Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - Which seniors will be drafted? | The value of an Iowa offensive lineman | Nick Easley the next Riley McCarron?

Episode Date: December 10, 2018

NFL Draft Analyst Sayre Bedinger joins us for another NFL Draft focused episode. This time we discuss the senior class for the Hawkeye football team specifically diving into which seniors will be drafted and which will likely be priority UDFA's. We discuss the value of an Iowa offensive lineman and we discuss what Nick Easley can do at the next level. If he tests well, could this be another Riley McCarron situation for the former walk-on senior pass-catcher? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to another exciting episode of the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. The Locked On Hawkeyes podcast is a part of the Locked On Sports Network, and we are the most recent addition to the growing list of college podcasts on the Locked On Sports Network. I'm your host, Andrew Wade, editor over at DearOldGold.com, where you can find analysis pieces on all things black and yellow, and we have another great episode for you today. If you missed our Friday episode, definitely want to check that out. We talked to Sarah Bettinger, one of the site experts at NFL Mocs,

the fan-sided website devoted to mock drafts, draft analysis, and that sort of thing. Had a great conversation with him. However, our conversation went a little long. So we cut the recording in half. We gave you half of it on Friday and we have the other half coming to you today. So make sure you check out Friday's episode. We talked a lot about Noah Fant, Nate Stanley, Imani Hooker, Anthony Nelson, and TJ Hawkinson. Today though, we're not talking about the underclassmen and whether or not they may or may not declare. And if you want to know what our thoughts are on that,

again, check out our Friday episode. But today we're going to talk about the seniors. What do we expect to happen with the senior class for the Iowa football team? Are they going to be drafted? What will happen in the NFL? Do they even have a chance? So it's a great episode that you want to check out, especially for you devoted Iowa Hawkeye football fans. You'll love to see seniors and Iowa football players make it to the NFL. So you don't want

to miss this episode. As I said on Friday's episode, we're not going to be following our traditional structure. We're not having three segments. We're just going to be having a great conversation with Sarah. So please jump in, listen, let us know if you have any comments, and we would love to hear from you from iTunes, Stitcher, or Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts at. So you can leave us a review there. You can also follow us on Twitter at LockedOnIowa, and you can follow me at Wade underscore Andrew,

and you can follow Sarah at Sarah Bettinger on Twitter. So let's jump right into it. All right, man. Well, thank you for kind of jumping through the underclassmen. I quickly wanted to go through the seniors. And we talked about this a little bit before the show started, but it feels like there's not a ton of standout seniors in the sense of high day one or day two picks,

but a lot of players who could be on the roster bubble could be a UDFA, a priority UDFA and that kind of thing. And we've seen, obviously as Broncos fans, I don't think we have a Phillip Lindsay on our hands by any means, but what kind of the point I was getting at is there's still a lot of potential and still a lot of respectability that can come with being a priority UDFA. You can make a big impact on NFL roster. And so just wanted to quickly run through a few of these guys.

Parker Hesse, honorable mention, all Big Ten, and really I feel like the heart and soul of the Iowa defense. But he is not exactly the right size. I wouldn't say he has most athleticism. Where do you see him fitting out in the NFL? I think he's going to definitely have to carve out a role on special teams and then find ways to make an impact wherever he's at on the defensive line. One thing that I noticed last year doing some of those games for PFF

was he lined up at the nose tackle in the NASCAR package. And that was interesting to me because he was often probably Iowa's smallest defensive lineman. And so I found that interesting that he was able to play that position and use his quickness. Consistent production from him, I think as a special teams guy, he's going to have to prove that he can play in that regard, and he's going to have to prove himself.

He's going to have to figure out a way to make sure that he has one really identifiable trait. Guys who can play special teams and maybe have one really identifiable trait can make it in the NFL. But otherwise, it's going to be tough sledding for sure. Yeah. So kind of jumping across the line, we're going to look at Matt Nelson and Sam Brinks.

And Matt Nelson, I Brinks and Matt Nelson. I think his size is really interesting because he's so freaking tall. He's six foot eight. He weighs two hundred ninety six pounds. To me, that's a little bit undersized. I was thinking maybe he, you know, be kind of a fit and he came in as kind of an edge player and moved inside to accommodate some other players. But do you think it would be wise for him or maybe a 3-4 team could maybe put him at the edge, kind of like a Derek Wolf style, big, tall, can kind of play both the run and the pass? What are your thoughts on Matt Nelson? Yeah, I think he's an interesting type of guy.

He's got such great size, and I think you look a couple years back at the production that he had on that really good 2016 defense where he was playing, like you said, more on the edge. I think that's where he fits is kind of at that, that five technique spot where he can, he can maybe get a little bull rush in every now and again, but he can sit back kind of like what, what Adam gots this does for Denver. You know, if he can't get a rush on, he's going to stick his hand up and it's going to be hard to throw it past his hand because he's so humongous. And that's what I think

he brings to the table is just that, that great length, well coached, does a good job of getting his hand in the throwing lanes. And he can make those plays behind the line of scrimmage too. He can get some leverage and he can play with power. So I think he's an interesting late round undrafted type of uh five technique in a three four defense who can slide in uh if need be on on past packages yeah i feel like he could be one of those guys where you know we everyone looks at him and thinks he could be good they take a six seventh round flyer on him and you know long behold he's starting on a defense that understands how to utilize his skill set appropriately. So, you know, kind of moving down the line again, the last senior starter, Sam Brinks.

This guy, I think for me personally, just from, you know, watching him, he's obviously I would say arguably the worst defensive lineman starting for the Broncos or not the Broncos. The Hawkeyes pretty easy to kind of see that he's six 6'5", 275 pounds, playing the defensive tackle position. What are your thoughts on him? To me, he kind of seems like a training camp roster spot type of player. Yeah, I think that's exactly right. A guy like that's going to have to have a big performance at the Pro Day. He probably won't get invited to the scouting combine, so he's going to have to perform really well at the Pro Day and show scouts that he can run the drills extremely well,

that he knows exactly what he's supposed to do at all times, and then just trust his tape. I mean, if he's not coming up with these big plays, he's not racking up the stats. He's got to trust that his tape shows, hey, I can do a lot of different things for your team. But I agree with you. I think he's probably facing the toughest road to the league.

Yeah. So moving to the other side of the trenches, we have Ross Reynolds and Keegan Render, both really first-year starters on the offensive line. And Ross Reynolds was named second team All-Big Ten. Keegan Render was named third team All-Big Ten. These kind of guys, they're not getting as much hype as uh you know larrick jackson or tristan wirfs who you know potentially could be first second round picks in the next year or two but these guys have the mark of an iowa offensive lineman in my

opinion the kind of guys who they they get drafted in the six seven round or they're a udfa and they come in they start right away kind of like an Austin Blythe type of player. So wanted to get your thoughts on those two guys. I obviously do not. I don't have the full ability yet to scout offensive linemen. Just wanted to get your thoughts on what they bring to the table as offensive linemen. Yeah, I think with Iowa's offensive scheme, it's interesting to evaluate the linemen because they almost always do their jobs extremely well and the other thing about iowa is that it seems like they they're just like a factory of just cranking

out these guys who come into college at like 230 pounds and then all of a sudden they're 315 pounds and they're going to the nfl it's like what what did they eat over the last three or four years that got them up to that that way but they seem to always be able to put on really good weight they don't seem to ever lose their athletic ability and they're always well coached I mean Kirk Ferentz deserves so much credit for Iowa just constantly having some of the most well-coached offensive linemen in college football and putting that program together the way that they do with their weight training, I would absolutely anybody who's coming out of Iowa on the offensive line,

I think NFL teams are interested in, and at least looking, looking closely at, you know, James Daniels having such great success for the Chicago bears early. Now, obviously he's a very, very special talent,

but I think Iowa always, they're just consistently putting talented offensive linemen out because they're so well coached. They get these guys a lot of experience and they're playing a high level of competition. And so they've got good tape out there. These guys do. So I'd be interested to see if even a late round situation, you know, look at Austin Blythe. He's taken advantage of being a later round guy. And so I think that these guys could do something similar. We're going to take a brief break from talking to you about the NFL draft and what Iowa Hawkeye football players could be declaring for the 2019 NFL draft

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That's S-L-I-N sling.com slash locked on that's S L I N G.com slash locked on. Never miss a game again with sling TV. Absolutely. And I, I mean, those are the kinds of guys that I would love to see the Broncos pick up in the late round to see if we can take a fire and, and hope it works out. I mean, obviously I think I'm very biased. I,

I can literally find a spot for any Iowa Hawkeye on a Broncos roster. So it's just, it just seems like it's too easy, man. It was, it was so long there for a while for the Broncos too, where it felt like they had no Iowa Hawkeyes players. So like,

it felt like it was never going to happen again. And then all of a sudden here comes the barrage. So I love it. I'm 100% with you on that one. All right, we have two last guys I wanted to bring up. I'm going to save the best for last. I guess you can probably guess who that's going to be. But before I jump to that guy, I want to talk about Jake Gervais.

And Jake Gervais has had somewhat of an interesting trajectory in the Iowa Hawkeye program you know last year was kind of in and out of the starting lineup struggled at times in coverage and now you know senior year he did a really great job of you know attacking the run game from this you know from the third level of the defense he had 83 tackles three interceptions and six passes defense um he he wasn't as big of a weakness as I anticipated him being there were still a few plays right I left you know kind of scratching my head like was that on him or was that on you know one of the corners you know several corners that were

starting for Iowa this past season wanted to get your thoughts on on him what does he bring to the next level does he really have a shot at the next level well I think anytime you get a guy who, you know, has six interceptions in a matter of two years, you take a look at that guy. You take a, you take, especially at a big school like Iowa, you know, those guys aren't going to get overlooked. I think for a guy like him, again, it comes down to, can you, can you show out athletically at the pro day, prove that you can be an effective special teams player at the next level. And then you just really have to take advantage of the opportunities you're given at training camp, at special teams player at the next level, and then you just really have to take advantage of the opportunities you're given at training camp, at mini camp, in the preseason.

Prove your worth, not only on special teams, but when you get those opportunities to go out there, make sure that you're making the right reads on plays. Make sure that you're always in the right position. And I think that's one of the things that I love about Iowa players is they're so well coached, they're so disciplined. They're usually always in the right place. Like you said, I mean, he struggled at times with that,

but it seemed a big improvement this year in his game. And so I'll be interested to see where he ends up going. I'll especially be interested to see how he tests because that's going to be an important factor, in my opinion. Yeah, if he runs a fast 40-yard dash, I feel like that could fault him up some of the draft boards, really move him up that. So it'll be interesting to see how that works.

I can't imagine him testing super well, to be honest. He just doesn't strike me as the most athletic safety we have. And maybe it's tough. You're comparing him to Monty Hooker and geno stone right so it's difficult to to say oh jake dravas is athletic when you're looking at two athletic physical specimens at safety right next to him so uh maybe just maybe just a case of looking at him relatively compared to his other you know his peers and a little bit tough to decipher that. Yeah, absolutely. All right. The last guy I want to talk about, and like I said,

we talked about this right before we jumped on the call, but my favorite Iowa Hawkeye, and for very good reason, Nick Easley. Not only do I love his story, but he's from my hometown, and that's pretty awesome. When you're from Newton, Iowa, a town of 15,000 people, I remember when nicks he ordered his first touchdown against uh against wyoming last year everyone i my my facebook my twitter feed everything everyone went off and i was sitting with five other newton people at the

time in a local bar in denver and everyone was going crazy not because the hawks scored because that was a newton kid so i obviously it's a little it's a little close to home for me pretty exciting it'll be really i'm really curious to see what happens with him to me he strikes me very much as a riley mccarron type and hear me out on this one just because riley mccarron was very underutilized in iowa's offense in my opinion he had apparently blazing speed uh came out of nowhere to run a sub 4-4-40, and has kind of bounced around on the Patriots roster. Nick Easley has gotten a ton of manufactured touches.

He has 95 catches over two years for only 920 yards. He's been sort of a third-down go-to threat for Nate Stanley, whenever it's not TJ Hawkinson or Noah Fanny. He's really been that third main option. And they do a really good job of manufacturing the touches, but they didn't really do a lot of passes that were directed towards him outside of those horizontal passes. And talking to a few people that are pretty close to him,

his brother, for example, there's some good hype, at least from my opinion, on what type of combine, not combine, but pro day numbers he's going to put up. Potentially 4-4-40, doing pretty well in the three-cone drills and that sort of thing. So I wanted to get your thoughts on him. Could he carve out a spot as a special teams type player, maybe even a slot receiver like a Wes Welker type of player? Oh, gosh, I would love that.

I would absolutely love that. And I loved what I've seen from him over the past two years. You know, Iowa has not had the best production from their wide receiver position. And then when this guy started making plays, like you said, starting in that Wyoming game last year, it was awesome to see. I think with Iowa receivers, you really got to evaluate traits at this point in time because they aren't doing a good job of really featuring their skill set within an offense. I think that they're, like you said, with the manufactured touches. And this is a guy who's

kind of a slot type who averaged over 10 yards a catch last year. So he's good at making plays. He can make plays after the catch. He seems to be a really natural football player. And that's, I mean, I'm guessing since he's the only guy from your hometown to ever make it to division one football, I'd say that speaks to the fact that he's a really just instinctive player. He understands the game. He's got that gamer mentality and he scrapped and clawed his way onto the, onto the field for the Hawkeyes. And there's something to be said for that. And especially if he can prove himself worthy as an NFL caliber athlete, I definitely think there's a place for guys like this in today's league who if you can manipulate the slot, if you can make plays after the catch,

if you've got quickness, if you've got vision after the catch, there's a place for that type of player in the league for sure. Yeah, I couldn't agree more obviously like i said i'm super biased but i love hearing it confirmed from you know someone who doesn't have as much uh i would like to invest it but emotionally invested in in this situation so fun to hear that as well i think it'll be interesting again when he has you know his just testing day or his pro day numbers how that all shakes out out. Riley McCarron was kind of an afterthought. And then he ran that 40 yard dash and all of a sudden it was like,

who is this guy and where did he come from? And why weren't we thrown in the ball deep at all? And obviously that speed has helped him and the special teams abilities helped him stay with the Patriots, at least on the practice squad. So hopefully, like I said, I think easily can carve out a niche in that, in that role. And I think like we talked about, I'm hoping to try to get him on the podcast with his brother at some point over the next you know after the Outback

Bowl and talk to him a little bit more and if you didn't get a chance to check it out his brother put together an awesome 15-minute clip of every single one of Nick Easley's catches so pretty fun stuff to watch yeah post it on Twitter if you do you feel like spending 15 minutes watching every single one of nick easley's 95 catches uh have fun with that yeah absolutely gonna dive in a little film session yeah i i enjoyed it played it you know put on the background watching some of his catches and like i said i've been pretty invested in and watching his success and it's pretty cool to see so that's awesome well man that uh that covers it for the the seniors or any other seniors that you wanted to target or highlight uh i didn't really i haven't really seen any of that i feel like would even have a chance

at a roster spot they might show up at the pro day but i just don't feel like there's any other seniors on the iowa roster that really have a much of a chance to, to even get a roster spot on, you know, during training camp. Yeah. I think, I think you covered it pretty well there. I mean, sometimes you look, sometimes you look at the kicker, but I don't think that's going to be, I don't think that's necessarily going to be in the cards, even, you know, even given the game winner against Nebraska, I just, yeah, I think that you've, I think you covered it well there and those guys hopefully those guys will all do as as is you know seems to be the new norm that I mean

do well the pro day and it seems like Iowa players are really doing well at in their testing and so I'll be excited to watch all those guys perform yeah man credit to coach Doyle for getting those players ready to go and having them be some of the best trained and getting the maximum production or maximum possible capabilities out of them, which is pretty awesome to see. Another reason why Iowa Hawkeye football is the best. That's right. That's right. Awesome. Well, Sarah, thank you so much for jumping on, man.

I really appreciate your time today. I hope everyone who's listening to Locked on Hawkeye podcast enjoys as well. I'm sure they will, and we'll definitely have to have you on another time, man. Dude, absolutely. It's my pleasure. I'm super thankful for you having me on and really excited to dive into this draft season. It feels crazy that we're, you know, what, a month, month and a half away from the senior bowl.

And man, it's crazy to think that this football season has flown by as fast as it has. But here we are. Absolutely, man. It feels like yesterday I was writing articles about why I think Baker Mayfield should be the next quarterback of the Broncos. And here we are now. I know it. Here we are. Here we are hoping for Nate Stanley in 2020.

Heck, yeah. If he could show out, that would be pretty great. Yep. Yep. Yep. All right. And that concludes it for our episode for today. Again, a special shout out to Sarah for having a great conversation with me about the NFL draft and the Iowa Hawkeyes, who could be hearing their names called during that time.

If you have any comments or questions, we'd love to hear from you on Twitter or wherever you get your podcast at, whether that's iTunes, Stitcher, or Spotify. And please subscribe to make sure you're getting all the appropriate updates and downloads of our latest episodes. As you probably know by now, we're giving you daily content, so you do not want to miss that. Make sure you're subscribed to wherever you get your podcast at. We have a fantastic episode coming up tomorrow. So you don't want to miss that. We have Quinn Douglas coming on to talk to us about Iowa Hawkeyes. We have a full gauntlet

of topics to discuss. So make sure you're checking out tomorrow's episode. And that will conclude it though for our Monday morning episode. I hope you had a fantastic weekend. I'm your host, Andrew Wade. You can follow me on Twitter at Wade underscore Andrew. And you can follow all the exciting happenings of the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast on Twitter at LockedOnIowa. Again, make sure you subscribe to our podcast on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcast at. And please leave us a review. You can also reach out to me with questions, comments, or suggestions at

LockedOnHawkeyes at gmail.com Again, thank you for joining us Locked On Hawkeyes. Again, thank you for joining us on the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. Have a fantastic day Hawkeye Nation and we'll be back tomorrow.