With the first day of practice at this year’s Senior Bowl in Mobile, here is a rundown of some of our observations from this afternoon’s workout, although we note that the players were only in shells and there was no tackling per se.
- To put it simply, none of the QBs in today’s afternoon session which included Joe Milton of Tennessee, South Carolina’s Spencer Rattler, Michael Pratt of Tulane and South Alabama’s Carter Bradley threw the ball with any kind of authority.
- The star of the day, at least in the afternoon session may have been WR Ladd McConkey of Georgia; he’s not all that big or fast, but displayed a dizzying of array of moves that left more than one cover guy wondering exactly where he’d gone. Don’t blink! To boot, McConkey also made at least one acrobatic diving catch to add to his resume. At the same time, Jamari Thrash of Louisville and McConkey’s Georgia teammate Marcus Rosemy-Jacksaint got free for a number of receptions in the team drills. On the other hand, scouts had to be a little disappointed with what they saw from Johnny Wilson of Florida State and South Carolina’s Xavier Legette. Both are big receivers who made a couple of contested catches, but they really struggled to get much separation in the open field, while neither showed much of an extra gear when the ball was in the air.
- If the American team (which practised in the afternoon) have an edge in Mobile one would figure its the offensive line which includes among others OTs Tyler Guyton and Patrick Paul. However, while both had their moments Tuesday afternoon, we’re not sure either was all that consistently dominant. Guyton, a potential top 15 candidate for 2024, for example, could really lock and generally kept his feet moving in pass protection, but lunged at a couple of rushers and pretty much whiffed completely. For his part, Paul consistently gave up too much penetration and seemed to have some issues planting and redirecting when challenged with counter moves. In fact, a pretty good case can be made the Christian Jones of Texas may actually have been the best OT on the day, while Missouri’s Javon Foster wasn’t all that far behind. A case could also be made that American team OGs were really good as a group as none of Brandon Colemen of TCU, Christian Haynes of UConn, Layden Robinson of Texas A&M and Miami’s Javion Cohen gave up much of anything.
- On the other hand, we’re still waiting for someone on the American defensive line to really step. Alabama’s Chris Braswell did flash while rushing the passer on a couple of plays, while Florida State DT Braden Fiske stayed low and aggressive and was also able to make a couple of plays in the backfield.
