While others chase 40 times, the Rams uncover hidden gems through advanced tracking data at the NFL Combine.
The Los Angeles Rams scouting process has been placed under a microscope in recent years, not only because of their success in the draft, but the unconventional ways that they go about it.
Pre-draft events such as the Senior Bowl and NFL Combine used to be must-attend events for team personnel, especially head coaches and general managers. The Rams haven’t attended these events in a large capacity since 2020. While certain team personnel may attend, the Rams don’t have the at-large presence of other teams.
Yet, this unconventional approach hasn’t negatively affected the Rams draft process. In fact, over the last two years, it’s hard to find another team that has had as much success drafting immediate contributors. Rookies Jared Verse and Braden Fiske were each Defensive Rookie of the Year candidates this season with the first round pick winning the award. In 2023, wide receiver Puka Nacua broke rookie receiving records while Kobie Turner was one of the top rookie defenders.
Some teams, fans, and analysts will obsess over 40-yard dash times this week at the NFL Combine in Indianapolis. The Rams won’t ignore that type of data, but they prioritize other forms of data that provide a fuller picture of a player’s potential. Wide receiver Cooper Kupp infamously ran a 4.62-second 40-time at the Combine. Nacua wasn’t much faster as he ran a 4.57-second 40-yard dash.
In an article back in 2021 by The Athletic’s Jourdan Rodrigue, the Rams’ director of draft management J.W. Jordan said, “Does it matter whether (a receiver) runs a 4.48 or a 4.56 That’s where you use tape, GPS, all the information and data you have on him.”
For some teams, that moved Kupp and Nacua down their draft boards. Conversely for the Rams, it was an opportunity. When then-Rams scout Brad Holmes watched Kupp at the Senior Bowl he said, “I’ll never forget, it came out that his GPS time at the Senior Bowl was the fastest.” That day, Kupp hit a max speed of 20.7 miles per hour.
Nacua didn’t run the fastest 40-time, but the future Rams wide receiver recorded the fastest speed of any wide receiver during the gauntlet drill at 20.06 miles per hour.
Player tracking data unlocks the ability to move beyond the forty yard dash and better approximate game speed.
Puka Nacua reached the fastest speed of any wide receiver during last combine’s gauntlet drill at 20.06 mph.#NFLCombine x @nflnetwork pic.twitter.com/BRu8rjo4eA
— Next Gen Stats (@NextGenStats) March 2, 2024
Over the last several years, a technology company called Zebra Sports has partnered with the NFL to provide teams this type of data. Zebra Sports is the official on-play, on-field, player tracking provider for the NFL. They collect and provide the data for every game and every player. The NFL owns that data and turns it into some of the metrics used with NextGen stats. Zebra Sports also gathers data for events that also include the Senior Bowl, East-West Shrine Bowl and NFL Combine.
Every player has a RFID chip in their shoulder pad which is different than GPS. The chip gets place inside shoulder pad and those tags communicate with the 18-24 antennas set up around the stadium. From that, teams are able to get an x, y location where players are on the field within a tenth of a second. This then gets turned into data such as speed, distance, acceleration, deceleration, etc. Once a player walks off the field, they are no longer being tracked as the RFID is localized.
“An event like (the Senior Bowl), I think, definitely has become huge for a lot of the teams that get this data,” said Zebra Sports client services supervisor Dominic Russo. “They’re able to use the data that we give them to kind of compare to guys that are already on their team, find guys that they that are similar to the players that are on their roster.”
It would seem as if the data that teams can gather in which players are in pads and actually playing football would be more valuable than data from players in shorts. Russo tends to agree, saying, “I think just having this data is just another piece to have, and it’s ultimately up to teams to use it how they see fit.”
Every team has access to Zebra Sports’ tracking data for the all-star events. The teams get an in-depth version of the data in a team-specific portal while fans only get access to data such as max speed, acceleration and deceleration, explosive efforts, and total distance traveled.
For example, in 2023 you could find out that Rams fifth-round pick, tight end Davis Allen, has the third fastest acceleration and second-best deceleration among tight ends while also traveling the second-most yards throughout the week. Van Jefferson had the fastest speed recorded at the Senior Bowl in 2020 while Terrell Burgess had the most explosive efforts and traveled the third-most yards among all defenders that same year.
Using the Shrine Bowl as another example. In 2022, Russ Yeast was one of the fastest defenders and, like Burgess, had the most explosive efforts among defenders.
The process works for non-skill position players as well. Edge rusher Byron Young had the third-most explosive efforts among defensive lineman in 2023 and Braden Fiske had a top-10 acceleration speed in 2024.
Like the Combine, Zebra Sports data helps confirm scouting reports and provide additional context, rather than serving as the deciding factor. For players like Kupp, the Zebra Sports data confirmed his play-speed that Holmes saw on film. Byron Young scored in the 91st percentile in the vertical and 98th percentile in the broad jump. Combined with the data at the Senior Bowl, it was confirmed that Young played with that same explosiveness.
Select teams also have the Zebra technology set up at their practice facilities which allows them to track even more data during specific workouts. This provides the team data throughout the season.
This technology hasn’t made its way into all of the big college programs yet, but one program that does use it is Ohio State. The relevance there is that former Rams safety and sixth-round pick Jordan Fuller played for the Buckeyes. At the Combine, Fuller ran a 4.67-second 40-yard dash, which was in the 13th percentile for safeties. As Rodrigue noted, the Rams received tracking data from Ohio State that showed Fuller hitting speeds of 20 miles per hour.
Looking at the scoreboard during practices during this year’s Senior Bowl in Mobile, fans would have seen that Oregon linebacker Jeffrey Bassa was the fastest player among linebackers and tight ends on Day 1 at 20.36 miles per hour. They also would have seen that Iowa State’s Jaylin Noel traveled the most distance at 4,638 yards. As everyone was raving about Miami’s Elijah Arroyo, they would have seen that he was the fastest tight end.
The Rams’ absence from traditional pre-draft events like the Senior Bowl and Combine might raise eyebrows, but their approach speaks for itself. By prioritizing advanced tracking data of players in pads over stopwatch times, they’ve consistently found diamond in the rough players that others have overlooked. As the rest of the league fixates on 40-yard dashes in Indianapolis, the Rams will continue trusting the numbers that matter most to them—ones that translate to success on Sundays.
