The NFL will hold its annual Scouting Combine in Indianapolis later this month and the league released the list of 332 players that have been invited.
Ohio State leads the way with 14 invites and Notre Dame was second with 10 players asked to go through drills for NFL scouts. Alabama had nine players invited from their national championship squad, although quarterback Jake Coker was not one of them.
Coker has good size at 6'6" and 236 pounds, but evaluators would seem to feel that his limited experience as a starter and reliance on a talented supporting cast didn’t make him a candidate for a longer look in Indy. Navy quarterback Keenan Reynolds didn’t have the same kind of talent on hand on his way to scoring an NCAA-record 88 rushing touchdowns, but he also didn’t get an invite to show whether his skills might translate to another position at the professional level.
Missing the combine doesn’t close the door on an NFL career. Doug Baldwin, Julian Edelman, Sam Shields and James Harrison are a few players who have gone on to success in the pros without running drills in Indianapolis.
Click here for the full list of players invited to take part from February 23-29.