The combine has brought us this year's crop of measurables, and they're pretty impressive! As a reminder, there is a remarkably simple subset of these numbers that almost all elite players share. Without further ado, here are this year's outside linebacker prospects:
As alluded to above, this year's set has a lot of upside. Starting with the consensus-ish top 10 outside linebacker prospects, both Beasley and Dupree hit every level shared by most elite pass rushers. Randy Gregory, Eli Harold and Kwon Alexander meet all except for being near-misses on vertical jump. That's the top four prospects who measure very favorably, and another guy with serious upside. The second tier doesn't look as good: Thompson isn't terrible, but Dawson, Orchard and Mauldin all show serious deficiencies and should fall into the later rounds of the draft. Teams looking to take a mid-round flyer could look at Edmond Robinson who is just 1" away in vertical from a completely green results line.
The story is similar in the projected 4-3 DE group. While none of the top prospects are all green lights, Ray, Fowler and Smith all have very good measurable as a whole. In the lower range of the top prospects, Edwards and Flowers should fall. Odighizuwa is the lone all-green and could be primed for a Justin Houston-esque rise to eliteness. Or a Corey Lemonier-esque wallowing in mediocrity. Reminder: green lights don't mean a sure thing. Lack of green lights mean a sure not thing.
This group overall is interesting (or boring) because the top prospects all tested well. In many years there are a mix of highly-ranked guys who produced or meet combine criteria, but not both.
| Name | Position | 40 dash | 10yd split | Broad jump | Vertical |
| Randy Gregory | OLB | 4.64 | 1.61 | 10'5 | 36 |
| Vic Beasley | OLB | 4.52 | 1.59 | 10'10 | 41 |
| Alvin Dupree | OLB | 4.56 | 1.60 | 11'6 | 42 |
| Eli Harold | OLB | 4.60 | 1.61 | 10'3 | 35 |
| Shaq Thompson | OLB | 4.64 | 1.69 | 9'9 | 33.5 |
| Paul Dawson | OLB | 4.93 | 1.68 | 9'1 | 28 |
| Hauoli Kikaha | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Nate Orchard | OLB | 4.80 | 1.65 | 9'7 | 31.5 |
| Kwon Alexander | OLB | 4.55 | 1.58 | 10'1 | 36 |
| Lorenzo Mauldin | OLB | 4.85 | 1.68 | 9'4 | 32 |
| Edmond Robinson | OLB | 4.61 | 1.61 | 10'1 | 37 |
| Shane Ray | DE | 4.68 | 1.65 | 10'0 | 33 |
| Dante Fowler | DE | 4.60 | 1.59 | 9'4 | 32.5 |
| Preston Smith | DE | 4.74 | 1.60 | 10'1 | 34 |
| Owamagbe Odighizuwa | DE | 4.62 | 1.61 | 10'7 | 39 |
| Mario Edwards | DE | 4.84 | 1.76 | 10'0 | 32.5 |
| Daniel Hunter | DE | 4.57 | 1.57 | -- | -- |
| Trey Flowers | DE | 4.93 | 1.73 | 10'1 | 36.5 |
As alluded to above, this year's set has a lot of upside. Starting with the consensus-ish top 10 outside linebacker prospects, both Beasley and Dupree hit every level shared by most elite pass rushers. Randy Gregory, Eli Harold and Kwon Alexander meet all except for being near-misses on vertical jump. That's the top four prospects who measure very favorably, and another guy with serious upside. The second tier doesn't look as good: Thompson isn't terrible, but Dawson, Orchard and Mauldin all show serious deficiencies and should fall into the later rounds of the draft. Teams looking to take a mid-round flyer could look at Edmond Robinson who is just 1" away in vertical from a completely green results line.
The story is similar in the projected 4-3 DE group. While none of the top prospects are all green lights, Ray, Fowler and Smith all have very good measurable as a whole. In the lower range of the top prospects, Edwards and Flowers should fall. Odighizuwa is the lone all-green and could be primed for a Justin Houston-esque rise to eliteness. Or a Corey Lemonier-esque wallowing in mediocrity. Reminder: green lights don't mean a sure thing. Lack of green lights mean a sure not thing.
This group overall is interesting (or boring) because the top prospects all tested well. In many years there are a mix of highly-ranked guys who produced or meet combine criteria, but not both.
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