INDIANAPOLIS – Senior writer John Oehser takes a look at Thursday around the 2016 NFL Scouting Combine …
The Daily Draw …
Two quarterbacks, each of whom could go in the Top 10 …
Or maybe not …
That's what happened at the 2016 NFL Scouting Combine Thursday, with North Dakota State quarterback Carson Wentz and California quarterback Jared Goff both talking to the media on Day Two at Lucas Oil Stadium.
With Wentz, the main topic was his ability to transition from a non-FBS school to the highest level of football. With Goff, much to his surprise, the topic was also about the size …
Of his hands.
Goff, like Wentz, is a strong possibility to be selection in the Top 10 of the 2016 NFL Draft – and perhaps even the Top 5. He became a major combine story Wednesday when his hands measured nine inches. That's considered small by NFL standards.
Goff on Wednesday was jokingly asked if he had been bullied as a youth because of the "issue."
"I just heard about that yesterday," Goff said. "I've been told I have pretty big hands my whole life. I heard I have small hands yesterday apparently. No, I've never had a problem with that or expect it to be a problem at all."
Wentz, as was the case at the Reese's Senior Bowl in late January, was asked often on Thursday about transitioning to the NFL from an FCS program.
"I'm a very confident player and I know what I'm capable of," he said. "I know a lot of people had that question so I was excited to go prove that."
Goff and Wentz are generally considered the top two quarterback prospects in the draft, with Paxton Lynch of Memphis also a possibility. The Cleveland Browns at No. 2 overall are widely projected to be the first team to select a quarterback in this year's draft.
"I'm not big on speculating about that," Wentz said. "I don't really pay a ton of attention to the other guys. I'm really focused on myself and being the best I can be. I believe in myself. I'm confident. I believe in myself to be a franchise quarterback. All the opinions only really matter for … you guys all have fun stuff to write about. And then the teams, that's really all that matters."
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Around the NFL …
*With safety – particularly free safety – increasingly important in the NFL, it's expected to be a premium position in free agency next month. Both Cincinnati Bengals starting safeties – Reggie Nelson and George Iloka – are scheduled to be free agents, and it's expected to be difficult for the team to retain both. "We want to do deals with both those guys," Bengals director of player personnel Duke Tobin said. "We'll see if we can get it done. There are no guarantees in free agency. There may be teams out there thinking about them at maybe a little different level than we are and we'll see where that goes." …
*Conventional NFL wisdom is left tackle is the most important offensive line position with center second. Green Bay general manager Ted Thompson spoke for another position Thursday, saying, "First of all, the offense goes nuts if you don't have good guard play." The secret of good guard play? "The same thing would be for good tackle play: the size, the length, the strength, the power, the ability to force their will on other people. None of these things are secrets. Offensive line play in the National Football League is a difficult thing to do." …
*Cardinals Head Coach Brice Arians is easily one of the NFL's most-quotable head coaches. He had this to say Thursday when asked about the difficulty of evaluating the quarterback position: "When you're dealing with these guys and evaluating the two muscles, you can't evaluate the brain and the heart. They're the two you play with. You try to get to know them as well as you can. You go back and try to get into a huddle with them as many times as you can and see. You can evaluate how much they know, but you can't evaluate how they process it in 30 seconds or less. That's how you play the game. So much of it's still a crapshoot. If you could analyze those two things, you could make millions of dollars." …
Position-by-position
Jaguars.com will wrap Combine Daily each day breaking down the day's featured position groups, examining how the Jaguars might address the positions during the draft …
*Quarterback.How good is this quarterback class? Better than you might think, but perhaps not as good as many in the NFL are hoping. Wentz, Goff and Lynch aren't considered can't-miss prospects, but all are good enough for a team needing a quarterback to consider a Top 10 selection. That's a high-risk approach, but such is the importance of finding a franchise quarterback and such is the pressure on organizations to do so. The Jaguars don't appear likely to go this direction even in the later rounds.
*Wide receiver.Make no mistake: this is not the star-studded wide receiver class of the last two drafts – and there's not really a consensus first-round selection in this year's class. Early-entry juniors such as Michael Thomas of Ohio State, Laquon Treadwell of Ole Miss and Will Fuller or Notre Dame are first-round possibilities, and Braxton Miller – who played quarterback at Ohio State – impressed scouts playing wide receiver at the Senior Bowl. This is not an area the Jaguars appear likely to address in the draft, particularly early.
*Tight end.If the wide receiver class is considered not as strong as recent years, many consider the tight end class flat-out weak. Only Hunter Henry of Arkansas is considered a first-round possibility. The Jaguars conceivably could address this position late in the draft for a blocking tight end.
