Stanford football’s 14 NFL hopefuls worked out in front of over 75 representatives from all 32 NFL teams at Pro Day on Thursday. A number of players looked to improve their draft stocks with the NFL Draft just six weeks away.
After an underwhelming performance at the NFL Combine, wide receiver Ty Montgomery was one of the standouts in the outdoor workouts: He ran a 4.38-second 40-yard dash on Thursday compared to his 4.55 time in Indianapolis. He accounted his success to dropping 10 pounds since the Combine almost exactly a month ago — he weighed in at 211 pounds on Pro Day.
“It wasn’t that I looked bad at the combine, it was just, ‘How much better could you look if you dropped the weight?’” Montgomery said. “It was something I discussed within my inner circle, and we decided to drop the weight, work on flexibility, and it paid off.”
Montgomery even said that extra rest made a difference in his performance on Thursday.
“I was able to sleep,” he said. “At the combine, I got no sleep. I didn’t go to bed until 1:30 a.m. and woke up at 6 a.m. to go perform. I didn’t do horribly, but I did a lot better out here.”
As the weeks count down to the Draft, Montgomery admitted that the entire experience as he hopes to make his mark on pro scouts has been “a little stressful, a little tiring.”
“But at the end of the day, this is what I signed up for, this is what I love to do. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
“If you think about the hundreds of thousands of kids that play Little League to high school — even kids in college — a lot of college players don’t get a chance to go through the Combine, go through the Senior Bowl, go through a pro day. So I’m very grateful.”
Safety Jordan Richards also likely improved his NFL Draft stock with a marked improvement in his 40-yard dash time. He ran a 4.65-second 40 at the Combine, but ran an unofficial 4.46-second 40 at Stanford’s Pro Day. (All times from the day are unofficial due to the multitude of stopwatches tracking times.) He also had a 34.5-inch vertical jump in the indoor session, 2.5 inches higher than his Combine mark.
Cornerback Alex Carter was another former Stanford star who improved on his Combine performance, focusing on just one timed outdoor event — the 40 — and bettering his time. He ran a 4.41 on the FieldTurf at the Elliott Practice Fields, a tenth of a second better than his 4.51 at the home field of the Colts, Lucas Oil Stadium.
Inside linebacker A.J. Tarpley, who did not receive an invitation to the Combine, had much to prove to NFL personnel in attendance and he did rise to the occasion. He led all players who worked out with a 4.10-second time in the 20-yard shuttle and a 6.90-second time in the three-cone drill.
“I’ve never been a guy that’s highly touted: three offers [along with UCF and Iowa State] coming out of high school,” he said. “But I started for four years: three BCS games, four bowl games, 48 games started. I’m just going to go do what I do: play football.”
Offensive tackle Andrus Peat and defensive end Henry Anderson participated only in positional drills on Thursday — save for Anderson’s reps in the bench press — after strong showings at the Combine.
For a photo gallery of Stanford’s Pro Day, click here.
Contact Jordan Wallach at jwallach ‘at’ stanford.edu.