Why worry about the WR D.K Seahawks. The Metcalf preparation at the NFL is exaggerated

As day 2 of the NFL 2019 draft continued, wide receiver Ole Miss, D.K. Metcalf continued the slide that had seen him fall from the first day of the draft. Many analysts and observers felt this was due to his mediocre shuttle 3 cones and 20 yards at the NFL Combine, combined with injury concerns. The front office of the Seattle Seahawks could not remain indifferent and resist the temptation to take the necessary steps to add the intriguing prospect to the list.

Although the concerns about Metcalf's injury remain unchanged after the draft, the fact is that the Seahawks have added a player whose skills and abilities perfectly match the offense committed by the Hawks. Anyone who has been an avid reader knows my disdain for the simplicity of the offense committed in Seattle in 2018, but there are two things that can conquer simplicity: performance and outperformance.

You can talk all day about a team's ability to consistently compete in the NFL, but we can not argue that some weapons for which the defenses have no answer can to be unstoppable. Doug Baldwin's ability to obtain a free release from the line of scrimmage, Tyler Lockett's ability to find free space on a scrambling exercise and the ability of recipients like Randy Moss and Calvin Johnson to present imbalances almost everywhere in the field.

That said, the advantage with the Hawks to add Metcalf is that the routes he travels well – routes borrowed and looped – are the routes he will have to travel most often when they play outside. of Brian Schottenheimer's offensive. The amount of NFL tracking data available for David Moore's 2018 season is quite limited, but you'll find some on the next generation NFL Statistics page. Despite the limited amount of data available on Moore's 2018 routes, it is not difficult to see that the Metcalf's gap in direction change and lack of experience in the complete route tree should not be to be a major problem in the Seattle offense.

Roughly speaking, there are not many significant directional changes on many of these routes and this is the role Metcalf will play. However, in the videos of the rookie mini-camp's first day on Friday, it's easy to see how much better the change in Metcalf's leadership is than others.

In particular, when you watch the video, pay attention to Metcalf, who is the first receiver to follow the exercise, then compare his footwork to that of the fifth and last catcher, Jazz Ferguson. Ferguson is a free 6 "& 22" freestyle player from Northwestern State, FCS Division I program where he scored 66 catches for 1117 yards and 13 touchdowns during the 2018 season.

Compared to a refined NFL receiver such as Doug Baldwin, Metcalf's footwook still needs work, but when compared to Ferguson, it's clear how Metcalf is ready for the NFL over Ferguson.

Of course, as noted, any gap in Metcalf's route as a rookie can largely be hidden by the combination of facts that the Hawks' outside receivers are not invited to handle an extremely complex road the insane building and physical abilities of Metcalf.

In short, the Seahawks may have had to negotiate up to the 64th choice to acquire Metcalf, but that could still turn into a project theft, simply because of the threat that it immediately represents on the ground.