NFL Draft Combine 2018: What does each drill mean?

The 40-yard dash

The 40-yard dash is something all football players love to turn into a fish story. Everyone knows someone who runs “a 4.3 40 (read: four seconds and three tenths of a second).”

However, on the contrary, very few of the elite athletes in the world run a 4.3 so it’s likely that Bob from K-Mart didn’t run one either. The 40-yard dash is important to separate fast players from really fast players, or a player that might have looked slow on film from himself. Again, it’s about arriving at the combine prepared as well.

In 2017, Leonard Fournette was coming off a season of being banged up and weighted in at 240 pounds. That’s a big body for a running back. Fournette ran a 4.51 40-yard dash which is extremely fast for his size. Fournette proved that he was fast enough for the NFL. Ron Dayne the famed Wisconsin running back ran a 4.65 and that proved too slow to hack it in the league.

“The 40” isn’t important for offensive linemen but if you are record breaking slow it probably means you won’t be quick enough to stop JJ Watt and the other elite edge rushers in the NFL. The 10-yard dash, which is recorded within the 40-yard dash, is the more important aspect for “burst” players like defensive linemen and offensive linemen, and even linebackers to a point.

Just because you’re fast doesn’t mean you’ll make an impact in the NFL. However, if you’re too slow for the speed of the game, that’s a bad sign at the combine.