Defence again dominates National Senior Bowl practice … If there was a story at this afternoon’s National team practice at the Senior Bowl in Mobile, it was that the defensive line simply dominated their offensive counterparts. In fact, it usually looked all the part of a jail break during the team drills part of the practice during which the QBs barely had time to just dump the ball off on the majority of snaps. And several of the guys who were just blowing past people at Tuesday’s initial workout were back at it today including DEs Nadame Tucker of Western Michigan and Clemson’s TJ Parker. Tucker, for example, could get washed out when bigger OTs got their hands on him, but for the most part he was just too quick off the snap and was also able to effectively use a long first step to find seams when stunting. And they were joined in the chase by relatively unheralded Cian Stone of NC State, another long, lean ER with a quick first step who was almost as disruptive, while Penn State’s Dani Dennis-Sutton was also quick and relentless.
It also didn’t seem quite fair that the already loaded National d-line was bolstered by the addition of Florida State DT Darrell Jackson, the star of last week’s Shrine practices. Fortunately, for the National offense, though, he didn’t get that many snaps. In fact, the star of today’s session was Penn State DT Zane Durant, who is somewhat undersized, but was explosive off the snap and relentless as he won time again by gaining leverage and maintaining it thru the whistle. At the same time, fellow DTs Bryson Eason of Tennessee and Minnesota’s Deven Eastern also had quietly effective days.
And while it was one of the those ‘shoudda stood in bed days’ for most of the National o-linemen, one who did hold up really well all day was Georgia Tech C/G Keylan Rutledge, while it was not a good day at all for Boise State’s Kage Casey, who struggled at times just to get his hands on people, never mind sustaining blocks.
We have noted over the years that all-star games are not necessarily great venues for LBs to show their stuff. Today, though, Jacob Rodriquez of Texas Tech had arguably the defensive play of the game when he picked off a pass to cement the D’s ‘win’ on the final play of the workout. However, the two most impressive LBs on the field earlier today were Kyle Louis of Pitt and Oregon’s Bryce Boettcher, both of whom were around the ball on just about every snap.
