With the NFL Draft a little over 24 hours away, here's a look around the Internet to see what is being said about Michigan's draft prospects ahead of the draft.
• The Athletic’s Arif Hasan aggregated all the various big boards and had interesting results for Michigan’s draft prospects. Linebacker Devin Bush slots in at No. 13, defensive end Rashan Gary at No. 15, defensive end Chase Winovich at No. 50, cornerback David Long at No. 92 and running back at No. 191.
“Michigan’s David Long is the single biggest “riser” in this process at any position,” Hasan writes. “He had outstanding production, tested extremely well for his position and did it all at a young age. From a production standpoint, cornerbacks help themselves out in a few ways — the first is allowing very few yards per snap in coverage, a statistic that Long dominated. Among 160 draft-eligible cornerbacks, Long ranked number one in that measure. Interestingly, he may have performed even better the year before.
Another metric that historically tracks with success, as one former member of an NFL team’s analytical department relayed to me, is something called “ball hawk rate,” which measures how often a player gets his hand on the ball, in the form of an interception or pass breakup, when targeted. Long ranks third in that statistic and first among any corners on the top 300 of the consensus board.
In terms of athleticism, my research has revealed that cornerbacks only need to perform well in a few drills — the three-cone, the 40-yard dash and the bench press. For the bench press, all that matters is getting at least eight reps, which 90 percent of cornerbacks have historically been able to do. All that does is filter out a few who can’t manage.
Long’s 4.45 40-yard dash certainly wasn’t the fastest at his position, but it was plenty fast. He really boosted his score with his incredible 6.45-second three-cone, the fastest any cornerback managed to run at the combine or the pro day and the third-fastest at the position in the history of the combine.
In addition to the on-field drills, arm length and cornerback weight historically correlate to performance in the NFL. Though Long didn’t pass the length filter — perhaps the biggest reason he didn’t have the best overall workout profile for corners — his 196 pounds help stabilize his drills, so we know he wasn’t running artificially fast at a lighter weight than his expected play weight.”
• Michael Renner of Pro Football Focus speaks highly of Long.
“That was a very long-winded way of saying that I don’t give a damn that Michigan cornerback,” Renner writes. “David Long checked in at 5-10 5/8″, 196 pounds with 30 7/8” arms. He makes up for that very minor lack in height (5-11 and 31” arms are popular thresholds) with a handful of other elite skills. The majority of concerns about Long are things that might hurt him at the next level: He hasn’t played zone, his length could be an issue, he doesn’t have elite speed. But I’m here to tell you what he can do, and that’s shut down receivers as well as any cornerback in this class
The statistics Long put up at Michigan are eye-popping. On 595 coverage snaps in his career, Long allowed a grand total of 18 receptions on 60 targets for 130 yards. There were 100 separate incidents of a cornerback allowing at least that many yards in a single game last year – that list includes draft prospects Saivion Smith (Alabama), Isaiah Johnson (Houston) and Kris Boyd (Texas). The craziness doesn’t stop there. Of his 18 receptions allowed, only three resulted in first downs and one resulted in a touchdown. The longest catch he allowed in his career went only 24 yards, and this past season, it was 12 yards. He broke up more passes (19) than he allowed receptions and never allowed more than two catches in a single game.
Now, these numbers certainly come with a bit of a caveat compared to most. Michigan runs pretty much two coverages exclusively. Long lined up in press nearly every snap of his college career. From there, he either played man coverage or cover-2 where he’d press and then trap the flat. Off-coverage, zone coverage, slot coverage: all pretty much non-existent in Long’s world. All will be present once he gets to the NFL, though, where even the most man-heavy franchises are running press-man less than 2/3 of their snaps. With his skillset though, I’d bet on him being a quick learner.”
• Albert Breer of Sports Illustrated is high on Bush.
“Michigan LB Devin Bush has gotten hot of late with coaches involved in the process,” he said. “And word is that new Broncos coach Vic Fangio, fresh off coaching Chicago’s defense, may see a little Roquan Smith in Bush.”
• Bush told Dave Birkett of the Detroit Free Press that the Lions told him he would be a middle linebacker if they picked him at No. 8.
“It was actually the Mike position, playing that position,” Bush told Birkett. “That’s where I like to be, right in the middle.”
• Connor O’Gara of Sunday Tradition doesn’t know why Gary is sliding.
“He didn’t put up the numbers that many hoped he would in 2018,” he writes. “The fact that he was injured in the middle of his junior season didn’t help, nor did the fact that it came out that he has a nagging shoulder issue that’ll need to be addressed by whoever drafts him.
Gary didn’t necessarily exceed expectations as a No. 1 overall recruit, which was the standard he was judged against from the moment he stepped on Michigan’s campus in 2016.
But yeah, the hate has gone too far.
By ‘hate,’ I’m referring to multiple reports this week suggesting that Gary could slip way past the front half of the first round on Thursday.
Bleacher Report’s Matt Miller reported that teams are souring on Gary because of the flagged shoulder injury and the fact that he only had 9.5 sacks in his Michigan career. Mel Kiper came out and said that according to one NFL general manager, the range for Gary is 10-28, which is an extremely wide margin for a first-round prospect. Pro Football Focus actually dropped Gary out of the first round in its mock draft. A report even leaked that Gary only recorded a 9 on his Wonderlic score.
It seems like a whole lot of negative information is leaking about a player who has never had an off-field issues, and has still been at the top of scouting reports when on the field…
… Sure, maybe a team picking in the top 5 or even the top 10 would want someone who already has it all figured out. That’s why Nick Bosa is considered a significantly better draft prospect even though both were limited by injuries in 2018.
Isn’t it strange, though, how the report comes out about Gary’s shoulder and it just feeds into this narrative that he’s going to fall in the first round? In a way, doesn’t that labral tear that he played with in 2018 almost cancel out that lack of production argument?”
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