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Today was 40 yard dash day at the indoor practice facility, apparently. How do we know this? Because John Franklin set #AuburnTwitter afire with his video and statement that he ran a laser-timed 4.28 40 yard dash.
4.28 LASER #FastestQBInTheNation #JF3 #WDE pic.twitter.com/fJHj9zaCAU
— John Franklin III (@jf3_5) April 28, 2016
If you wanted the proof, he then provided it:
Number dont lie #40Time pic.twitter.com/6EOZslDQiS
— John Franklin III (@jf3_5) April 28, 2016
He wasn't the only one with some eye-opening times, either. Take a look at Auburn's secondary:
John Franklin-4.28
— Deon Mix (@DMix_AU_75) April 28, 2016
Carlton Davis-4.28
Jamel Dean-4.28
Rudy Ford-4.20
Javaris Davis-4.18
Y'all boys ain't making no noise. We #Auburnfast
That's a lot of sub-4.3s. Javaris Davis' time is down right hard to believe. A laser-timed 4.18? Bo Jackson's famous hand-timed NFL Combine number was 4.14.
That's where I really start to wonder. John Franklin III was All-ACC track when he was at FSU, so we know he's got a lot of speed. I could genuinely believe he's that fast. Sub 4.3 numbers are rare in the NFL Draft, though. Most years there are only one or two of them at best. There wasn't a single one in 2016, where Auburn's Jonathan Jones was the fastest at 4.33.
I know people will talk about these as inaccurate or inflated numbers, and I can understand why. We're always told how fast our players are and then when they get to the Combine or Pro Day, their numbers are much slower. It's worth noting that this year the numbers seemed to be very close at Pro Day in comparison to the NFL Combine. Maybe the system gets tweaked for days like today, I don't know.
It's straight-line speed, anyway, so it doesn't exactly translate to skill on a football field, but even if you had a few hundredths of a second to these times, you're still looking at numbers that would have been at the top of this year's NFL Combine. It also means our DBs should be able to run with any wide-receivers on deep routes.
It wasn't just the DBs getting in on the fun, either:
All Wrs ran 4.4s and under today #AuburnFast
— Ryan Davis (@thaRD5) April 28, 2016
I'm really hoping all of these numbers are real. I'm not holding my breath on the specifics, here, though. Either way, the true #AuburnFast I want to see is the pace of play, not the individual player's speed.