Wild Frogs, Starbucks Brawls and Duck Tales: the 2025 NFL Combine Forty Awards!

Anyone can tell you who ran the best 40. Only Too Deep Zone spotlights the Best Tattoo, Best Bling, Worst Drip and Dumbest Conversation About Ducks.

Mar 03, 2025

∙ Paid

You’ve combed through the workout results. You’ve heard the soundbytes. You’ve read dozens of Combine Risers and Fallers listicles.

Or perhaps you are are an emotionally-balanced person with a fulfilling personal life and have barely paid attention to the NFL Scouting Combine.

Either way, brace yourself for Combine coverage like only Too Deep Zone can provide, including:

A head coach dressed like a duck.
A defensive lineman from the Duck (and Rice) Capital of the World.
The meat in the Cam Ward-Shedeur Sanders sandwich.
KU-MA-TE! KU-MA-TE! KU-MA-TE! (I’d like an iced grande Americano) KU-MA-TE! KU-MA-TE!
The Tight End With the Humble Tattoo.
Brian Schottenheimer performing his version of “Stairway to Heaven.”

And much more, including some actual information about teams and prospects that slipped in by accident.

Let’s ride.

Best Drip: Kaimon Rucker, Edge, North Carolina

Every prospect wears standardized Combine workout gear during press availabilities. So it’s hard to make a fashion statement without wearing some flashy jewelry, which gets its own category. But Rucker found a way to show that he’s got the rizz.

Fashion sense is all about building harmony from carefully-balanced contrasts. Rucker’s dreads, babushka, pirate earring and snappy frames (also on display in his NFL.com profile) scream: I’m part Von Miller, part church-choir baritone and part philosophy major who convinced your daughter to start wearing Che Guevara tee-shirts.

Worst Drip: Sean Payton, Head Coach, Denver Broncos

Payton decided to meet the press on Tuesday while dressed like a giant marshmallow Peep.

Seriously: who do you think pulls off that look better: Payton or Ducky Momo?

Best Bling: LaJohntay Wester, WR, Colorado

Colorado prospects blew away the field in the bling category this year; Coach Prime probably reaches into his jewelry vault and tosses pendants and medallions to his players like Mardi Gras beads after Colorado victories. But Wester outshined everyone, even Shedeur Sanders, with this understated accessory:

Weston looks ready to punch a fool in the throat in that photo, doesn’t he? He’s not looking at me! And he was an engaging speaker who was happy to talk about what appeared to be the Nobel Prize for Skinny Posts hanging around his neck.

“It might be a necklace to y'all, but it's like a trophy to me,” he said of the medallion, which reads Been 1. “It's just a daily reminder to always remember that you're the one, you're that guy. Whether they see it or not, you always been that one.”

An inspirational message. Heck, I might want a pendant like that. Does it come, like, 300 sizes smaller?

Best Ink: Chris “Pooh” Paul, LB, Ole Miss

Paul’s sleeves took one look at his tattoos and gun show and took the first train to Peoria: