Iowa football: Hawks shine bright at 2019 NFL Combine

The Iowa football team had quite the impressive showing at the 2019 NFL Combine. Here is a recap of each player’s performance.

Every year the NFL Combine has surprise performances, both good and bad. Future NFL players just don’t want to be on the bad side of their surprise. Fortunately for the four Iowa football players that were in Indianapolis during the 2019 NFL Combine, the only surprises were good surprises because, to be honest, the Hawks balled out.

In fact, each player did basically everything that we said they needed to do to make their draft stock rise at the combine starting with the dynamic tight end duo of Noah Fant and TJ Hockenson.

Noah Fant

Fant set the NFL world on fire when he checked in at 6’4” and 249 pounds and then ran a 4.5-second 40-yard dash. That’s a solid time for anyone, but especially for a tight end. He also managed to set the bar in most of the other combine metrics for tight ends as well. It’s safe to say, he is a surefire first-round draft pick.

TJ Hockenson

Fant’s running mate didn’t have quite as impressive of a day but didn’t cost himself any money. As we expected, most of his metrics were in the upper echelon of tight ends. In fact, if it wasn’t for Fant, Hockenson would have been first in quite a few of the combine tests. Hockenson finished second in every single drill except for the 40-yard dash and the bench press.

The 40-yard dash wasn’t that bad though as Hockenson finished 7th overall with a 4.70-second 40-yard dash, which for context, is faster than All-Pro tight end Zach Ertz ran when he was going through the draft process.

Anthony Nelson

Coming into the combine, Nelson had probably the most to gain and lose. After Sunday’s performance, it’s safe to say he may have just improved his draft stock by one or two rounds.

At 6’7” and 271 pounds, Nelson ran a 4.82-second 40-yard dash (5th best), jumped a 35.5-inch vertical (5th best), posted a 9′ 10” inch broad jump (4th best), completed a 6.95-second 3 cone drill (2nd best), and hit 4.23 seconds in the 20-yard shuttle (3rd best). While you don’t typically see defensive lineman run a 40-yard sprint in a game, checking in with an outstanding 3 cone drill, vertical, and broad jump are immensely important for measuring the explosiveness and lateral ability of a defensive lineman.

Considering, each of these three things was a potential knock on Nelson coming into the draft process, this is absolutely huge and cannot be understated.

Amani Hooker

Hooker has been battling athleticism concerns that consistently plague Iowa football players entering the NFL in the secondary. On Monday, he put those concerns to rest.

The former Iowa football dime-backer ran a 4.48 40-yard dash, which was 8th best among safeties. He also had the 5th best vertical jump at 37 inches and the 2nd best 3 cone drill at 6.81 seconds. Lastly, his 20-yard shuttle time of 4.10 seconds was fourth best.

I think it’s safe to say that Hooker can now put those concerns to rest. His game tape is outstanding, and now that he put up solid numbers as a 5’11”, 210-pound safety, I fully expect him to hear to his name called on day two of the NFL Draft.

While these are early and relatively instant reactions to the combine, as we have seen in the past combine performances can do a ton for boosting the stocks of draft-eligible players.

With the Iowa football Pro Day just a few weeks out, there is just one more chance for these four plus a plethora of other eligible Hawkeyes to show NFL scouts what they can do.