Keondre Coburn Q&A: Getting to Know the 2023 NFL Draft Prospect

Find out more about defensive lineman Keondre Coburn, a top prospect for the 2023 NFL Draft.

The NFL Scouting Combine kicks off on February 28 and one of the prospects who has been preparing for this event is Texas' Keondre Coburn.

Listed at 6-foot-2, 343 pounds, Coburn has done a good job for the Longhorns holding his ground and being a defensive tackle who’s been a force against the run.

Depending what happens, Coburn could quickly become a player of interest for the Jets heading into this draft. Two of their mainstays, defensive tackles Sheldon Rankins and Quinnen Williams are question marks. Rankins is a free agent, and Williams wants a new lucrative contract.

Coburn took time out to talk with Jets Country while training at the Exos Athletes' Performance Institute in Phoenix Arizona.

For the past 20 years Exos has been working with athletes prior to the NFL Scouting Combine to get ready for one of the biggest moments of their lives when all eyes in the league will be on them. To date, Exos has helped to train and prepare 1,085 athletes who have been drafted, including 206 first-round picks.

Here's what Coburn had to say:

Q: In what ways has Exos been helping you prepare for the Combine?

Coburn: They've helped me in so many different types of ways. They helped me get my flexibility better than it has been, working on little things like that. Not trying to strain to the point you're killing yourself, but knowing how to work in little steps and things like that where we're not running four 40's all the time, but we're taking it step by step, because that's the progression of getting better, taking it step by step and certain things like that. My time out here has been amazing, I'm around a bunch of good guys who are training for the same thing I'm training for, so being around those, is just a feel of being around NFL guys and things like that, just sitting there working trying to make our bodies ready and get everything together to where we make that next chapter.

Q: What is a typical day like for you preparing for the NFL Combine?

Coburn: It's different for everybody. Interior d-line, o-line, kind of changes every couple of weeks. Now our schedule is we get up at 9:30 and lift, first thing we do. Arizona weather hasn't been hot as it was. It's been cold every day almost, and it was raining yesterday. I didn't even know it rained in Arizona to be honest. We lift at 9:30 and then I've got P.T. right after that, and that's just working on my flexibility, working on little things I need to work on and that's at 10:30, and after that then at 1, we run in the sun, just to get the heat and the conditioning. That's a typical Monday and Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, then on Wednesday, that's when we work on the longer stride and the 40. We go on a high school field and come in at 10 a.m. to do that and after every lift we've got, we come back at 2 and we do d-line drills at first to prepare for the bowl game and now we're preparing for the Combine, drills like that, drills we're going to do at the Combine. On Saturday, that's the big bench day. You've got to come in and be ready, be hydrated, arms are good, because we're going to be bench pressing on that day. Then Sunday is a day off, and Monday we are back to it, it's a six day week. This is the profession we choose to do, and there's no time off because the Combine is on the way. We just have to stay ready.

Q: What is your why?

Coburn: I have two whys, actually now I do. My first why is, because I love this sport. To be growing up, you know when you're a kid kind of trying to find your path, trying to find what you're good at, and find what your career is. I didn't know what mine was at first. I used to play games all day. I used to sit around and watch movies and things like that until my dad told me to play football and I started playing football and then I realized that first year that I was good in some kind of way. I took it ever since then and started playing the game as much as I wanted to. I started watching football highlights, and I literally started studying football, loving the sport. I just fell in love with it, and I just felt like this is the sport I could argue with people, this is my path, this is my career. I'm a football player. This is where I make my money, this is my career, this is what makes me eat the things I want in life, and just be happy with myself and I enjoy waking up every morning playing football, and this is the sport I enjoy literally. That was my why because I love this, I want to do this, this is the profession that I chose, this is the career path that I've chosen, I'm constantly working with it, a lot of people chose this for their path and don't go through with it, and the fact that I'm still here, I'm just thankful for everything I've done and I don't want to change anything in the past. My other why is, I'm having a daughter. My daughter is being born in May. My why is I want to make sure my daughter is never in a position where she has to worry. I want to give her everything in the world. I want her to be proud of her dad of his career and his path. That's my second why, is my daughter.

Q: Do you have any friends in the NFL, and if so, in what ways have they helped to prepare you for your rookie season?

Coburn: I've got a lot of friends in the league, especially coming from my school. I've got Keaontay Ingram who's on the Arizona Cardinals right now, literally just went in the league, played his first rookie season. I have Joseph Ossai, that's my dog, we are still roommates right now, still got the same apartment and things like that. He just played his full healthy year, and had a hell of a season. Malcolm Roach for the New Orleans Saints. You've got Josh Thompson who plays for the Tennessee Titans right now. You've got a bunch of players like that. We still stay in touch and they tell me all the time to just enjoy it, work, and little things like that. They tell me to stay motivated and just be ready, it's not easy, nothing is easy, especially in a chapter and in a sport that I chose, nothing is easy and you have to be willing to work at all times, and things like that. They keep motivating me and things like that, telling me how it is when you come in and when you leave, how you should take the off-season and things like that. They give me so many pointers to the point where I'd be a fool not to take their lessons and literally take it from there. I've got a bunch of people I'm looking up to this day in the league

Q: What would it be like for you if you get drafted by the New York Jets?

Coburn: To be honest, I'll be so thankful. Any team that drafts me, I don't want to point it out to just one team. Any team that drafts me, you've just given a kid like me, somebody like me who's dreamed about this his whole life, an opportunity to help his family out, an opportunity to make sure my daughter, she doesn't really have to worry right now, or put me into position I get to play this sport and play at a high level, and get to enjoy it. I've never been in New York, but I know I'm going to have to kick a bunch of rats around, and things like that I've heard, or eat hot dogs every once in a while and things like that. I'd just be thankful to be with any team, any organization that gives me an opportunity to play the game I love and I grew up loving. I mean if it's the Jets, it's the Jets, it is what it is, I love it.

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