The city of Houston doesn't have hockey but there are enough Texans fans that follow hockey. At the end of every hockey game, there are three stars announced for that game's performance. It's like naming a Player of the Game, but three of them for each game. As such, I decided I'd grade Combine performances on the Hockey Three Stars' scale. The Combine saved the best for last - the REAL ball players - the Offensive Linemen.
Here are the three stars from Sunday's final workout.
3. OT Roger Rosengarten, Washington - The fastest OL 40-time went to one of the members of the Joe Moore Award winning quintet. Rosengarten ran a 4.92 second 40-yard dash, then hit 30-inches on the vertical jump and a 9-5 broad jump.
2. OT Troy Fautanu, Washington - Rosengarten's teammate and a 1st Team All-American Fautanu was one of the major winners of the entire Combine. He ran 5.01 in the 40-yard dash then hit 32.5-inches on the vertical and 9-5 broad jump. But, he was amazingly fluid in all of the on field drills, just ridiculously so. Throw in his 34 ½ inch arms and teams were/are salivating over another potential first round tackle prospect.
Before we get to number one, a handful of Honorable mention amongst this incredible group of OL.
Wisconsin IOL Tanor Bortolini was one of the smoothest, and athletic OL, in the entire group. He ran the second fastest 40-yard dash (4.94 seconds), posted a 32.5-inch vertical, a 9-4 broad jump and registered two solid times in the change of direction drills.
Wyoming OT Frank Crum showed off the best head of lettuce imaginable and ran 4.94 in the 40-yard dash.
I loved the athleticism of Holy Cross IOL C.J. Hanson, same goes for Kansas State IOL Cooper Beebe, one of my highest rated guards in this draft class. But, number one goes to the best run blocker in this draft and one heck of an athlete.
1. OT Taliese Fuaga, Oregon State - Fuaga is one mean, nasty finisher, but he showed the athletic side, posting a 5.13 40-yard dash, a 32-inch vertical and a 9-3 broad jump. Similar to Fautanu, Fuaga's on-field movement skills were top notch. A 6-6, 324 lb young man shouldn't move like he does, but my goodness, it's impressive to watch.
What a weekend it was and now we flip over to free agency before Pro Days before the Draft before OTAs before The Desert before Training Camp before the start of the season…sorry, I just got carried away. Thanks for reading!!
