Great article bhelm!!! THANKS for the post! When does summer camp start? Don't answer, I know about when, I just can't wait. I truly believe if JJ plays like a slightly above average Jr. SEC QB, this team can be as good as they WANT to be. I picked them 10-2 for next season, and I hope that's pessimistic a little. Nice to see Barkevious Mingo at #5 in the bench press. That's great for a skinny defensive end!
Wow. What really stands out to me is that we have RBs and CBs doing some of the olympic lifts (squat, clean, jerk) with the big boys. Had no idea Murphy was that strong. Michael Ford is just a freak. I've always said that he looked like an NFL RB when he was a senior in HS. This just confirms that. Crap. Our RBs are gonna pound some freaking skulls this fall, boys. This is very promising for Miles' commitment to the run.
Everyone does everything and most of it comes from the program created by my friend and Olympic Weightlifting coach, Gayle Hatch. Probably the most surprising is Mingo's bench max given his weight and long arms. His long arms would cause his reps at 225 to suffer though but I have always felt that the NFL combine should have them max instead of reps. PP's Squat max is very impressive as well.
I'm glad someone realized that having short arms is an advantage in weightlifting, whether you are locking your elbows out for an overhead lift or extending your arms fully on a bench press. If you watch Olympic competitions you quickly realize that some of the best competitors are born with certain physical attributes. I am also surprised by Mingo and Murphy's numbers. The weightlifting and vertical numbers would be hard to fudge. The 40 times are ridiculous, but it gives you an idea of who are the fastest guys on our team. If these guys make it to the NFL combine and run 4.4's and 4.5's it won't be a huge surprise.
They make them rep because they know they're all strong guys, they want to see who's still going to be strong when the 4th quarter comes around.
I know there theory but reps on a bench press are pretty useless. There are better measures of endurance and strength out there which would relate to football a little better. That is why most NFL scouts do not but much stock in the bench press results and have private workouts with more telling exercises like Clean and Jerk and Snatch and other variations of these workouts. Bench should be out of it totally IMO and I know a few scouts have said the same.
