2020 NFL scouting combine: What the Patriots and other NFL teams are really paying close attention to

Three weeks after the Super Bowl, the NFL turns its attention to Indianapolis: the scouting combine takes place at the Colts’ Lucas Oil Stadium this week, and 337 college players have been invited to participate in the league’s so-called “Underwear Olympics.” This year, however, the event will be more than just another scouting opportunity for 32 teams in between player exhibition games and pro days all over the country.

The combine, for the first time ever, is now a primetime event: the most intriguing on-field drills will take place in the evening as opposed to during the day to maximize appeal for the audience. This development is only expected to continue in the next few years, with the NFL’s popularity making the combine a major sporting event in the middle of what would otherwise be the down season — and another opportunity to add revenue.

But while fans will be glued to events such as the 40-yard dash, the broad jump, and the various quarterback drills, the team representatives present view the combine a bit differently: it simply is another opportunity to add to the mosaic that is pre-draft prospect evaluation. Accordingly, the New England Patriots and the 31 other clubs will pay close attention to different aspects of the combine than fans and reporters.

With that being said, let’s take a closer look what teams are really paying attention to this week.

Medical evaluations

When the combine was initiated in the early 1980s by a group of executives including then-Patriots general manager Francis “Bucko” Kilroy, one of its primary goals was to give teams an opportunity to perform standardized medical testing at a neutral site without players necessarily having to travel all over the country to visit each team separately. Since the combine’s early days, this focus on medical evaluation has remained a key aspect of the event.

Scouts, who have gathered medical information from the various schools, will forward this information to doctors and training personnel to perform examinations based on the available information — from weigh-ins to blood and drug testing to evaluating pre-existing conditions and previous surgeries. The goal is to get a clearer picture of any potential medical concerns, and to grade players based on those and their long-term outlook.

Medical testing has a big impact on draft boards, with teams potentially moving prospects up or down based on the results or even eliminate them altogether. One of the best examples for a player in the latter group is current Patriots defensive lineman Keionta Davis, who headed into the combine as a draftable candidate but was diagnosed with a bulging disk in his neck during his medical checkup. He went on to go undrafted and miss his entire rookie season due to the condition.

Interviews

Player interviews are an equally important part of the combine, as they give teams the opportunity to get close one-on-ones with prospects in both formal and informal fashion. While each team used to have 60 interview slots of 15 minutes each, the numbers were changed a bit with the combine’s modified scheduling: starting this year, clubs are only able to conduct a total of 45 interviews with each of them lasting up to 18 minutes.

The interviews are generally held by the team’s primary decision makers — head coaches and general managers; in New England’s case Bill Belichick and Nick Caserio as the leading members of the personnel department — and are meant to serve two primary purposes: 1.) To get to know a prospect better and a feel for his character and football knowledge, and 2.) See how he performs in a high-pressure situation and reacts to unusual questions.

Performance under pressure

Speaking of working under pressure, teams will try to throw curveballs at prospects during interviews to see how they react. Whether it is unusual questions — sometimes crossing the line as the Miami Dolphins did when they asked Dez Bryant if his mother was a prostitute — or breaking down film or playbook excerpts, teams want to see if players are prepared and capable of performing when being put in uncomfortable or unusual situations.

The same holds true during the on-field portion of the combine. With the spotlight being on players individually during each drill, the question becomes whether or not they can rise up to the occasion and perform to their capabilities in a somewhat clinical setting that is the same for every participant. While pro days are similar when it comes to players being at the center of attention, the added media circus and level playing field at the combine makes for a more challenging environment.

Tape confirmation

As noted above, the combine is only one piece of the pre-draft puzzle. This is particularly true when it comes to the various on-field drills. A comparatively slow 40-yard-dash, for example, will not necessarily lead to a team pushing a player down its draft board unless similar issues are also visible throughout his college game tape. Likewise, players performing above expectations do not necessarily see their grade improve.

The main goal of the various positional drills is therefore to either confirm what has already been evaluated on tape, or to eliminate potential blind spots in the process up to this point. Of course, not all drills are equally suited to do that: the bench press, for example, carries comparatively limited meaning for teams while they do pay close attention to agility workouts like the three-cone shuttle — a drill New England values highly.

That all being said, proper contextualization is the key for all the drills. Tom Brady’s now legendary 40-yard time of 5.28 seconds, for instance, was not a reflection of limited upside as a quarterback but rather that he would not be a dual-threat at the next level.

General conduct

From body language during drills to just moving around the facility and from one situation to another, scouts and members of a team’s personnel department will evaluate everything to get as complete a picture of a prospect as possible. Considering that team interviews can take place in an informal manner as well, as noted above, prospects need to be able to adapt to every situation while not losing their cool or bringing their A-game.

Behaving in a professional manner throughout this entire process — not just while under pressure during interviews and on-field work — is therefore a key for the 300+ men invited to the event every single year.

Pats Pulpit at the Combine

Pats Pulpit’s own Mark Schofield will be in Indianapolis to cover the event from a Patriots perspective. Besides regularly checking this here website, please also make sure to follow @markschofield and @patspulpit on Twitter.

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