A lot of news you year about teams meeting or privately working out draft prospects, somehow meaning they are very interested in picking the prospect, can be overblown.
For instance, a lot was made about the Jets meeting with USC WR Makai Lemon at the combine.
NFL coaches, personnel executives, and scouts meet and work out hundreds of players
Last time I checked, teams don’t have hundreds of draft picks.
These meetings don’t mean as much as many people think.
It’s about teams doing their due diligence on as many prospects as possible. Meetings don’t always equal interest. In fact, a meeting could lead to a lack of interest if the exchange doesn’t go well.
A coach talking to a player at a pro day is a coach talking to a player at a pro day. That is all it is.
That is what pro days are for, for coaches and personnel people to talk to players and watch them work out.
So take the teams’ “meeting” with draft prospects’ stories with a grain of salt.
When the Jets picked Virginia linebacker James Farrior in the first round of the 1997 draft, the player said he had no contact with the team before the draft.
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