INDIANAPOLIS — If speed does indeed kill in football, then the artificial turf at Lucas Oil Stadium yesterday qualified as a crime scene.
As if it weren’t already apparent the game has gotten exponentially faster in recent years, especially at the receiver position, this year’s NFL scouting combine has been shouting it since the annual gathering of the top draft prospects began last week.
Titans running back Chris Johnson, who holds the unofficial combine record for the fast time in the 40-yard dash at 4.24 seconds, was admittedly sweating it out yesterday as the skill position players ran for the first time, and not one, but four prospects challenged Johnson’s five-year-old mark.
The record survived, but not before wide receivers Marquise Goodwin of Texas, Tavon Austin of West Virginia and Ryan Swope of Texas A&M and Auburn running back Onterio McCalebb all put it in jeopardy.
Goodwin ended up with the fastest time of the day, clocking it in 4.27 seconds, while the other three all came in at 4.34 seconds. McCalebb at one point appeared to break Johnson’s mark with an unofficial time of 4.21 seconds, according to the NFL Network, but it was later recalculated downward.
“Can’t lie that one scared me,” Johnson wrote on Twitter about McCalebb’s performance.
The league has long had receivers with Olympic-level speed, of course. Bob Hayes was so fast in the 1960s, that he’s considered singlehandedly responsible for the creation of zone pass defense.
Credit for the influx of speed is going to better training, better use of techniques to maximize performance and an emphasis on skill-position players also running track throughout their high school careers.
But as the Jets learned with Johnny “Lam” Jones (and are currently experiencing with Stephen Hill), the speed is meaningless at receiver if the player doesn’t have the hands to go with it.
“Speed is great and obviously what you want when you’re talking about receivers, but that can’t be their only attribute,” Falcons coach Mike Smith said last week. “The hands have to come with it.”
Especially when they’re as small as some of the extremely fast receiver prospects this year. Austin and Goodwin are each just 5-foot-8 and roughly 175 pounds, so there aren’t many opposing defenders they will be able to outfight for the ball.
Indeed, despite the influx of track-worthy speed, size at receiver still appears to be prized most of all by NFL teams in the wake of big targets like Calvin Johnson, Brandon Marshall, Andre Johnson and Julio Jones dominating at the position.
That’s why it’s little surprise to see players with size atop the draft boards of most analysts when it comes to the receiver position. California’s Keenan Allen and Cordarrelle Patterson of Tennessee — widely considered the top two wideouts — are each 6-foot-3 and around 210 pounds, while Clemson’s DeAndre Hopkins checks in at 6-foot-1, 200 pounds.
While Austin might have sneaked into the first round thanks to his blazing 40 at the combine yesterday, the other three are all expected to be gone early despite 40 times that were never going to be a threat to Chris Johnson’s record.
Even so, the noticeable injection of speed isn’t limited to receiver. Not only is McCalebb a running back, but this year’s combine saw a 306-pound offensive lineman — Terron Armstead of Arkansas-Pine Bluff — set the record for his position with a 4.71 40.
“Everyone’s getting faster, it seems,” Seahawks GM John Schneider said, adding with a laugh: “Even the equipment managers.”