The NFL Combine in Indianapolis known as an opportunity for future professional football players to show their raw athletic abilities and boost their stock. But it’s also a chance for the people working behind the scenes in the football industry to network and connect.
This year, I trekked to Indianapolis, Indiana for the opportunity to connect and reconnect with other scouts, coaches, and agents.
After flying in late on Tuesday night, I woke up at my Air B&B on Wednesday morning and quickly headed over to the JW Marriott downtown.
With the large majority of NFL staff members staying at the JW, the first and second floor lobbies are consistently teeming with current and aspiring football staffers from around the world.
After spending a few hours at the lobby highlighted by one particularly long conversation with an agent who may have some players of interest available for the Blue Bombers to sign after the NFL Draft, I head to lunch with a few old friends from around the country.
This motley crew includes scouts, contract negotiation specialists, consultants and agency staffers, all intermingling and catching up. Oftentimes working in football you develop relationships with people you see regularly on the road, and events such as the Combine provide an ideal opportunity for old friends to get together again.
When our long lunch is wrapped up, I walked back to my home base for the week to get some film work done and answer a few pressing emails.
Next on the docket is the UMass Alumni Get Together that I helped set up at a nearby hotel.
With everyone in town to network, and a large alumni base of people who work in football, this was the second year of the event that featured a few high-level NFL coaches and scouts and one of our former professor’s flying down to help host.
Once that networking event died down, a few of us headed over to another event put on by Pro Football Focus at the famous St. Elmo steakhouse. About five minutes after walking into the door, I met a Cleveland Browns senior software developer who used to square off against our quarterback Zach Collaros in high school. The football world is a very small one!
When 11 p.m. rolled around and all NFL personnel and coaches were done with their player interviews, the bars around downtown become exceedingly crowded. Around that time a group of friends and I headed over to one of the local watering holes to have a drink and keep the networking going.
Perhaps the highlight of the night was meeting former CFL All-Star quarterback Kerry Joseph, who is currently the assistant quarterback coach for the Seattle Seahawks. Kerry let me know that incoming Blue Bombers rookie defensive back Deuce Wallace is his nephew, and mentioned how excited Deuce is to head up to Winnipeg.
With a few early meetings the next morning, I head back at half past midnight for what’s considered an early bedtime by NFL Combine standards. Several others will be out until well past 3 a.m. nightly as they look to make as many personal connections as possible in the limited time we all have here.
While there won’t be any players signed by the Blue Bombers directly out of the NFL Combine in the short term, some of the connections made with agents and fellow scouts can help us continue to bring in the best possible players in the future. The football industry is a relationship-based business, and the NFL Combine is as good of a place as any to develop those relationships.
Cyril Penn is a Blue Bombers U.S.-based scout and he will be writing regularly for bluebombers.com through the spring, providing an inside look at some of the American prospects the club will brining to training camp.
