Colbert: We Didn’t Interview Jarvis Jones At The Combine Last Year

Steelers GM Kevin Colbert made his rounds addressing the media at the Combine today. During one of his appearances, he made an interesting revelation. “We didn’t even interview Jarvis down here [at last year’s combine],” said Colbert. “We didn’t think we had a realistic chance of him being there when we picked at 15.”

While this isn’t exactly earth shattering news, it does reinforce a couple ideas- don’t put too much stock into who teams interview at the combine, and as much as you’d like to think the draft is a science- it’s not.

The Steelers first round pick last year ran a slower than expected 40, which contributed to his slipping on other teams’ draft boards. Running back Le’Veon Bell was a similar case, in that the team didn’t benefit from the combine as much as one might think.

“We attended both [Jones’ and Bell’s] Pro Days,” said Colbert. “We got more information from those Pro Days than we had got from this process.”

Colbert went on to add that they did work out Bell, and had a follow up meeting with him. I recall that they took him out to dinner after visiting his pro day last year. While knowing who the team meets with does have some value, don’t focus on these meetings too heavily.