Will McClay dissects the Senior Bowl judging process



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“At the end of the day, he still watches football,” McClay said in a virtual interview with DallasCowboys.com. “Access is the same. There aren’t that many people running. It’s more of a clear player process.”

The game will be played Saturday at 1:30 p.m. at the NFL Network.

One might suggest that this year’s Senior Bowl is more important than ever, given the major changes to the NFL combine. This week’s assessment is an opportunity to get a first-hand glimpse of several players, including a few who didn’t even play last season, due to Covid-19.

“It’s just great to see guys playing and participating,” said McClay. “This year is so different with schools playing, not playing, guys pulling out, opting – all of those things. It’s digging for that information and finding out more about who these guys are.”

McClay said the favorite part of the Senior Bowl experience isn’t just the guys taking the field and competing against each other, but how they soak up the whole process throughout the week.

“When you go to a college cabinet – our boy scouts – you’re going to get pieces and then they kick you out,” McClay said of visiting schools on campus throughout the season. “Well, (at the Senior Bowl) we can see the full process of stretching at the end of practice when they call them. These are things that we keep evaluating about the player – their interactions. he interacts with his teammates and coaches. These are the things I enjoy the most, watching from the start to the end of the practices, then starting to form an opinion based on what was said about the player. Then we go back and have the personal interaction, we can put it all together to really paint a picture of the type. “

For some reason, Senior Bowl players seem to make a good impression on the Cowboys. Dating back to 2005 when they evaluated a slender but explosive passer named DeMarcus Ware, to Zack Martin, DeMarco Murray and even recently with Tony Pollard and Bradlee Anae, the Cowboys appear to be signing players from the Senior Bowl.

While McClay said it was more of a “coincidence,” he recalled one of his favorite players, the Cowboys, who had been in that game.

“The bigger one is Dak Prescott – he was on the other team when we coached him back then,” McClay said of the 2016 Senior Bowl when the Cowboys coaching staff was there to coach the one of the teams. “When you train you get a more intimate feel about the guys because you train them every day and see how they take things and you spend more time with them. With Dak being a part of the team, the teams can change staff and the coaches can interview them as well as the staff. We were able to spend some extra time. Just from this interaction with Dak, watching him in practice, but this interaction with him started to tell us about it more about who he was and how different he was. And that added more information to what we had. We felt like when the time comes we have a chance to pick this guy – he’s the good guy. “

And whatever the job, finding the “right” guy for the team is Goal 1. McClay said when the Cowboys enter sophomore year with Mike McCarthy, they have a better understanding of what they’re looking for. but that does not change the general philosophy too much.

“It’s important to know what they’re looking for, but at the end of the day we’re looking for good football players,” McClay said. “We understand the profile of the different positions and what we’re trying to do. It’s a permanent thing. We’ve been with Jason (Garrett) and this staff for a long time and there was a better impression. For example, we can talk to Coach McCarthy and his staff, the better that fits. Our goal is to say what the guy can do. What are his areas of concern or weakness. And we give that information to the coaches and Jerry and Stephen as we go. as we go. And that’s how we choose our player. “

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