NFL Draft Combine 2018: What does each drill mean?
The 2018 NFL Draft Combine field drills started Friday, March 2. Learn what the combine drills mean and why they’re so important to the players and franchises.
Prospective professional football players have traveled to Indianapolis, Indiana for the NFL’s pre-draft Combine. The annual NFL Combine is the biggest job interview of the invitees lives.
Many of these same players and even more of their teammates will hold a “Pro Day” on their college campuses designed to give the NFL scouts and front office personnel another chance to see them perform a series of drills before the NFL Draft gets underway in April.
The NFL Combine was first held, under a different moniker, in Tampa, FL back in 1982. The then called “National Invitational Camp” was invented by Tex Schramm of the Dallas Cowboys and was renamed the NFL Scouting Combine in 1985. The Combine has grown into a sport of its own with around the clock coverage on the NFL Network and in the media. But what is the importance of the drills and the entire weekend?
As I said previously, the Combine is a job interview. If a player is to show up out of shape, or ill prepared, that projects poorly on said player’s ability to stay in shape during a grueling NFL season and career. If a player folds under the pressure of the combine, how will they handle the NFL spotlight on a weekly basis? But even more than that- what do the drills themselves mean?