Track speed vs. football speed

[TailgateChef]

Interesting:

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/31417650/seattle-seahawks-wr-dk-metcalf-runs-100-1037-finishes-15th-17-event

[billsfan89]

Track is way different type of running and a different type of training regime needed. It is an impressive feat for DK at his size with very little if any of that training was able to beat out 2 other track athletes who had been training for that event presumably for years. 

[Big Turk]

It's not really speed that is the issue...he can run fast. It's the maintaining speed past 40-50 yards and not wasting any steps. To shave a half second off your times takes years or practice and perfecting your form under the eyes of professional track coaches, something Metcalf obviously doesn't have time for.

Edited May 10, 2021 by Big Turk

[John from Riverside]

Let’s face it he’s just a stud

[IgotBILLStopay]

Metcalf's 10.37 time is pretty lit for a 6'3" 230+ pounder. But y'all forget that Bills players have actually done even better. To my knowledge, Marquise Goodwin has run a 10.24 and that may not even be his fastest. I am also reasonably sure Chris Johnson or John Ross could  best the 10.37.

[Stranded in Boston]

"Bullet" Bob Hayes ran a 10.06 at the 1964 Olympics, tying the world record at the time. He played football and ran track at Florida A&M, and went on to have a great 10-year NFL career, culminating in election to HOF in 2009. Of course, he was also 45 lbs. lighter than DK!

 

[Niagara Dude]

1 hour ago, John from Riverside said:

Let’s face it he’s just a stud

Still pissed we took Ford over this future HOF player

[Augie]

24 minutes ago, Niagara Dude said:

Still pissed we took Ford over this future HOF player

 

DK could fly by the HOF, but at the time nobody was sure if he could turn into the parking lot.  

 

I get that hindsight is perfect, but this picture is yet to be fully formed. We still don’t know what Ford will be, but I’ll try to be hopeful.

 

Regardless, I won’t let regrets make me angry or upset. Not one single team goes without some whiffs in the draft. We do better than most, on the whole. I like our direction, I’ll let the pros do their jobs. 

[Punching Bag]

59 minutes ago, Niagara Dude said:

Still pissed we took Ford over this future HOF player

 

if you wear yellow pants it will not be so noticeable. 

A whole wardrobe would work well.

28 minutes ago, Augie said:

 

DK could fly by the HOF, but at the time nobody was sure if he could turn into the parking lot.  

 

I get that hindsight is perfect, but this picture is yet to be fully formed. We still don’t know what Ford will be, but I’ll try to be hopeful.

 

Regardless, I won’t let regrets make me angry or upset. Not one single team goes without some whiffs in the draft. We do better than most, on the whole. I like our direction, I’ll let the pros do their jobs. 

 

But @Niagara Dude could be the next Matt Millen hopefully working for an AFCE rival.

[Doc Brown]

I give him credit for even attempting it.  Just glad he didn't get injured working out away from the team facility.  

[Tcali]

jerry Rice not much of a 40 time(i think like 4.6)  Never saw him tackled from behind on breakaways.Something kicked in.

[Stanley Lombardi]

You do realize that he finished last in a qualifying heat.

You do realize that he was not running in the USA Olympic Trials, but that he finished last in a qualifying heat (not the finals) against a field of runners who were attempting to gain entrance into the U.S.A. Olympic Trials (where the USA Olympic entrants will be determined.)

 

What it all means is that he ran dead last in a low-level race full of wannabes, who were attempting to secure a spot in a further race, in order to secure a spot in a further race in order to secure a spot in a further race in order to secure a spot in a further race in order to secure a spot in the Olympics where somebody from Jamaica, or Trinidad, or Timbuktu will embarrass them.

It is fortunate, for Metcalf, that he did not qualify for further fields of runners where he would be totally humiliated.  

He is a very fast football player.

[Logic]

3 hours ago, John from Riverside said:

Let’s face it he’s just a stud

[machine gun kelly]

Yes, in hindsight it would be fun to have him, but at the time if the draft, Metcalf was considered a raw talent.  He could’ve flamed out as much as he ended up doing well.  I don’t think we know yet what we have in Ford.

 

Ford was bounced around in 2019, and ######ed his development.  If we drafted him for a tackle position, that was a mistake.  He’s a Guard.  After 2021, given he stays healthy and is asked simply to be the left guard, we’ll see if he can be the best at that spot.  If so, we have a young Guard for awhile.  If not, he was a bust and we move on or relegate him as a permanent backup role.

 

In the end, we have Diggs, and Davis for a long time, Beasely for a couple of years, and Sanders is a nice pieces to plug a hole for this year.

 

As far as his tryout, I’m happy he tried, and even if he didn’t go far, at least he pursued a dream.  There’s nothing wrong with that one.  Remember when Carl Lewis wanted to see if he could play in the NFL.  The Cowboys drafted him in the 12th round, but never played.  

[DCOrange]

Pretty cool that he even did this. Just another excuse to talk about how badly teams overthought him as a prospect; was one of the easier WR evaluations of the past few years IMO (at least on the field; obviously no idea what these teams might have seen in his medicals).

[Royale with Cheese]

10 hours ago, Stranded in Boston said:

"Bullet" Bob Hayes ran a 10.06 at the 1964 Olympics, tying the world record at the time. He played football and ran track at Florida A&M, and went on to have a great 10-year NFL career, culminating in election to HOF in 2009. Of course, he was also 45 lbs. lighter than DK!

 

 

That's insane.....60 years ago!

[H2o]

DK chasing down Budda Baker

[Bleeding Bills Blue]

1 hour ago, DCOrange said:

Pretty cool that he even did this. Just another excuse to talk about how badly teams overthought him as a prospect; was one of the easier WR evaluations of the past few years IMO (at least on the field; obviously no idea what these teams might have seen in his medicals).

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Hill_(American_football) 

 

Thats why...  Both had crazy good workouts, and not a ton of field production.  

 

But him being the 9th one selected is still a bit shocking tho.

Edited May 10, 2021 by dneveu

[Shaw66]

15 hours ago, billsfan89 said:

Track is way different type of running and a different type of training regime needed. It is an impressive feat for DK at his size with very little if any of that training was able to beat out 2 other track athletes who had been training for that event presumably for years. 

Very true.  Track athletes and football players train differently and develop different muscles to maximize different kinds of performance.  The fact that Metcalf can compete with track athletes is impressive.  But if he wants to go to the Olympics, he's going to have to spend a lot of train retraining his body, and that time and that training will detract from his football performance.   

 

It's never been clear how much Goodwin's devotion to track limited his football development, but it at least made a little sense in his case, because his primary football advantage came from his speed.   Metcalf combines size, strength, and speed, and elite track training will make less competitive on the football field in other ways.   For example, while Metcalf is training for track, he will do nothing at all to develop the deceleration muscles that give Diggs is remarkable escapability.  

 

It's overused, but Metcalf is a freak. 

[Logic]

Speaking of football speed vs track speed (and doing it in a way that doesn't encourage a 20 page re-litigation of passing on Metcalf):

Marquez Stevenson appears to be a great example of having football speed, as opposed to track speed. I believe he ran a 4.45 forty, which certainly isn't slow, but also doesn't match what we typically see from him on a football field. He claims he usually runs in the 4.3s, of course (don't they all). In any event, he seems to have a second gear that often sees him pulling away from the nearest defender and widening the gap until he seems to be 10-15 yards clear of everybody on the opposing team.

In Stevenson's case, the 40 time and his lack of college track background do not seem to be indicative of a lack of rare speed. We'll see if this keeps up now that he's playing in a league where there are tons and tons of fast guys playing defense, too.

[Rock-A-Bye Beasley]

13 hours ago, Augie said:

 

DK could fly by the HOF, but at the time nobody was sure if he could turn into the parking lot.  

 

I get that hindsight is perfect, but this picture is yet to be fully formed. We still don’t know what Ford will be, but I’ll try to be hopeful.

 

Regardless, I won’t let regrets make me angry or upset. Not one single team goes without some whiffs in the draft. We do better than most, on the whole. I like our direction, I’ll let the pros do their jobs. 

Spare me the “hindsight” BS when I spent months before the draft defending DK against his doubters. I broke down every criticism systematically and explained why they were not a big deal. I went on record saying I would hypothetically take him #1 overall. 
 

Still all his doubters are hiding behind the hindsight excuse. 
 

Cody Ford’s struggles just magnify an obvious mistake. We couldn’t trade our entire 2019 draft for DK at this point. 
 

it’s not the end of the world, and the Bills have been good despite passing on him. I just don’t understand why fans can’t admit it was a mistake

[Straight Hucklebuck]

13 hours ago, Augie said:

 

DK could fly by the HOF, but at the time nobody was sure if he could turn into the parking lot.  

 

I get that hindsight is perfect, but this picture is yet to be fully formed. We still don’t know what Ford will be, but I’ll try to be hopeful.

 

Regardless, I won’t let regrets make me angry or upset. Not one single team goes without some whiffs in the draft. We do better than most, on the whole. I like our direction, I’ll let the pros do their jobs. 

There were plenty of people talking about Metcalf. 

 

The pictures of him looking like the Hulk before the Combine made the rounds, and then the 4.33 (1.49s at 10 yard) caught attention, with a 40.5" vertical, 11'2" broad, 27 reps on the bench.  

 

There were concerns about his neck and his agility scores. 

 

Of course Metcalf was worth taking over Cody Ford, who immediately wasn't thought of as a pure NFL OT. 

 

[Straight Hucklebuck]

5 hours ago, machine gun kelly said:

Yes, in hindsight it would be fun to have him, but at the time if the draft, Metcalf was considered a raw talent.  He could’ve flamed out as much as he ended up doing well.  I don’t think we know yet what we have in Ford.

 

Ford was bounced around in 2019, and ######ed his development.  If we drafted him for a tackle position, that was a mistake.  He’s a Guard.  After 2021, given he stays healthy and is asked simply to be the left guard, we’ll see if he can be the best at that spot.  If so, we have a young Guard for awhile.  If not, he was a bust and we move on or relegate him as a permanent backup role.

 

In the end, we have Diggs, and Davis for a long time, Beasely for a couple of years, and Sanders is a nice pieces to plug a hole for this year.

 

As far as his tryout, I’m happy he tried, and even if he didn’t go far, at least he pursued a dream.  There’s nothing wrong with that one.  Remember when Carl Lewis wanted to see if he could play in the NFL.  The Cowboys drafted him in the 12th round, but never played.  

There were plenty of people clamoring for him. 

[Bulldog]

Could never be sure of this,of course, but DK seemed to fit the profile of the "freak" athlete that Beane has seemed to favor over guys with big stats on the field at the college level (examples Allen, Edmunds, and now Rousseau, among others). Makes me suspect that the Bill's had something that they did not like in DK's medical. Understandable that he was passed over for that reason. Can't win them all ...

[Augie]

44 minutes ago, Rock-A-Bye Beasley said:

Spare me the “hindsight” BS when I spent months before the draft defending DK against his doubters. I broke down every criticism systematically and explained why they were not a big deal. I went on record saying I would hypothetically take him #1 overall. 
 

Still all his doubters are hiding behind the hindsight excuse. 
 

Cody Ford’s struggles just magnify an obvious mistake. We couldn’t trade our entire 2019 draft for DK at this point. 
 

it’s not the end of the world, and the Bills have been good despite passing on him. I just don’t understand why fans can’t admit it was a mistake

 

“Hindsight” is exactly what it is. I understand, you are very proud that you got one right. Too bad every NFL team didn’t listen to you, because they pretty much all passed on him. TWICE. 

 

I know some people who just love to tell you about every stock they bought that did well. They should be gazillionaires! But they never tell you about the ones they got wrong. 

[The Wiz]

Track is a violent sport that human beings weren't meant to play.

 

Edited May 10, 2021 by The Wiz

[thunderingsquid]

Marquis Goodwin vs MMarquez Stevenson?

[Mr. WEO]

6'4" 230 offseason NFL player just shows up and clocks a 10.37.  That's nuts.

[Supe]

Put them in helmets, pads, cleats and on grass and it might be a different result. 

[DrPJax]

20 hours ago, billsfan89 said:

Track is way different type of running and a different type of training regime needed. It is an impressive feat for DK at his size with very little if any of that training was able to beat out 2 other track athletes who had been training for that event presumably for years. 

He did great and actually had a great start but they caught him the last 15 -20 yards.  He dwarfed all the track guys ; would be interesting to see the results if they ALL  had pads on !  😀

[quincy]

I think he should run the trials for the World Indoor Championship for the 60m sprint considering he got caught towards the end of the 100m.

 

I know some sprinters attempt to get to the Olympics via Bobsleigh - I assume his extra mass compared to most sprinters might actually be a benefit in this sport?

 

In any case he gave it his best and seemed to enjoy the experience and gave us something to talk about.

[DCOrange]

8 hours ago, dneveu said:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_Hill_(American_football) 

 

Thats why...  Both had crazy good workouts, and not a ton of field production.  

 

But him being the 9th one selected is still a bit shocking tho.

I don't really care about the workouts. His film should have made him a top 10 pick. The thing missing with guys like Stephen Hill is they don't show the ability to get off press coverage and without that, those physical tools aren't super helpful. DK embarrassed corners when they tried to press him. Elite ability to get off the press and then elite acceleration, speed, and size; even with just adequate hands he was a dynamite prospect. NFL teams blew it with him.

[Straight Hucklebuck]

3 hours ago, thunderingsquid said:

Marquis Goodwin vs MMarquez Stevenson?

Goodwin all the way.

 

Stevenson is not close.

[John from Riverside]

7 hours ago, Straight Hucklebuck said:

There were plenty of people clamoring for him. 

Yes there were....I remembering being hesitant because i thought he was juicing and thought he was too smart to get caught.   I was wrong

[Rockinon]

13 hours ago, machine gun kelly said:

Yes, in hindsight it would be fun to have him, but at the time if the draft, Metcalf was considered a raw talent.  He could’ve flamed out as much as he ended up doing well.  I don’t think we know yet what we have in Ford.

 

Ford was bounced around in 2019, and ######ed his development.  If we drafted him for a tackle position, that was a mistake.  He’s a Guard.  After 2021, given he stays healthy and is asked simply to be the left guard, we’ll see if he can be the best at that spot.  If so, we have a young Guard for awhile.  If not, he was a bust and we move on or relegate him as a permanent backup role.

 

In the end, we have Diggs, and Davis for a long time, Beasely for a couple of years, and Sanders is a nice pieces to plug a hole for this year.

 

As far as his tryout, I’m happy he tried, and even if he didn’t go far, at least he pursued a dream.  There’s nothing wrong with that one.  Remember when Carl Lewis wanted to see if he could play in the NFL.  The Cowboys drafted him in the 12th round, but never played.  

Jerry Rice at one point had a world class hurdler opposite him on the 49ers named Renaldo Nehemiah. He had something like 750yds in three seasons and 4 TDs. That didn't really pan out either.

[TailgateChef]

Here's an interesting factoid that most track guys know:  you can only sprint at max. speed for around 1.5 seconds.  The remainder of a 100 sprint is either acceleration or deceleration (the latter despite your best efforts - and truthfully, trying hard makes it worse - you need to stay smooth and relaxed).  Sprinters train for years to maximize speed maintenance, through repetition and technique training.  Football is all about rapid acceleration and change of direction.  So there really is a difference.

I have no doubt Metcalf (and others, like John Ross or Tyreek Hill) could be a World-class sprinter.  But as many on here have pointed out, he would need to walk away from football (and the millions of dollars) to focus exclusively on track.  To possibly have career earnings of $10 million.

[Freddie's Dead]

Interesting.  I've seen only one post that hated on DK for being an also-ran in the meet.  C'mon 'quise haterz, you should be all over this!  You rained down your hate on 'quise for being an also-ran in long jump, so send some of that DK's way.  What are you waiting for?

 

Good for both DK and 'quise.  10.37 is an awesome 100m time for someone who doesn't sprint full-time.

Edited May 11, 2021 by Freddie's Dead

[Bleeding Bills Blue]

14 hours ago, DCOrange said:

I don't really care about the workouts. His film should have made him a top 10 pick. The thing missing with guys like Stephen Hill is they don't show the ability to get off press coverage and without that, those physical tools aren't super helpful. DK embarrassed corners when they tried to press him. Elite ability to get off the press and then elite acceleration, speed, and size; even with just adequate hands he was a dynamite prospect. NFL teams blew it with him.

 

The production was fairly limited though.  65 catches across 2 seasons.  

[947]

I saw the race clip on YouTube. DK absolutely towered over all the other guys. The other track athletes were not only better technique-wise, they were all 40+ lbs lighter. He probably does have elite track speed for his size, but sprinters just aren't that big, for a reason. They interviewed him after & asked him if he had interest in doing another event after further training & maybe shedding some weight, he said "Na, I've got to get ready for minicamp". I thought that was great.

[Brand J]

DK was the first and only receiver I’ve seen (so far) who bullied Tre White. Looked like a kid competing against an adult.