Senior Bowl Preview: Chase Claypool

Previewing what's at stake for former Notre Dame WR Chase Claypool at the Senior Bowl

Matt Cashore, USA TODAY Sports

The Senior Bowl begins today and four former Notre Dame players will participate. It will be the first postseason opportunity for them to attempt to boost their stock ahead of April’s NFL Draft.

Practice sessions are Tuesday to Thursday and the game will be Saturday. You can watch recaps of the practice sessions at 8:00 PM (eastern) on the NFL Network the next three days, and the game airs live on Saturday, beginning at 2:30 PM (eastern).

I'm going to break down the four Irish players competing this week and what's at stake for them. We'll begin with Notre Dame's top 2019 wide receiver.

Chase Claypool, Wide Receiver

2019 Stats: 66 catches, 1,037 yards, 15.7 YPC, 13 TD’s
Career Stats: 150 catches, 2,159 yards, 14.4 YPC, 19 TD’s

What’s At Stake: This is an incredibly deep year at wide receiver, so any opportunity to stand out is big for Claypool and the rest of the Senior Bowl receivers. Claypool will get three significant athletic opportunities to shine; the Senior Bowl, the NFL Scouting Combine and the Notre Dame Pro Day. The combine and the pro day will be more about testing and athleticism, but the Senior Bowl is about football.

Claypool is ranked No. 92 on The Athletic NFL Draft analyst Dane Brugler’s Top 100, and there are three wideouts ranked ahead of him at the Senior Bowl; No. 38 Brandon Aiyuk from Arizona State, No. 61 Michael Pittman Jr. from USC and No. 90 Antonio Gandy-Golden from Liberty. Claypool shining this week would help him jockey for position in the deep position group.

Show Off Your Strengths: Claypool is a physical wide receiver with exceptional size. He has at least above-average length and is incredibly strong. Claypool is also a natural when it comes to using his hands and catching the ball away from his body. His catch radius is impressive and he shows strong hands.

During the 2019 season he used those traits to out-maneuver and out-leverage defensive backs for the football. Showing that off against talented cornerbacks at the Senior Bowl would solidify his strengths, and that is vitally important at the Senior Bowl.

Claypool made catches like this look routine as a senior, and if he shows that off this week he'll certainly turn heads.

Claypool was a bit inconsistent as a pass catcher throughout his career. He has strong hands and his timing as a pass catcher was quite good as a senior. The issue for Claypool has been consistency and focus. If he can stay locked in and show off just how impressive his hands are that will not only cancel out a question mark of his game, it will solidify a strength.

A Lot To Prove: While part of the Senior Bowl is solidifying your strengths, a case could be made that even more important is answering questions about your game. There are several reasons Claypool’s draft stock doesn’t seem to match his size, strength, talent and production. A strong week could end with him vaulting up draft boards, but there are areas where he’ll need to perform well for that to happen.

When I read various evaluations of Claypool there are questions raised about his speed and athleticism. I don't agree with that and this week he'll have a chance to change the narrative. Claypool's issue isn't athleticism - he's quite athletic - the issue is that his athleticism doesn’t show as well because he's not a technician.

My hope is that Claypool has spent the last month working on the finer points of wide receiver play, which begins with doing a better job getting off the line against tight coverage with more than just his size/strength. Getting off the line using his strength can be effective at times, but he’ll need to find a couple of go-to moves that involve getting up field quicker, which will make his power moves even more effective.

Once he gets off the line, Claypool needs to show a greater sense of urgency eating up the cushion of defenders than we saw at Notre Dame. A clean release helps, but Claypool didn’t come off as fast as I believe he’s capable of. This week I want to see him put pressure on corners at the snap. 

This is a positive example of Claypool getting off the line well. There’s still room for improvement, but he comes off with some speed and urgency and it results in him immediately threatening the corner. By coming off fast, Claypool gets the corner to actually flip his hips on a hitch route, which gives Claypool room to make the third-down reception.

The final piece of this is what Claypool does at the top of his routes, which is the biggest area where the former Irish star must improve. Claypool relies too much on being bigger and better than his opponents. To thrive at the Senior Bowl and in the NFL he’ll need to add more precision to his natural physical tools.

Claypool does a good job on comeback and stop routes, but he’s not nearly sharp enough on vertical routes. He doesn’t threaten leverage and he isn’t sharp at all at the top of his routes, which allows cornerbacks he should otherwise torch to run with him. This is why he doesn’t seem to get the separation of other top wideouts, and if he improves his route running you’ll see Claypool dominate even more.

Claypool makes it too easy for the cornerback to run with him. His release is good and you can actually see his speed on this route, as Claypool initially gets good separation on the post route. The problem is he never threatens the corner's leverage and gives no kind of top-end threat, which allows the corner to easily recover.

If Claypool did more to threaten the corner it would give him at least one more step, and that is the difference between a pass break up and a 40-plus yard gain, or even a touchdown. When he is even a little bit sharp with his top ends he gets very good separation, because the athleticism is there.

Claypool adding more nuance to his game would make him incredibly hard to defend, even on the NFL level, and if he can show some of that off at the Senior Bowl he’ll have a big week.

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