Heading into Sunday, former Kansas University linebacker Ben Heeney had a specific set of goals for his performance at the NFL scouting combine.
And then he hit the field in Indianapolis and outdid them all.
Heeney, a Hutchinson native, finished among the top linebackers at the combine in four of the seven drills he tested in Sunday, including first-place finishes in the three-cone drill (6.68 seconds), the 20-yard shuttle drill (4.0) and 60-yard shuttle drill (11.06 seconds).
His 60-yard shuttle showing was the top time by a linebacker since at least 2006 and was called by many people a new combine record for the position. According to Heeney, it would have been even faster had he not slipped early in the drill.
“That’s crazy to me,” said Heeney via telephone from the Atlanta airport when reached by the Journal-World on Sunday night. “I would’ve been down near 10 seconds if I didn’t stumble. I asked the coaches if I could do it again, but they told me no and said my time was plenty good enough anyway.”
For Heeney, who also finished fourth in the 40-yard dash at 4.59 seconds, the whole experience of competing at the combine was a little unreal. He likened it to his first days as a freshman at Kansas, when he came in wondering just how he would stack up against the rest of the guys on his team and in the Big 12. It did not take long for him to prove he was one of the best defensive players in the Big 12.
“In my opinion, Ben was already one of the best football players in this draft,” Heeney agent Graylan Crain, who works for the Texas-based Select Sports Group, told the Journal-World Sunday night. “But after his performance today, I think he showed that he’s one of the best athletes in this draft as well.”
Crain made sure to emphasize that Heeney’s success Sunday came from years of hard work. And he added it was a joy to watch a guy who had worked as hard as Heeney set personal-bests in all of the areas he tested.
“He had a mission, he had a goal, he had a chip on his shoulder, and we’re about as proud of him as we can be,” Crain said. “He was fantastic, and it’s fun to see good guys do well.”
Add Heeney’s testing times to his 10-foot leap in the broad jump (14th among linebackers), 19 reps of 225 pounds in the bench press (24th, and five better than when he started training for the combine a couple of months ago) and 33.5-inch vertical jump (19th), and Heeney likely did nothing but help himself in the eyes of the dozens of NFL scouts and coaches in the building.
Crain — whose firm also represents pro bowlers Jordy Nelson, Derrick Johnson and Andy Dalton, along with former Jayhawks Kerry Meier and Bradley McDougald, as well as dozens of others — said he had been in contact with several coaches and scouts about Heeney throughout the day Sunday but had not heard final feedback from them after Heeney’s eye-opening performance. That, Crain said, would come in the next few days.
As he waited to board his plane for Florida, where he will stay until returning Wednesday to Kansas, Heeney remained numb to most of what had happened on the field Sunday.
“Hopefully today just showed everyone what I’m capable of and validated me as a football player,” said Heeney, who gave a shout-out to the coaches and players he trained with at EXOS performance training center in Gulf Breeze, Florida. “The main thing for me is, I just want to get drafted, man.”
Former KU cornerback JaCorey Shepherd will be on the field today in Indy, going through the same tests and drills that Heeney and the linebackers went through Sunday.
Like Heeney, Shepherd has spent the past several weeks hoping to fine-tune his 40 time, but there’s a chance the tweaked hamstring that kept him out of the Senior Bowl could keep Shepherd from running at the combine.