Washington Post

by Pete Williams

A Dash for NFL's Cash: Draft Prospects U
 

January 20, 2000

BRADENTON, Fla. - Thomas Jones is running hard across an artificial turf practice field, his legs churning. He would like to improve his personal best time in the 40-yard dash - 4.41 seconds - but at the moment he is more concerned with his form, running on the balls of his feet with his toes pointed slightly up to produce greater acceleration.

Jones rushed for 1,798 yards as a senior at the University of Virginia last season. On Thursday, when National Football League scouts and personnel executives gather in Indianapolis for the league's annual scouting combine, they will be familiar with the 5-foot-9 running back and his quick, powerful running style, which has been compared to that of the Dallas Cowboys' Emmitt Smith.

But Jones might surprise them. He and five other top clients of International Management Group have spent the past six weeks training here at the IMG-owned Bollettieri Sports Academy to make sure they demonstrate the raw strength and speed that is tested and emphasized more than football skills at the combine. How the players perform could mean the difference in several slots, or even rounds, in April's NFL draft, which can mean a difference of hundreds of thousands, even millions, of dollars in signing bonus money.

"We're training for the biggest test of our lives," says Chris Hovan, a defensive tackle from Boston College who, like Jones, is a projected first-round draft pick. "Everything we do here, every rep we do is geared toward improving draft position."

No longer do all NFL prospects rely on self-made and self-directed training programs after their final college season. Much like high school students who spend months on expensive SAT prep courses, they sign up for grueling training regimens at places like this to give themselves an edge in the draft.

Their primary testing ground is the combine, four days of intense workouts, drills and interviews in which officials from all NFL teams try to assess college players' physical skills, mental acumen and psychological makeup. Although many players who attend the combine are certain to be selected in the draft, they can improve--or damage--their desirability by their performance at the combine.

At the Bollettieri Sports Academy, getting ready for the combine means spending 90 minutes most mornings with "performance specialists" on the artificial turf working on running form, breaking down the 40-yard dash into strategic segments and mastering the three-cone shuttle drill. It means spending hours in the weight room to improve overall strength, with a special emphasis on preparing for the combine test of bench-pressing 225 pounds as many times as possible.

It means spending two hours late in the afternoon with a group of former NFL coaches on the same football drills used at the combine. It means eating healthy meals on the Bollettieri campus and taking nutritional supplements such as creatine. And it means undergoing videotaped interviews to prepare for the questions that will be asked in Indianapolis.

"In a lot of ways we're training for a test, not for football," Jones said. "A guy could do very well at the combine on physical skills and not be a very good player. But you want to show you have both physical and football skills."

The International Performance Institute was created five years ago as an on-campus training center at the Bollettieri Sports Academy, which over the last two decades has produced dozens of top tennis players, including Andre Agassi, Pete Sampras and Mary Pierce. Four years ago, IMG football agents Tom Condon and Ken Kremer began sending clients to IPI to prepare for the combine and for individual team workouts that occur between the combine and the draft. IMG not only paid for the players' housing and training, it used its arrangement with IPI as a recruiting tool.

The results have been impressive under the leadership of Scott Pucek, IPI's Combine Director. Last year, Tim Couch worked at IPI on improving his foot speed and mobility. Improvement in those areas during a second workout for the Cleveland Browns helped convince team officials to choose him over Akili Smith with the first overall pick. Couch received a $12.25 million signing bonus. Smith, who became the third overall pick, received a $10.8 million bonus. Luke Petitgout, the former Notre Dame offensive tackle, was projected as a mid-second round pick last year. But after adding 20 pounds at IPI before the combine, he was taken by the New York Giants with the 19th selection in the first round.

"You just have to get one team to like you," said Petitgout, who has returned to IPI, this time paying $1,500 per week. "You make that kind of jump and it's a huge difference financially." The Giants' early selection of Petitgout stunned many NFL observers, but the IPI champion is Kyle Turley. Considered the fifth-best offensive tackle prior to the 1998 combine, Turley put on 14 pounds at IPI and lowered his time in the 40-yard dash. That impressed the New Orleans Saints, who selected him with the seventh overall pick.

"For kids willing to work hard, the payoff can be huge," says Phil Janaro, who spent 25 years as a college coach before becoming an IMG recruiter in 1995. "We take care of everything here so the players can concentrate on preparing."

IMG houses the players in furnished apartments near the Bollettieri campus. Janaro and his staff take care of car rentals, cell phones--even sending Valentine's Day flowers to girlfriends, although some of those bills get passed on to the players.

While IPI is the most prominent pre-draft facility, other agents have put together programs and hired performance gurus for their clients. IPI even has inspired spinoffs. Mark Verstegen, who spent four years as IPI's director, left last fall to create the Athletes' Performance Institute on the campus of Arizona State University. Verstegen is using the Sun Devils' facilities until his own 30,000-square-foot building is finished. This month, he's training Hofstra quarterback Giovanni Carmazzi and Tyrone Carter, a top-rated safety from the University of Minnesota.

At IPI, the football hopefuls train alongside veteran NFL players and other fellow IMG clients such as Derek Jeter and Monica Seles in a gated, manicured campus lined with palm trees. In this environment, they quickly come to feel like professionals.

Janaro says that is by design. After spending nearly two months in such a high-profile environment, the players will not be overwhelmed when they see famous NFL coaches at the combine. Plus, they do not have to deal with the distractions of college life they would have faced had they remained at school to train. Some players leave their campuses having already graduated. For example, Virginia's Jones completed his degree in psychology in May 1999 and took graduate courses lst fall. Carmazzi graduated in December. Either way, with so much at stake, some players feel it is better to get in this elite-level environment.

"It would have been tough to train at school," says Todd Wade, an offensive tackle from Mississippi. "I wouldn't be anywhere near where I am right now."

IPI tailors a program to address each player's weaknesses. The 6-7, 330-pound Wade has been working on his vertical leap and dropping body fat. Sylvester Morris, a 6-2 wide receiver from Jackson State who says he chose IMG as his representatives after visiting Bollettieri, bulked up from 199 pounds to 214.

Chad Pennington, the former Marshall star, is rated the draft's top quarterback. But while he is highly regarded for his strong arm, size and leadership skills, his mobility and speed are average. So he has spent much of his time improving his 40-yard dash speed, which has dropped from 4.9 seconds to 4.78.

"By now teams know what you can do," Pennington said. "But the combine isn't so much about ability as it is numbers and you want to maximize your ability in every area. You want to eliminate any doubt teams may have."