Notre Dame football produced nine players who were invited to the NFL Scouting Combine which we are currently in the midst of. This includes three likely first round picks in May’s NFL Draft: OG/T Zack Martin, NT Louis Nix III and DL Stephon Tuitt. The other six Notre Dame football players at the combine are: OG Chris Watt, WR TJ Jones, OLB Prince Shembo, CB Bennett Jackson, RB George Atkinson III, TE Troy Niklas.
ND has the third most combine invitees of any school, and when you add that to the 8 they add last year, the 17 over a two year period is the fifth most in all of college football. We’ll breakdown where we think each player might be picked.
Tuitt- ESPN NFL Draft guru Mel Kiper Jr. believes Tuitt could step in and start right away. “Very impressed with him, a 3-4 Defensive End, suits him perfectly, kind of like a Richard Seymour when he came out of Georgia,” said Kiper, an admitted Notre Dame football fan. Could be a top 20 pick
Related: feature on Tuitt, and his NFL Draft potential
Nix- grades out as the best 3-4 NT in this draft. Irish Chocolate is a fantastic soundbite too.
“That’s what all teams need to be scared of. Everybody needs to be scared of Irish Chocolate.
Everyone.
Including you,” he said at his last Notre Dame football spring game. Nix could be a top ten pick
Related: feature on Louis Nix III and his NFL draft potential
Watt– should be a round 5-6 prospect
Jones– known primarily as the guy Brian Kelly screamed at on the sideline in front of national television cameras, just weeks after his father, a former NFL player and Notre Dame football legend, had passed away. Jones is a round six, seven or maybe undrafted priority free agent type prospect.
Martin– could go as late as round three, but I think he makes sense as Miami’s first round pick. Go here to see why.
GA3– running backs never go in the first round these days, and they don’t often go in the second round either. There’s also plenty of RBs ahead of Atkinson. He’s a round 6-7 type prospect. He was happy to leave South Bend early, and I’m not sure that the program was really broken up about him jumping early either. He’s definitely a project type pick
.
Shembo- He’s a mid round pick, an OLB/DE tweener type prospect. So it all depends on how teams evaluate his fit in the 3-4 or 4-3. And there’s….one big issue looming over everything: his involvement in the chain of events that led to the Lizzy Seeberg suicide. He’s coming clean about everything now in his interviews with NFL personnel, which is the best thing he can do. He says he has nothing to hide, so it’s a question of whether or not the NFL teams scouting him believe him or not. If they do, he’ll get drafted. If they don’t, well he won’t be and if a worst case scenario occurs, then you ND might have a lawsuit on its hands over lost potential future earnings. More on this issue here, and here.
Jackson- has to show that his health issues are a thing of the past. Needs a great combine. Round 5-7 type prospect.
Niklas- if you’ve never heard of him, it’s understandable given that he’s only had one season as a starter. He had a great combine and looks like a second round prospect. It also helps that Notre Dame football has produced a pair of tight ends that went extremely high in the draft in Tyler Eifert and Kyle Rudolph.
Paul M. Banks owns The Sports Bank.net, an affiliate of Fox Sports. An MBA and Fulbright scholar, he’s also a frequent analyst on news talk radio; with regular segments on ESPN,NBC, CBS and Fox. A former NBC Chicago and Washington Times writer, he’s also been featured on the History Channel. President Obama follows him on Twitter (@paulmbanks)