn’t have gone past the Steelers because Colbert said Miller knows how to get open and runs good enough routes that he would get his catches.
Rang talks abut the 6-5, 250-pound Klopfenstein in similar fashion, saying he could get drafted ahead of Pope because of his ability to just flat out catch and produce. He’s one of these guys who finally found a home after playing different positions each year in high school, starting at quarterback and moving to guard, and then split end and linebacker.
Pope admitted that in college he wins battles because he towers over 6-1 linebackers in stunning mismatches that won’t be as stunning at the next level. Although, he does say the right thing when he says he believes blocking is his biggest priority.
“The big thing is the complexity of the defenses,” Miller said. “They disguise so much more than they do in college. Recognition is a big thing. Especially when you play a team like Cincinnati that disguises a lot on third down. They’ve got some really good defensive ends and they’re always moving.”
Miller thinks he got a break because he went to a team that runs the ball so well. “Teams respect the run so much, a lot of times I was running wide open,” he said.
The Bengals ought to know a lot about at least two of the top tight ends. Lewis is close enough to Bengals receiver Tab Perry that he calls him “my big brother.” Pope talked with middle linebacker Odell Thurman a few days after the season, and he heard from a Bengals trainer this week that another former Georgia teammate, David Pollack, has been saying positive things about him.
Lewis thinks the 220-pound Perry could even play tight end because of his versatility, and he saw him do it at times in practice at UCLA when receivers and tight ends would flip roles.
But Hayes put a stop to all that college talk. Perry couldn’t play tight end, he said, the way the Bengals currently do things. Translation: Nice hands are nice, but blocking remains a must.<SCRIPT> <!-- var FiltersEnabled = 1 // if your not going to use transitions or filters in any of the tips set this to 0 applyCssFilter() var link_text=[]; //--> </SCRIPT>
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This link shows their mixed feelings on the matter.
BTW Kudla just made the top 5 in the vertical jump for defensive linemen

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR class=bg1><TD align=middle colSpan=4>Group 9 -- defensive linemen </TD></TR><TR class=bg2><TD>Vertical jump </TD><TD>Mario Williams </TD><TD>NC State </TD><TD>40½ </TD></TR><TR class=bg2><TD></TD><TD>Manny Lawson </TD><TD>NC State </TD><TD>39½ </TD></TR><TR class=bg2><TD></TD><TD>Stanley McClover </TD><TD>Auburn </TD><TD>39 </TD></TR><TR class=bg2><TD></TD><TD>Kamerion Wimbley </TD><TD>Florida St. </TD><TD>38½ </TD></TR><TR class=bg2><TD></TD><TD>Mike Kudla </TD><TD>Ohio State </TD><TD>37 </TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
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Those are some awesome pics! lol. Yeah, on Cold Pizza this morning they were now trying to blame the low scores on Vince Young not really taking the test seriously, "as most are just lounging around shooting spitballs." If thats true though, that just shows lack of maturity during an important matter.

Its sad that Vince has now been at COLLEGE for 4-5 years, and scored low on an easy exam. Hell, I came out of high school and scored into the top 90 percentile on my ASVABs - which are much harder. I really hope for his sake, and many Longhorn fans he can get his scores up. Its starting to remind me of a few Miami players last year: Frank Gore (6), Brock Berlin (13), Roscoe Parish (10).
 
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VY Bombs Wonderlic Test

It had been reported that Vince Young originally scored an embarrasing score of 6 on the Wonderlic test, but later came out and claimed that was false, and re-took it and got a 16. If you need a basis for comparison, Alex Smith scored something like a 40 last year, and Leinart got a 35.

LINK


EDIT: Fixed Link ~LKB
 
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<!--StartFragment -->Why did young take the test again? They're claiming that the only reason young scored so low was because the test was graded wrong. Basically, they're saying Young did do well on the test if it was graded properly. If that's true, then why take the test again? Wouldn't it just be easier to re-grade his original test?

I doubt Young would have retaken the test if simply re-grading his initial test produced a good score. 16 is still on the low side for a QB.
 
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