Record crowd descending on OSU for pro day … Don’t know exactly if there is an ‘official’ record for most attendees at a pro day, but all indications are that if there is one, Ohio State will take a shot at it later today when the Buckeyes hold their on-field workout. Indeed, upwards of 150 NFL personnel people are expected to attend today’s workout including as many as ten GMs and as many head coaches. So far, GMs from Carolina, Buffalo, Green Bay, Pittsburgh, Tennessee, Washington, Las Vegas and the Giants have all committed to attend. Carolina, in particular, will be sending an 11-man contingent including both owners, GM, head coach, offensive co-ordinator, QB coach and director of college scouting. Of course, the Panthers, who have the first pick overall, will be there to check out QB C.J. Stroud. In fact, the Panthers staff already took Stroud out to dinner last night. On the other hand, neither Houston nor Indianapolis, which have the 2nd and 4th picks respectively and are also expected to be taking a QB, are apparently sending more than cursory teams to Columbus. The Texans will have three scouts there, but none are senior people, while the Colts reportedly will have one lonely area scout in attendance. To be fair, neither the Texans nor the Colts generally put a lot of stock in pro days, but still this is the future of your franchise and you’d like to at least look like you are paying attention. It will certainly be interesting to see if this pattern holds for tomorrow’s Alabama pro day where Bryce Young will do his thing.
Of course, not everyone at the Buckeyes’ pro day will be there to see Stroud. Indeed, Ohio State has several other top 10-15 prospects including OT Paris Johnson and WR Jaxon Smith-Njigba, neither of whom ran at the combine. Smith-Njigba, potentially the top receiver in this year’s class if he’s healthy – he barely played in 2022 because of hamstring issues – in particular, will get a lot of scrutiny today. For the record, it was the Giants who took him to dinner last night. Other Buckeyes to watch today include rising DE Zach Harrison, who also didn’t run at the combine, CB Cam Brown and s Ronnie Hickman.And for anyone looking ahead to 2024, junior WR Marvin Harrison, a top 5 prospect who isn’t eligible for this year’s draft, will be one of the receivers catching passes from Stroud later today!
The Ohio State pro day is expected to start around 11:30 AM ET, with Stroud expected to throw sometime beginning around 2 PM. The NFL Network is scheduled to stream the event on NFL Network+, but the regular NFL Network supposedly will be on site and we’re hoping at least covers Stroud’s throwing session live. Meanwhile, other pro days today include those at Stanford, SMU, UAB, Temple, Texas-San Antonio and UConn. Have a great day.
