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2023 NFL Combine: Best Drills for Immediate Returns

2023 NFL Combine: Best Drills for Immediate Returns

Any GM with his job on the hot seat will aim to connect on a draft pick(s) who provides immediate production, no different than fantasy managers looking to hit big within the later rounds of drafts. For teams and fans alike on the lookout for instant impact players from this upcoming rookie class, what can the position-specific data from recent Combines tell us? Let’s dive into it.

Note: these tables include the top-performing first-year players dating back to 2010. The numbers within columns for Combine drills represent percentiles of performance compared to other players at the same position (per MockDraftable.com). Players are sorted by fantasy points per game.

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2023 NFL Combine: Best Drills for Immediate Returns

Quarterbacks

If you are looking for a true QB1 output from a rookie signal caller, just know that’s only happened four times in the past 13 seasons. What did Deshaun Watson, Cam Newton, Justin Herbert, and Robert Griffin III all share in common? They were well above-average athletes across the board. Each of them posted elite scores in the 40-yard dash and jumping drills. Even looking down the leaderboard at rookie QBs whose performances were more “serviceable,” they have the speed and explosiveness in common too. Notably, the four QBs on the list who did not test to these percentiles – two performed at the Combine, two opted out of drills – were each the first overall picks in their respective NFL Drafts.

Running Backs

The degree to this finding is staggering: it’s all about weight with rookie running backs. If you need a Year 1 boost from your RB, and he’s weighing in under 215 pounds, think again. From a fantasy perspective, 15 rookie RBs have averaged over 15 PPR points/game since 2010, and all of them weighed in over the 50th percentile at the Combine. This isn’t a case of selection bias either; there have been 32 RBs who weighed in beneath the 50th percentile selected on Days 1 or 2 of the NFL Draft since 2010, and none of them cracked those criteria. The logic makes enough sense. Defenders only get bigger, and the season only gets longer, so you need every pound on your body to survive the wear and tear. But it’s stunning that there are zero outliers in a sample size that isn’t particularly small.

If you’re on the hunt for a lottery ticket selection, go back to the jumping drills. 5 of the Top 6 RBs within the above table crushed the jumps, including two third-rounders in Alvin Kamara and Kareem Hunt, and a UDFA in James Robinson.

Wide Receivers

Nearly all of the Top 12 rookie performers at wideout by PPR points/game shared one above-average attribute in common: arm length. This includes guys who weren’t able to sustain their first-year success, like Kelvin Benjamin and Mike Williams, and guys who clocked less-than-impressive 40 times, like Keenan Allen and JuJu Smith-Schuster. The only exceptions were two Top 6 NFL Draft picks: Ja’Marr Chase and Jaylen Waddle. The combination of arm length with explosiveness (jumping drills) is particularly lethal. It’s practically a ‘who’s who’ at the WR position when you condense the table to qualifiers with arm length and at least one jump above the 50th percentile.

To strike gold with a rookie receiver, move on to the agility drills next. The Top 4 WRs within the above table provided WR1 production from the jump – including Odell Beckham‘s otherworldly rookie season – and each OBJ, Chase, and Michael Thomas posted elite times in the 3-cone and/or 20-yard shuttle drills. (I have a hunch Justin Jefferson would have, too, had he not shut down his Combine early due to already proving himself.) Outside of Chase, none of the other three were Top 10 draft picks either.

Tight Ends

This one is easiest, especially once you come to peace with expecting the minimum from rookie tight ends. The only “great” season by receiving production from a Year 1 TE in NFL history came from Mike Ditka in 1961…so yeah. Now that that’s covered, just look at 40-yard dash times for tight ends. It’s that simple. Every TE in the above table ran the 40 in better time than average at the position. 2022 was a particularly dismal season of production from rookie TEs; the top fantasy scorer of the year was Chigoziem Okonkwo, a fourth-rounder who was the 10th TE selected in his Draft. And who ran the fastest 40 in the 2022 TE class? Okonkwo at 4.52 seconds.

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