#derrick thomas

Game time is 2:30pm ET on NFL Network. There are tickets available if you’re going to be in Mobile today. 

Every Senior Bowl has winners and losers but they’re mostly identified during the practices, not so much during the actual game. So I can already secondhand tell you who most of them are.

Before I get into roster rundowns, let’s take a look back to the 1989 Senior Bowl. 

For any dumbfuck who gives a shit about this moronic crap, the 1989 NFL Draft is a watershed event. It’s considered one of the greatest drafts of all time and several future stars played in the Senior Bowl that year, most notably Derrick Thomas. You might know him as a great NFL player but back then he was merely a consensus All-American coming off a 27-sack season for the Alabama Crimson Tide. You won’t find that in NCAA record books because it wasn’t an official stat yet. It blows my mind that a player with Thomas’s obvious physical gifts and that kind of production would bother to play in the Senior Bowl but it was a different era. He did get drafted 4th overall so maybe that week helped him? I don’t know. I say it was a different era but most of the superstar seniors (Troy Aikman and Deion Sanders in particular) were already skipping the game if they were considered sure things.

The MVP of the 1989 Senior Bowl, over future NFL luminaries like Eric Metcalf and Carnell Lake, was Miami Hurricanes legend Cleveland Gary. The big story of the 1989 draft was actually juniors (Barry Sanders) skipping their senior seasons to enter the draft for the first time, so some of the biggest names weren’t even eligible for the Senior Bowl.

THIS YEAR

NORTH ROSTER

In every level of football coverage the quarterbacks are always the lead story for good or for bad. From what I’ve heard and read about this year’s practices, Drew Lock is the story. His arm looks great and he’s taken well to coaching and (no shit) he gives a great press conference. Those are all considered positives. He also measures out well. So! Look for Drew Lock to get drafted as high as or even higher than Missouri great Blaine Gabbert. How dumb will the hype get leading up to at least the NFL Combine? He might be the next Patrick Mahomes! 

The other big winner on the offense for the North is Dalton Risner. He’s an offensive lineman from Kansas State. Don’t pretend to give a shit. Every receiver is supposed to look great but every receiver in this entire draft class is supposed to look great and if even three of them are actually good it will be considered a great year for receivers. I’m not getting suckered by this shit. Tony Pollard (RB, Memphis) is bigger than I realized.

For the defense I noticed Zach Allen from Boston College is much huger than I knew but I haven’t really heard any chatter on him, good or bad. That doesn’t mean it isn’t out there but I haven’t heard it. I’ve heard Amani Oruwariye (DB, Penn State) looked like crap but they’ve got him running as a CB. I think he’s probably better suited to safety in the pros but I don’t have any input into this process for anybody so it doesn’t really matter what I think.

SOUTH TEAM

I haven’t seen a ton about him as a “winner”, per se, but the fact that Sheldrick Redwine has been working out as a cornerback is a positive for him. If that’s where NFL teams see him playing then he’s probably a day two pick. He’s probably the face of the turnover chain at The U over the last two years and I hope he gets to hang around the NFL for years and make millions of dollars.

On offense I’ve heard good things about Oli Udoh and Tytus Howard but they’re FCS offensive linemen. Just making the NFL is probably a massive win for them and there isn’t a lot of commercial appeal in that kind of story. Will Grier has apparently looked godawful (a weak-armed Jameis Winston.) Gardner Minshew is ripped. Tyree Jackson is a giant with a strong but inconsistent arm and horrible instincts. Jarrett Stidham is probably back into day 2 territory but he’s also going to suck if he ever makes it into a game. Josh Oliver (TE, San Jose State) and, again, all of the receivers “impressed.” Not getting my hopes up for any of them.

Montez Sweat is apparently Marcus Davenport redux. Some twitter scouts love him for his athletic traits and strength, some hate him because he has no technique at all. His size, athleticism, production and pedigree all scream first round pick but he’s not going to elevate over Nick Bosa or Josh Allen. NCAA all-time career sack leader Jaylon Ferguson (EDGE, Louisiana Tech) is probably a fringe depth guy in the NFL. If I heard anything about other guys I already forgot it.