1084: NFL Combine Winners and Losers

**JJ Zachariason** (0:02)
This is The Late-Round Podcast with your host, JJ Zachariason.
What's up, everyone? It's JJ Zachariason. In this episode, 1084 of The Late-Round Fantasy Football Podcast, thanks for tuning in. Before I get to the topic today, I just want to send another reminder that The Late-Round Prospect Guide is currently available for pre-order, and it's better than ever. This year's guide includes an outline of what goes into the models, prospect profiles for every running back wide receiver and tight end who is at the combine, over 30 year 2 profile write-ups, there's rankings, and more. It'll launch in mid-March, so pre-order it now at $14.99, because that's going to rise to $19.99 in just a couple of weeks. You can find out more over on lateraound.com. When I tell people that I have prospect models, they often respond with something NFL Combine related. That if I'm inputting a bunch of data, clearly the Combine is going to play a role in how well the model likes a player. But really, there aren't a ton of inputs in the models that have to deal with the NFL Combine. Sort of. Speed score matters for running backs and tight ends, and height and weight measurements, those were all taken from the NFL Combine. So I can't say that nothing matters to the Combine as it relates to the Zap model. But I've seen a lot of discourse on social media this week about what does and doesn't matter. How wide receiver 40s are irrelevant, how this drill or that drill, how none of it really matters. At least analytically. I don't totally agree with all of that. Because not only are there direct inputs for me, like height, weight, and speed score, but draft capital is the single most important input in these Zap models. Where these dudes get drafted. And even though it's true that NFL teams often over draft wide receivers when they're really, really fast, how players perform at the combine is still more than likely having an impact on draft capital. When you think of it from that perspective, even if our little models in our corner of this football world may not care that much about what happens in Indianapolis each year, what's happening in Indy is still having a pretty real impact on the landscape overall at running back wide receiver and tight end. Now, as you know, the combine just concluded for this year's class, and naturally, there's a lot to talk about. On today's show, I'm going to go through who I think are the biggest winners and losers from that combine, keeping this whole draft capital impact in mind. Let's do it. One of the main stories from this year's combine was how fast the wide receiver group was. We had 11 wide outs run faster than a 4-4-40. That was one of the highest marks that we've seen at the combine dating back to when the thing started. This is going to undoubtedly get a lot of players pushed up draft boards who probably shouldn't be pushed up draft boards. Some of them I don't mind as players necessarily, but the vast majority of them have serious problems with their production profiles. Like Zachariah Branch. I talked about this at length in the Perspectives episode last week, but Branch to me fits the mold of the type of wide receiver that's just completely burned teams in the past, consistently. This is straight from this year's Prospect Guide. It says, If Branch is selected inside the top 100 as NFL Mock Draft Database currently projects, he'll be the 11th player drafted in that range since 2020 with a career behind-the-line target share above 30%, and the first to exceed 40%. Only two players in that bucket, Wanda Robinson and Luther Burden, posted breakout scores above 75, which by the way, Zachariah Branch, way below that 75 mark. The others, Lynn Bowden, Amari Rogers, Anthony Schwartz, Kadarius Toney, Rondell Moore, Valis Jones, Trey Tucker, and Malachi Corley. I know you guys have heard this before. I've said this now multiple times in the podcast, but it's important to repeat, Zachariah Branch's production profile is not very strong. And then there's Dionne Burks. Burks is getting some love from bigger name draft experts, and NFL Mock Draft Database right now has him as a potential day two pick. But he has a 1.35 career yards per outrun rate that's third worst in the class. Since 2020, the ZAP model has 24 wide receivers who have entered the league with career yards per outrun rates below 1.5. The only one to provide any meaningful fantasy production is Josh Palmer. Jeff Caldwell tested like an absolute beast when his production profile isn't overly special. Brennan Thompson, he's kind of interesting as like a tanked out, maybe Calvin Austin type player, and he ran the fastest 40 of the group. That was expected. But even his production profile has some flaws. There's Bryce Lance, Trey Lance's brother. He tested really, really well. He ran a 4.344 at 6.3204. I guarantee you that people are going to fall in love with him. They're going to slap that Christian Watson comp on him and go after him in rookie drafts. And look, for any of these guys, I see the vision. I see the vision with Bryce Lance. I don't think they're autobus. I'm just telling you that a lot more marks don't favor them than do favor them. For Lance, he broke out very late, to the point where he doesn't even have a breakout score in the model. And he's going to be over 24.5 years old at draft time. That's a clear red flag, even if that upside case is evident. There's a lot of that in this year's class. I alluded to this in the wide receiver prospects who produced like studs episode. But I do think we're bound to see one or two of these guys really buck some trends this year, just because of the sheer number of wide receivers in this class who are fine, but not special. Fine prospects will slip through the cracks. I'm talking about fine analytically. And sometimes every once in a while, athleticism will translate. So I'm not going to be shocked if someone like Bryce Lance makes a legit impact in the NFL. It's just that over the long run, if you generally fade the uber athletes who didn't produce in college, you're going to win out. And when I say produce in college, I mean good age-adjusted production. And there's a lot of that in this year's class. The combine really showed that. We have some really good athletes, but the production profiles, they're not amazing. Nevertheless, all of those guys that I just mentioned, they were winners. I'd expect better draft capital now that the combine is over. Jeremiah Love was already far and away the best running back in this year's class, and nothing from the combine remotely changed that. I've had a lot of people ask me if he's better than Bijon Robinson or Jameer Gibbs or Ash and Gentie as a prospect. If the ZAP model likes him more or less. And the answer is that the ZAP model still likes him less. But as I've discussed, it really doesn't matter. He's still an incredibly great prospect, and his comps, they're just stud after stud after stud. I really don't want people to get hung up on the fact that he's going to likely be an elite producer as opposed to a legendary performer. These are tags within the ZAP model. That's just a quick and dirty label to help us wrap our heads around the scores. To me, he's a fantastic prospect. And his 43640 at 212 lbs, which gave him a 117 speed score, that just cemented that. The model just has a decent amount of weight for the receiving metrics, and his receiving numbers in college, they were great, not excellent. Love is the rookie 101 in all formats. I actually don't think it's very close when you consider the hit rates for these early first round running backs and the talent and size profile that he's bringing to the table. And with so many running macks not even running the 40 at the combine this year, and with the position just being super thin overall, Jeremiah Love is a clear, clear winner stemming from the combine.