ADAM CAPARELL
Caparell is CSTV.com's football editor and national football writer. E-mail
MOBILE, Ala. - There's a popular misconception that the Senior Bowl is an All-Star game.
Sure, the annual game pits the nation's best seniors from the North against the best from the South, but what the week long event really boils down to is one long job interview for the 100-plus participants. Measured, taught, tested and critiqued by some 800 odd members of the NFL's 32 teams who are in attendance, this year's crop of seniors are being scrutinized like never before.
For many of the players here, the Senior Bowl is one big exercise in pressure.
"It's stressful, it's tiring, but you have to go through it," LSU cornerback Chevis Jackson said.
With five days of practice before Saturday's game in the aging Ladd-Peebles Stadium, the Senior Bowl represents the last chance coaches, general managers and scouts will see these seniors prepare, practice and play in a football game before April's draft. After Saturday, the players focus on their conditioning, their 40-yard times and Wunderliks with the NFL Combine less than a month away.
After Saturday, the pads go away, along with the helmets and playbooks. So the players are feeling the pressure of a one week football crash course
"These coaches really expect a lot out of you," LSU running back Jacob Hester said. "You don't have time to make mistakes. They expect a lot out of you and if you make a mistake they'll find someone who won't."
Probably more than anything, the Senior Bowl provides the best opportunity for teams to evaluate how quickly a player can learn and adjust to new surroundings. The pressure is on for the players to learn an entirely new playbook, grasp what the offense or defense is throwing out them, show your maturity and talent, all in front of your future employer.
"You have to learn a lot of stuff under pressure and think on your feet and the coaches are there and you have four hour meetings," WakeForest center Steve Justice said. "But as the week's starting to go along you're starting to get used to it and first flow of stress is kind of subsiding."
The pressure the players are feeling is far from gone, but it's considerably less than it was when the week began.
"We got there the first night and we opened the play book and went through every play," Justice said. "And everybody was just like, `Oh my gosh.' I was getting stressed just trying to remember it. At first you're like, `I'm never going to learn it. I'm never going to learn it.'"
There's new terminology, new schemes and, of course, new teammates to become acclimated with in only six days. Many players are thrust into entirely new offensive and defensive systems while others must adapt and survive against a level of talent they're not accustomed to.
"The guys that are here are here for a reason," 49ers and South head coach Mike Nolan said. "They belong here, they deserve to be here and I just like to see them be themselves and enjoy the week. They've all practiced hard and practiced well. The game will dictate how that will flow."
One of Nolan's players, Hawaii quarterback Colt Brennan, can be counted among those who are being rigorously tested this week. Brennan thrived under the run and shoot offense June Jones perfected, but this week he's been forced to run an entirely different offense. Instead of taking nearly all of his snaps from the shotgun, as was the case in Hawaii, Brennan's lined up under center practically every snap, running an offense better suited for teammates Erik Ainge and Andre' Woodson.
"Unlike some of these other guys, they all came from traditional offenses and I really haven't had any experience with that in college," Brennan said.
NFL scouts and coaches want to see if Brennan, one of the players who entered Senior Bowl week with the plenty to prove, is really worth a high draft pick (Brennan's a projected second round selection). But while some players like Brennan will have to make big adjustments to their games over the course of the week to impress, the pressure won't nearly be as high for others like Hester.
"The offense is always going to be the same plays, but just different terminology," Hester said, "You have to kind of open your brain up and learn it and put it in your system."
And so far, so good for Hester. He's had a pretty easy time of it through the first three days while Brennan's progressed a little more slowly. He was, however, more satisfied with his performance Wednesday, but if there's one thing Brennan and his teammates have quickly learned is that the NFL coaches aren't there to coddle.
"They give you a couple of chances to get it right and then they move on," Jackson said.
But the coaches also know this isn't the most ideal learning situation and with all the new faces and all the new things being thrown at the players, perfection is not expected.
"To come together as a cohesive unit in one week is a difficult thing," Nolan said. "Every offensive play and every defensive play, there's math to the equation and when it starts it's all easy math, but once it starts to go, all the math changes and that's the beauty of the game."
There's been a lot of number crunching through the first three days of practice and Nolan -- just like his counterpart in charge of the North squad, Oakland Raiders head coach Lane Kiffin -- is pretty happy with how his team has progressed through the first three days.
But that doesn't mean they're going to let up, or stop pushing them. Nolan may call what transpires Saturday an All-Star game when in reality it's anything but that. It's the culmination of a long, preliminary job interview and a chance to leave a lasting impression for the next month in the minds of the decision makers.
It's also a pretty significant transition game in the football career of each player.
"It's your last college game, your first professional game," Jackson said.
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