Which Workouts Matter Most for Cornerbacks at the NFL Draft Scouting Combine?

When looking at which workouts matter for wide receivers at the NFL Draft Scouting Combine, we saw that there wasn't really any single workout that translated to success at the NFL level. This made sense, given receivers come in all shapes, sizes, and skillsets, so it'd be hard to find a single measurement that translated to everyone.

What about the guys covering them?

We'll dig into that today, looking at cornerbacks at the combine from 2010 to 2021 (giving them at least four years in the league). We'll take their workouts in Pro Football Reference's database and compare them to the Approximate Value (AV, PFR's attempt to quantify the value a player provides to his team) for each player across his first four years in the league, the length of a rookie contract (minus the option for a first-rounder).

This isn't a perfect exercise. AV is better at tracking who was on the field than who excelled, and not every player does every workout. Some don't do any. Still, it can at least give us a ballpark of which workouts we should emphasize (or not).

Key Workouts for Cornerbacks at the NFL Draft Combine

There are two routes to examining this, and we'll go through both today.

First, we'll just look at the R-squared value between each player's workout metrics and his AV across the first four seasons. R-squared measures the predictiveness of data points with zero being no relationship and one being a perfect correlation.

This table shows that for cornerbacks at the combine from 2010 to 2021. The raw column just shows this for their baseline workout metric, and the weight-adjusted column accounts for the player's weight at the combine.

This is the only position where adjusting for weight -- at times -- made things worse than leaving workouts unadjusted. It seems like we just want speed.

That speed was important, too. The R-squared of 0.136 between unadjusted 40 time and first four years AV was tied for the third highest R-squared across all workouts at all positions. The only workouts at or above that mark were 40 time for tight ends, offensive tackles, and off-ball linebackers, all of which were adjusted for weight at those positions.

No other workouts really moved the needle here, though broad jump and 3-cone (again, unadjusted) were at least noteworthy.

The other way to measure this is to look at how the standouts at the position measured up at the combine.

The table below looks at the average percentile rank for each workout of the 29 cornerbacks to produce at least 20 AV across their first four seasons. Because of the data below, the percentile rank here is the player's raw ranking rather than the weight-adjusted one.

This data is interesting, and I do think it should shape the way we look at the 40 time for corners.

For most of the other positions, when the R-squared for 40 time popped off, it was because the best of the best were standouts. The studs at tight end (79th percentile), offensive tackle (73rd), and linebacker (73rd) were all in at least the 70th percentile on average in weight-adjusted 40 time. For corner, that's just the 65th percentile.

It seems like this position is more about hitting a threshold than finding the true standouts. Richard Sherman led the position in AV across his first four seasons, and he was in the 32nd percentile for 40 time. Josh Norman was in the 17th percentile.

Players with truly poor 40 times just didn't produce, though, leading to the elevated R-squared value. In this span, 14 corners ran a 4.65 40 or worse; every single one of them had 0 AV across their first 4 seasons. Of the 36 players to run 4.60 or slower, only 8 had more than 0 AV, and one of those was at just 2.

You'll hear a lot that the combine is more about hitting benchmarks than finding standouts. That appears true at cornerback more than any other position.

If a player isn't a standout in the 40, he can still be a quality corner via instincts, agility, and physicality. You just need to have a certain level of speed to stick in the NFL, and that should be our primary focus at this position during workouts.

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