Taylor Mays Laughs at Chris Johnsons 40 time

[Goober Man]

http://www.steelersdepot.com/2010-nfl-combine-results-defensive-backs/

Taylor Mays just ran a 4.24 40 yard dash

At 6'3 and 230lbs...Thats really movin.

 

[DoTheDew]

http://www.steelersdepot.com/2010-nfl-combine-results-defensive-backs/

Taylor Mays just ran a 4.24 40 yard dash

At 6'3 and 230lbs...Thats really movin.

Mays is a heck of an athlete no one ever questioned that. Question has always been does he have a head for the game and does he make plays when it counts. That said I think if we took a flier on him we would be thrilled as I feel with good coaching (AKA Whiz) he can be the next Ed Reed.

 

[Weenus O'Baggins]

He was the guy I wanted in our mock draft but he didn't make it to us. I doubt he will be there.

 

[Goober Man]

I agree with ya Dew. I think he is one of those super athletes but it doesn't always translate on the field.

 

[MadCardDisease]

Dude just made a ton of cash in 4.24 seconds.

 

[MoeIsBetter]

Dude just made a ton of cash in 4.24 seconds.

+1

I'm calling it right now. THIS is the Raiders first pick lol.

 

[Goober Man]

Lol thats a pretty safe call Moe

 

[Goldfield]

+1

I'm calling it right now. THIS is the Raiders first pick lol.

lol

 

[DoTheDew]

+1

I'm calling it right now. THIS is the Raiders first pick lol.

Well it's official then. Mays will be a bust

 

[Goober Man]

Some how he got an offical 4.43 after running a 4.24 and a 4.37...or something..It just doesn't make sense.

 

[kerouac9]

Michael Huff made a ton of money as a safety, and he even made plays in college. Not so much in the NFL.

Roy Williams made a ton of money as a safety, and he made a ton of plays in college. Not so much in the NFL.

Taylor Mays didn't even make a lot of plays in the college. Last year he had three first-round picks playing in front of him.

 

[joeshmo]

That is not his official time. That is one guys hand clock time. NFLnetwork always shows the unofficial time right after they run but you ahve to wait until all of his group has run before they give the official electronic time.

 

[football karma]

Mays isn't a free safety -- he is a strong safety prospect that if everything turns out well becomes what Adrian Wilson is today.

In college -- Mays was a serious liability in deep coverage.

 

[187]

Taylor Mays isn't 4.2 fast, the official 4.43 is about what I expected.

 

[DoTheDew]

Taylor Mays isn't 4.2 fast, the official 4.43 is about what I expected.

At his size 4.43 is still pretty sick. Honestly the difference between 4.23 and 4.43 is not that big on a football field. That's what an extra yard or two if running 40 yards in a straight line (which only happens on special teams plays and broken plays anyway). If Chris Johnson was a 4.43 player but every bit as quick laterally as he is now we would have seen no difference in his performance this year IMO.

 

[Early]

Even if he runs 4.1, i'm still not drafting him to be my starting safety. I think he is great on special teams. Fast and big hitter. But those picks are reserved to later rounds.

There is the kid Broncos drafted two years ago. Barret. Is just as big as Mays and he was running a 4.3 time, faster than Mays. He hasn't been much on the field, reason being he can't play football at all. He is still learning tough.

The safety i'm impressed with is Myron Rolle. That's a football player and high IQ.

 

[Russ Smith]

Deion just put his foot in his mouth. Mays did the vertical jump and Deion said "you can see he's going to be stiff in these drills just from his vertical. He doesn't get all the way down so he can't explode up."

Mays got a 41" vertical at 230 pounds, the average for SS last year was 33, for FS 38". When they gave the actual measurement Deion said boy can get up, and then someone else joked "imagine if he'd gone all the way down."

He probably won't do good in the on field drill they're doing now that's not his strength, but as I have been saying all along he's going to grade out very high at the combine he's going to run faster and jump higher than people expect.

Wilson has had some obvious holes in pass coverage but I think we can all agree he's been a pretty good player for the Cards? Mays is bigger, faster and stronger than Wilson .

 

[red desert]

Deion just put his foot in his mouth. Mays did the vertical jump and Deion said "you can see he's going to be stiff in these drills just from his vertical. He doesn't get all the way down so he can't explode up."

Mays got a 41" vertical at 230 pounds, the average for SS last year was 33, for FS 38". When they gave the actual measurement Deion said boy can get up, and then someone else joked "imagine if he'd gone all the way down."

He probably won't do good in the on field drill they're doing now that's not his strength, but as I have been saying all along he's going to grade out very high at the combine he's going to run faster and jump higher than people expect.

Wilson has had some obvious holes in pass coverage but I think we can all agree he's been a pretty good player for the Cards? Mays is bigger, faster and stronger than Wilson .

Good point.

 

[187]

At his size 4.43 is still pretty sick. Honestly the difference between 4.23 and 4.43 is not that big on a football field. That's what an extra yard or two if running 40 yards in a straight line (which only happens on special teams plays and broken plays anyway). If Chris Johnson was a 4.43 player but every bit as quick laterally as he is now we would have seen no difference in his performance this year IMO.

For his size that is great, but the emphasis people put on 40 times is pretty damn high so saying "he ran a 4.23" and then backpedaling to "oh it was actually a 4.43" is a big difference. 4.2 anything is freakish for a 230 pounder. 4.4 is very impressive for mays, but nothing out of this world. From all I heard Mays looked terrible in the coverage drills, but his athletic intangibles were definitely going to get attention at the combine. I want nothing to do with Mays in the first round if he is supposed to be a free safety. Everyone brings up Wilson as being nothing special in coverage, but he is a SS that lives in the box. You combine a rookie who looks to be lacking in coverage skills with Adub and your secondary is in some serious ____ from a coverage standpoint. We'd kill every safety tandem in in the league when it comes to average bicep size, but that doesn't mean much on the field

 

[Russ Smith]

For his size that is great, but the emphasis people put on 40 times is pretty damn high so saying "he ran a 4.23" and then backpedaling to "oh it was actually a 4.43" is a big difference. 4.2 anything is freakish for a 230 pounder. 4.4 is very impressive for mays, but nothing out of this world. From all I heard Mays looked terrible in the coverage drills, but his athletic intangibles were definitely going to get attention at the combine. I want nothing to do with Mays in the first round if he is supposed to be a free safety. Everyone brings up Wilson as being nothing special in coverage, but he is a SS that lives in the box. You combine a rookie who looks to be lacking in coverage skills with Adub and your secondary is in some serious ____ from a coverage standpoint. We'd kill every safety tandem in in the league when it comes to average bicep size, but that doesn't mean much on the field

FWIW there is speculation that the official time is wrong. Even NFL Net showed that comparison of Mays 40 and Jacoby Ford's 40 and Mays is very close to Ford. He clearly didn't run a 4.24 since Ford ran a 4.28 and on the combined video beat Mays, but I also doubt he ran a 4.43. If his time is 4.43 then Ford's 4.28 was actually slower.

Mays moved up today virtually everyone agrees on that, the question is how much stock do you put on the combine compared to what they thought on tape? One guy who I think is nuts wrote today that mays moved into the top 5, that's crazy, but he clearly helped himself.

I also think people forget just how often the Cards have had 3 safeties on the field together in recent years in passing packages. I don't think Mays is a FS either but I don't think Rolle has proven he is either and Mays is significantly faster than Rolle.

I don't think we'll draft Mays but I also doubt he'll be on the board when we pick.

 

[DoTheDew]

For his size that is great, but the emphasis people put on 40 times is pretty damn high so saying "he ran a 4.23" and then backpedaling to "oh it was actually a 4.43" is a big difference. 4.2 anything is freakish for a 230 pounder. 4.4 is very impressive for mays, but nothing out of this world. From all I heard Mays looked terrible in the coverage drills, but his athletic intangibles were definitely going to get attention at the combine. I want nothing to do with Mays in the first round if he is supposed to be a free safety. Everyone brings up Wilson as being nothing special in coverage, but he is a SS that lives in the box. You combine a rookie who looks to be lacking in coverage skills with Adub and your secondary is in some serious ____ from a coverage standpoint. We'd kill every safety tandem in in the league when it comes to average bicep size, but that doesn't mean much on the field

I think these people you mention aren't exactly most teams. Just some scouts and pundits. Outside of the Raiders can you really think of a team that has 40 time as even one of their top two or three things for drafting a guy?

Agreed though we need a FS who can cover. Rolle couldn't cover either. I see Mays more as ADubs eventual replacement if we drafted him. Since he will be a first round pick this would be a bad choice of course, but I do still think Mays can be an elite safety with good coaching. As they say you can't coach big or fast but you can coach everything else.

 

[Russ Smith]

I think these people you mention aren't exactly most teams. Just some scouts and pundits. Outside of the Raiders can you really think of a team that has 40 time as even one of their top two or three things for drafting a guy?

Agreed though we need a FS who can cover. Rolle couldn't cover either. I see Mays more as ADubs eventual replacement if we drafted him. Since he will be a first round pick this would be a bad choice of course, but I do still think Mays can be an elite safety with good coaching. As they say you can't coach big or fast but you can coach everything else.

The problem is teams say they don't care about 40 times and yet year after year the NFL has a combine where they have kids run the 40, and the kids then have a pro day where they again... run the 40.

Obviously NFL teams value it or they wouldn't have kids running it?

Al Davis is clearly fixated on speed but all NFL teams pay attention to 40 times.

Mays didn't have the senior year people wanted to see but to say he had a bad senior year would be inaccurate. He had a career high in tackles, 23 more than his next best year. He did that while missing a game and playing hurt in several others. USC lost so much in the last draft at LB that Mays had to play closer to the LOS last year. If you saw the loss to UW last season you know how much they missed Mays when he missed that game.

They asked Mays today if NFL teams had talked to him about playing LB and he said no but if that's what an NFL team wanted he would do it and be the best LB he could be. He considers himself a DB but he loves football and will play where they ask him to. Can't ask for much else.

 

[lauraw]

Did anyone else notice when they put that simulcast run with all the runners before Mays ran his 2nd 40? They had that 4.28 guy smoking Mays By a step and a half.. He[Mays] was even with some other kid that ran a 4.3; Then on Mays 2nd run he runs a 4.33 or 4.34. I think someone who hand-timed the 4.24 just got it wrong. They never announced what the timer got, did they?

 

[DoTheDew]

The problem is teams say they don't care about 40 times and yet year after year the NFL has a combine where they have kids run the 40, and the kids then have a pro day where they again... run the 40.

Obviously NFL teams value it or they wouldn't have kids running it?

Al Davis is clearly fixated on speed but all NFL teams pay attention to 40 times.

Mays didn't have the senior year people wanted to see but to say he had a bad senior year would be inaccurate. He had a career high in tackles, 23 more than his next best year. He did that while missing a game and playing hurt in several others. USC lost so much in the last draft at LB that Mays had to play closer to the LOS last year. If you saw the loss to UW last season you know how much they missed Mays when he missed that game.

They asked Mays today if NFL teams had talked to him about playing LB and he said no but if that's what an NFL team wanted he would do it and be the best LB he could be. He considers himself a DB but he loves football and will play where they ask him to. Can't ask for much else.

Caring about it and emphasizing it are two different things. Every year there are plenty of kids who run good times for their position and get drafted late or go undrafted like Garvin was last year for us. Even during the combine when they were running the 40 one of the analysts on NFL network (I think it was Billick) said 95% of what teams pay attention to when drafting a player is already on tape when the combine rolls around. He went on to say the interviews can tell a team as much or more about a player than any of the workouts. Also said the positional drills are of more value to teams than 40, bench and vertical.

Point of most of those drills is basically to find whether a guy has some glaring hidden weakness (extremely poor strength or speed for his position) or a hidden strength (extremely good 40 time or bench for example.) As long as a guy falls into the "normal" range for his position he isn't going to really help or hurt his draft stock with the 40. It isn't that big a deal.

As for Mays senior year, I agree he is talented. He is more a SS than FS to me and the high tackles reflect that. The increase in tackles this year though, might have been a direct result of USC losing so many LBs. He had to pick up their slack and likely got more tackles as a result of the new LBs missing more than the great ones USC had last year.

 

[Russ Smith]

Caring about it and emphasizing it are two different things. Every year there are plenty of kids who run good times for their position and get drafted late or go undrafted like Garvin was last year for us. Even during the combine when they were running the 40 one of the analysts on NFL network (I think it was Billick) said 95% of what teams pay attention to when drafting a player is already on tape when the combine rolls around. He went on to say the interviews can tell a team as much or more about a player than any of the workouts. Also said the positional drills are of more value to teams than 40, bench and vertical.

Point of most of those drills is basically to find whether a guy has some glaring hidden weakness (extremely poor strength or speed for his position) or a hidden strength (extremely good 40 time or bench for example.) As long as a guy falls into the "normal" range for his position he isn't going to really help or hurt his draft stock with the 40. It isn't that big a deal.

As for Mays senior year, I agree he is talented. He is more a SS than FS to me and the high tackles reflect that. The increase in tackles this year though, might have been a direct result of USC losing so many LBs. He had to pick up their slack and likely got more tackles as a result of the new LBs missing more than the great ones USC had last year.

So then do you think Haden is still a top 5 pick? Many thought he was before yesterday, then he ran slow, measured small and now many think he slipped maybe out of the top 15. As one guy said it's not unusual for a top CB to be small or a step slower than expected at the combine, but it's VERY unusual for a top CB to be BOTH smaller and slower.

Haden's agent is already saying he'll run better at his pro day, I'm guessing his agent has been around the block and knows that the slow 40 time cost his client some cash and the best way to get it back, is to run a faster 40. Everyone thinks the kid can play, but his 40 time hurt him.