Due to what is said to be a lack of interest from teams around the National Football League, the veteran combine has been cancelled after just one year.
Per Pro Football Talk’s Michael David Smith:
“NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy told PFT the league shelved the veteran combine this year after evaluating whether the clubs were interested. The level of interest wasn’t sufficient to warrant the event.”
Last year’s event, held in Arizona, drew some interest due to the presence of Michael Sam at the event. Though, that was just surface-based interest from the media more than anything else.
The idea of a veteran combine made some sense. It gave unsigned players an opportunity to show that they belong in the NFL. We aren’t talking about free agents that are on the radar of teams around the league.
Instead, it was more about those who have slipped through the cracks of the thousands of individuals looking for jobs in a league with just 32 teams.
It, however, didn’t take hold around the NFL as the organizers would have hoped.
A lot of this has to do to the fact that teams are allowed to meet individually and work out unsigned players at any point, pretty much making the combine itself a moot point.
With that said, this will have an impact on those who want to make their names known to teams around the NFL — players that currently aren’t on the radar.
All said, just nine of the 100-plus participants in last year’s event were signed by NFL teams. That’s out of the over 2,000 players that applied to showcase their abilities at the combine itself.