Byron Cowart – Noteworthy
Once rated the nation’s top recruit, the NFL Combine was an assumed future destination for Byron Cowart. Picking Auburn over Florida was a huge score for Gus Malzahn’s 2015 signing class. It just didn’t work out in the end. Leaving the Tigers in September of the 2017 season after a disappointing tenure, Cowart returned home to Florida before transferring to Maryland. Now, four years after being a can’t miss-recruit, Cowart was not exactly the star attraction last week at the NFL Combine in Indianapolis. While the top prospects did interviews at podiums with crowds of reporters, Cowart was at a table for the lesser-heralded draft hopeful. There, he reflected on the path from a top high school senior to the No. 240 player in the draft, according to CBS Sports.
“Coming out, I was like, ‘I’m going to be the next Jadeveon Clowney,’” Cowart told the group of three reporters Saturday in Indianapolis. “That’s what I thought. He was the end coming out going to the league when I was going into college. The expectations, I didn’t really understand it. I didn’t know it came with it. I didn’t even know what adversity was. It was just, Oh, I’m a good high school player. I think it transfers to college. I didn’t know the preparation. I didn’t know that just because we go through something in the meeting room, that don’t mean that you just turn your brain off.” – Birmingham News