2018 Draft Eligible LB Thread.

[lark25]

Is Jewell really that bad of an athlete?  Combine numbers were pretty much as expected but with some of the best 3cone quickness times indicative of good lateral movement.

concerning combine drills of 35" vert, 4.68 40 and 22 bp are all avg even slightly above for NFL lbs. 

Rashaan Evans is a worse athlete but nobody's striking him off their lists. Just curious on everyone's take?

[Tugboat]

11 hours ago, lark25 said:

Is Jewell really that bad of an athlete?  Combine numbers were pretty much as expected but with some of the best 3cone quickness times indicative of good lateral movement.

concerning combine drills of 35" vert, 4.68 40 and 22 bp are all avg even slightly above for NFL lbs. 

Rashaan Evans is a worse athlete but nobody's striking him off their lists. Just curious on everyone's take?

Kind of that bad, yeah.  Pro Day numbers are often harder to completely trust.  On the same field by the same timing rig as the bulk of his peers, he ran a 4.82 at the combine.  And the film shows a guy who may have some serviceable short area quickness, but generally looks like more of a 4.8 long speed guy on the field.

He's a smart and "polished" player with good instincts and recognition that let him play faster than he runs, which should help him get around the athletic limitations a little bit in probably finding a way to start somewhere.  But it hurts the upside quite a bit.

[Forge]

5 minutes ago, Tugboat said:

Kind of that bad, yeah.  Pro Day numbers are often harder to completely trust.  On the same field by the same timing rig as the bulk of his peers, he ran a 4.82 at the combine.  And the film shows a guy who may have some serviceable short area quickness, but generally looks like more of a 4.8 long speed guy on the field.

He's a smart and "polished" player with good instincts and recognition that let him play faster than he runs, which should help him get around the athletic limitations a little bit in probably finding a way to start somewhere.  But it hurts the upside quite a bit.

Pretty much. I mean, he's not the worst athlete to ever play the position, but nobody is going to confuse with some of the greatest. High IQ player though, his awareness and knowledge will help circumvent the lack of athleticism and speed overall. Scheme will help too. Zone heavy teams will get decent use out of him. He could come in and start right away, I don't doubt that. And I think he could be effective as well. But he's never going to be in the upper echelon. @jrry32keeps pounding the Laurinaitis comp, and I think that is really good idea of what you may get here. I think you're largely going to get what you see - limited ceiling to be much more than how we view him now. But that's not necessarily a bad thing. Some of these guys who are going to go higher than him based on their perceived ceiling are going to completely flame out while he's still cashing checks in 10 years.