NFL Scouting Combine Recap: 12 Fallers

I broke down the winners & losers from each day of the combine in detail already, listed my ten takeaways from the combine, and the players who helped their draft stock the most. Here I’m going to list the players who hurt their draft stock the most. If I forgot anyone or you disagree, let me know in the comments.

Biggest Fallers: 

Cyrus Kouandjio, Alabama (6’7, 322) – Looked slow, weak (relatively speaking), and unathletic in drills. To make matters worse, some teams took him off their draft boards entirely due to an arthritic knee. Ouch. Despite his awful combine and injury red-flag, his tape is pretty good and some team will take a chance on Kouandjio late in the 2nd round. That is a pretty significant drop for a player almost universally mocked in the top 25 picks of the 1st round before the combine.

Brian Spurlock-USA TODAY Sports

Jace Amaro, Texas A&M (6’5, 265) – After a slower than expected 40-time and a couple of bad drops in the gauntlet drill, Amaro looked bored and almost annoyed that he had to continue participating. I may have read it wrong (I’m no psychologist), but it looked pretty obvious to me. More importantly Amaro ran a 4.74 in the 40, had the 3rd worst 3-cone time, and dropped a bunch of balls in the drills. Amaro is almost strictly a receiving tight end so the fact that he looked sluggish with shaky hands is going to hurt his draft stock considerably. I had Amaro going in the 1st round to the Pats in my last mock draft and I still have him ending up in New England, but in the 2nd round.

Jarvis Landry, LSU (5’11, 205) – Not sure what to make of Landry’s 4.77 40-time. He looks much faster on tape. With the ridiculous depth at WR, Landry is going to fall behind quite a few guys that ran in the 4.4-4.5 range unless he owns his pro day. Some team could definitely get a steal in Landry if he falls to the late 2nd or early 3rd, he’s a good football player. He reminds me of a smaller Anquan Boldin. Regardless of how good he looks on tape, Landry lost some money last weekend and dropped at least out of 1st round consideration and possibly much farther.

David Yankey, Stanford (6’6, 315) – One of the biggest disappointments of the combine for me. I like Yankey on tape, but was shocked by how slow and unathletic he was. Furthermore, he looked like he didn’t care that much and his body language gave me a bad vibe. I had Yankey near the top of the 2nd round in my last mock, but in my next one he’s an early 3rd round pick.

Louchiez Purifoy, Florida (5’11,190) – I can’t say I was sad to see Purifoy have a bad combine. His cocky attitude always rubbed me the wrong way and frankly he’s not good enough to back it up. Purifoy has always been hyped, but has yet to produce on the field (2 INTs in 31 games). That being said, I was shocked how poor his workouts were at the combine. I thought Purifoy would run in the 4.4 range, nowhere near the 4.61 he ran on Tuesday. It doesn’t help his cause that he had the lowest number of bench reps (6) of the corners. Purifoy was a top 10 corner on every draft board I saw before the combine, but his lackadaisical attitude during drills and awful workout numbers dropped him out of the 2nd round for me. I hope even more now that he ends up on the Lions. His teammate Marcus Roberson would have been the next guy on this list if I had one more spot, but his production and coverage on tape was much more impressive than Purifoy’s over the course of their college careers.

Andre Williams, Boston College (5’11, 230) – There are few doubts that Williams is a stud ball carrier. The question was whether he could catch the football because he had ZERO catches at BC last season. Williams showed everyone why in the pass catching drills. He looked tentative running routes and awkward trying to catch the football. It is definitely a flaw in his game and limits his value in the draft. Williams could still be a target for teams that don’t throw to their running backs often or teams just looking for a short-yardage power guy. I thought Williams had a shot to go in the third round pre-combine, but now he’d be lucky to go in the 4th and could conceivably drop all the way to the 6th.

Ka’Deem Carey, Arizona (5’9, 207) – I still can’t believe this guy ran a 4.7 in the 40. I went back and watched some film on Carey and there are plenty of examples of him running away from defensive backs. I don’t get it. Maybe he was sick and just has too much pride to say so? Carey’s stock has fallen from a mid 2nd round pick all the way to around the 4th round. Teams just don’t draft 4.7 running backs highly unless they are big-time power backs and that isn’t Carey’s game.  Carey also has some off-field red flags and his slow time brought up questions about whether he is a product of Rich Rodriguez’s spread offense at Arizona. I think Carey is going to redeem himself at his pro day and run in the 4.55-4.60 range which could boost his stock back into the 3rd round at least. He’s too fast on tape to run a 4.7 again.

Yawin Smallwood, Connecticut (6’2, 246) – I was pretty high on Smallwood after reviewing his tape, but after watching him at the combine I think his dominance at the college level could have more to do with the lack of competition in the AAC. He ran a slow 40 (5.01), had the 3rd lowest bench, and worst broad jump of all the linebackers. Smallwood did pull up lame at the end of his 40 run so that may of affected his time, but it looked to me like he was already done when the injury occurred. Either way, it was a disappointing performance by Smallwood and he dropped from the mid 3rd round to late in the 4th in my latest mock.

Ahmad Dixon, Baylor (6’0, 212) – Dixon has been in a free-fall this off-season. He looked sloppy in coverage at the Senior Bowl and then failed in pretty much every workout at the combine. He ran a slow 40 (4.64), had the worst vertical, worst broad jump, worst 3-cone drill, and 2nd worst 20-yard shuttle. It’s hard to believe he was right behind Clinton Dix and Pryor in the safety rankings at the end of 2013. At this point he’s a 5th round pick in my book.

De’Anthony Thomas, Oregon (5’9, 174) – Tyler Gaffney (220 pounds) ran a better 40 yard dash then De’Anthony Thomas (174 pounds). Let that sink in for a minute. Thomas’ game is built mainly on speed and last weekend it looked like he didn’t have much of it (relatively speaking, again). It hurts Thomas more that his doppelganger, Dri Archer (5’8, 173), had a great weekend; Archer posted a much better 40-time (4.26) and more than doubled Thomas’ bench press output (20 to 8). Thomas was a 4th-5th rounder coming into the combine and unless he kills it at his pro day, he’s going to be a 6th rounder at best. It’s hard to look at Thomas’ combine numbers and not think he was a product of the Oregon offense. On the bright side, it would be fun to see Thomas reunited with Chip Kelly as an Eagles late round pick.

Michael Sam, Missouri (6’2, 261) – Disappointing weekend for Sam. I was impressed with the way he handled his press conference to start the weekend, but once the workouts started Sam just didn’t test like an NFL athlete in any category. He’s a tweener on defense and at this point looks like a special teams only player. Unless they are explosive return guys, special teams only players normally aren’t drafted.

Antonio Andrews, Western Kentucky (5’10, 225) – He led the NCAA in all-purpose yards two seasons in a row! Then he ran a 4.82 at the combine and dropped off everyone’s draft boards. I love this guy on tape, but 4.82 isn’t even fast for a fullback. Andrews needs to shave about .15 secs off his 40-time at his pro day to have a shot at getting drafted.

Dishonorable Mention:

Marcus Roberson (FLA), Tajh Boyd (CLEM), Kenny Ladler (VAN), Adam Muema (SDST), Victor Hampton (SC)

Twitter: @MikeFlannery_