Massive debate: How high will Georgia’s dancing bear, Jordan Davis, be drafted?

It didn’t take Jordan Davis long to arrive at the conundrum that 32 NFL teams are facing when it comes to his scouting report.

When Georgia’s comically mammoth nose tackle strode to the podium at the NFL scouting combine in Indianapolis last week for his media session, Davis delivered the meat and potatoes of his evaluation.

“Everybody knows I’m a run stopper,” the 6-foot-6, 341-pound Davis said, “and pass rush kind of goes by the wayside with me.”

That 341, by the way, was about 15 pounds or so lower than Davis’ expected weight — or at least, the weight at which he played parts of last season. His role on the Bulldogs’ defense has been clear cut since Davis first cracked the team’s rotation back in 2018.

Eat up space.

Occupy blockers.

Shut down the run.

Block out the sun.

“In our scheme, I play zero (technique, head up over the center), and I always say, ‘Two (blockers) on me, somebody’s free,’” Davis explained. “I free up the linebackers so they can make plays.

“It’s one of those things that you have to be selfless about. You’re not going to make every play, especially at that nose position. If you can do anything to influence the play, it’s good for the defense.”

One day after his media chat, Davis — the supposed non-playmaker — went out and put on a circus performance in the combine drills.

At 341 pounds, Davis ran a ridiculous 40-yard dash (4.78 seconds), the fastest known combine time for a player 315 pounds or heavier. It was faster than five tight ends and three linebackers at this year’s event; those eight players, weighing an average of nearly 100 pounds less than Davis, averaged 4.85 seconds.

Even more shocking in scouting circles was Davis’ broad jump of 123 inches, a number no similarly sized prospect has even sniffed previously.

“Make it make sense,” one AFC scouting director joked about a player weighing nearly one-sixth of a ton jumping more than 10 feet horizontally.

Two years ago, Iowa OT Tristan Wirfs wowed combine onlookers with 121 inches at 320 pounds. Davis improved on that mark by two inches, doing so at 21 pounds heavier.

“I leaned over to the guy I was sitting next to and said, ‘Best big-man workout since (Dontari) Poe?’” the director said, “and he said, ‘Maybe even better.’”

Poe was drafted 12th overall by the Kansas City Chiefs in 2012 after a banner combine workout that saw him run a 4.98, broad jump 105 inches and bench press 44 reps. A more recent comp for Davis might be former Washington DT Vita Vea, another No. 12 overall pick who ran a 5.1 and benched 41 reps at 347 pounds.

Davis whipped those numbers and looked shockingly spry in positional drills. He skipped the bench press in Indy, able to make it up at Georgia’s pro day on March 16 if Davis wants.

But does he need to? Could Davis already have a lofty draft spot locked up after his combine performance?

How Jordan Davis fits in the modern NFL game

There are some fascinating debates in the 2022 NFL draft, but Davis is among the best — and one of the more divisive.

The biggest question before the combine with Davis was: How high do you draft a freakishly gifted nose tackle who offers little in the way of a pass rusher? Now after the combine, the argument is: How high do you draft a freakishly gifted nose tackle who offers little in the way of a pass rusher … but is even more freakish than many realized?

Davis collected 90 tackles (11.5 tackles for loss), seven sacks, one pass defended and zero forced fumbles or recoveries over his career — over more than 1,100 defensive snaps in 41 career games.

In a league where passing is still king and front-seven defenders by and large have trended toward smaller and faster, Davis’ positional value and third-down impact absolutely must be weighed.

But what Davis offers an NFL defense is the kind of thing that doesn’t show up in the box score, at least for himself. The working theory is that if you need to double team Davis’ combination of power and burst up front, that leaves someone else unaccounted for. That showed up time and time again on Georgia’s defense the past few seasons.

“I don’t think he gets out of the top 20 (picks),” the director said. “Maybe top 10, who knows. You mentioned Vea; go ask the Bucs how much he’s meant to their defense. Or look at (D.J.) Reader in Cincinnati, how he’s changed their defense.

“I go back to Vince Wilfork and Haloti Ngata, guys like that. What makes them special isn’t their size but what they can do at that size.”

Nick Saban referred to this when he was asked about Davis prior to facing Georgia last season. The Alabama head coach believes Davis is a unique piece whose impact will be felt in other ways.

“I mean, I think the guy is one of the most dominant players in college football,” Nick Saban said of Davis in December. “Any defensive lineman, I guess you can look at a lot of things. But the No. 1 thing is how hard are they to block? And he’s really hard to block.

“He’s got great size. He’s very powerful. But he’s got really good initial quickness, short-area quickness, and can push the pocket and pass rush. He’s about as good a player as I’ve seen for a long time as an inside player on any college football team.”

Still, not all are convinced Davis would be worth such a high pick in today’s game.

“We had this same debate a few years ago with (former Clemson DT) Dexter Lawrence,” a southeast area scout said of the New York Giants’ 342-pound nose tackle. “Light on his feet, explosive, all that, just like (Davis). But at the end of the day, you want to see more production. More impact plays.”

The area scout ended up with the equivalent of a second-round grade on Lawrence and envisions something similar for Davis.

“I just don’t know you go higher for a player who isn’t going to get to the quarterback,” he said, “although it probably depends on your system and all that. For us, (Davis) is a two-down player for us.”

‘Heavy guys don’t play for us’

By our count, there were 31 defensive tackles north of 330 pounds who played at least one game in the NFL last season. That’s an average of roughly one per NFL roster. But look closer, and you realize that there are certain teams that favor that big a man up front.

The Arizona Cardinals had four 330-plus pounders on their roster last year. (Five if you count Zach Kerr, who did not play a game for them). The Cincinnati Bengals had three, including Reader and fourth-rounder Tyler Shelvin. Eight other teams had two DTs weighing that much or more.

So that’s 10 teams, less than one-third of the NFL, accounting for nearly half of the NFL’s oversized nose tackles.

“(Davis is) scheme-specific,” the area scout insisted. “Some systems want that plugger up front. Others want a little more quickness there. So it’s going to depend on … team to team, he’ll grade out differently for each of them depending on what they want to run.”

Even Georgia head coach Kirby Smart was trending away from the Davis-type of nose tackle before he arrived. Smart linked up with Saban as Alabama’s defensive coordinator in 2009, when 354-pound Terrence “Mount” Cody was the man in the middle.

But in 2017, Smart started 308-pound John Atkins at nose. Davis arrived on campus the following year pushing 350, and Smart immediately requested he drop 20-plus pounds.

“Heavy guys don’t play for us,” Smart said at a 2018 coaching clinic. “We need guys that can line up, play fast, be active and run in space.”

Smart’s change of philosophy was cemented, he said, late in his Alabama tenure when the Crimson Tide started a beefy three-man front of Jonathan Allen, A’Shawn Robinson and Jarran Reed — all over 300 pounds and nearly half a ton combined.

In that game, Ohio State didn’t even try to run inside on that trio, instead throwing quick passes and running to the perimeter in order to wear out Bama’s massive front. It worked — the Buckeyes pulled ahead for good on Ezekiel Elliott’s 85-yard TD run right through the guts of that defensive line in the fourth quarter.

But even as Smart was installing his “havoc” scheme in 2019, one aimed at getting more speed and more disruptive plays on the field, Davis was ascending into a starting role — and the coach couldn’t keep the oversized Davis off the field. Despite averaging fewer than 20 snaps per game that season as a sophomore, he was able to make a few “wow” plays with his extraordinary combination of quickness and power.

Following a down 2020 season for Davis when he looked more sluggish and static, which compelled him to return to school, Smart started seeing more of the old Davis — surprisingly quick and unusually skilled — and crediting Georgia DL coach Tray Smith with coaxing it out of Davis prior to the 2021 season.

Smart noted last June that Davis was “not necessarily lighter but he is quicker” than in 2020, and it resulted in a dominant final season — both for Davis, who played far more snaps and created more pressure, and for the Georgia defense, which was one of the most dominant units in recent college-football memory, en route to a national title.

Finding the sweet spot, weight-wise, for Davis

Davis finished the season with a slew of national honors, winning the Chuck Bednarik and Outland Trophies, earning consensus All-America status and even earning nine first-place Heisman Trophy votes despite barely denting the stat sheet.

By the time he was used as a short-yardage runner against Charleston Southern, running in a 1-yard TD, Davis was a household name among college football fans. The draft crowd helped him achieve rock-star status with last week’s combine showcase.

But that title felt briefly elusive when Georgia first lost to Alabama in the SEC title game, with the vaunted Bulldogs defense was shredded for 41 points and 536 yards, with Bama essentially doing to Georgia what Ohio State did to Bama seven years earlier.

The sight of a stalled, ineffective Davis gasping for air in that game — often with his hands on his hips — made for some salty Twitter fodder.

Davis atoned in the rematch vs. Bama in the national championship, nearly getting a strip sack on the opening series, notching a fourth-quarter tackle for loss after Georgia took the lead for good and logging 47 snaps, the second-highest game total of his career.

Asked at the combine what his focus has been since that game, as he prepares for the draft, Davis didn’t mince words.

“Definitely pass rush ability and conditioning,” Davis said. “I’m working towards that. I feel like I’m at that level. You have to keep your knives sharp. You have all the tools in your toolbox, you just have to make sure they work.”

Smart also hasn't shied away from the topic of Davis' weight, which has fluctuated over the past four years. The coach has always preached that lower is better for Davis, even as he ballooned to the 360s at times at Georgia.

But Davis said he likes his combine weight better — and plans to stay below that mark.

"Once I get into the 330s, I think that will be my spot," he said. "That's where I'd like to stay."

Davis knows that's what NFL teams are most likely to want to hear.

"Wherever I land, whatever plan they have for me, I'm willing to do it," he said. "That should be no issue."