Ereck Flowers 2015 NFL Draft Scouting Report

Position

Right tackle

School

Miami

Size

6'6, 329 pounds

Strengths

The best thing Ereck Flowers has going for him is his massive frame.  He comes in at 6'6 and possesses long arms that should assist him down the road in the NFL.  He displays excellent power while run blocking.  Flowers flashes a nasty streak, something that everyone loves to see in their offensive lineman.

Flowers is a project in pass protection, but he shows off good anchoring ability and a decent kickslide.  He can cover ground quickly out of his stance with long steps.  He'll have to get better off of the snap, but he at least has some tools to work with in pass protection. His length will pay dividends down the road.

I've mentioned that he's a project as a pass protector, but here's a good rep from Flowers on the left side.  He doesn't do this consistently, but he keeps his feet under him and maintains his balance here.  His long arms keep the defender from getting into his body, totally neutralizing the pass rusher.

Weaknesses

Balance issues really plague Flowers.  He's a massive player, but his feet don't always match up with his upper body.  He's a reacher.  Instead of bringing his feet with him, he lunges and gets off balance.  This eliminates any element of strength from his game. His feet overall are average at best.  He comes off as a heavy footed guy which could spell danger in the NFL.

Flowers is a bit of a penalty machine.  I caught several false starts in the games that I watched along with a hanful of holding calls.  The holding penalties stem from his lack of balance and will only get worse if it isn't cleaned up at the next level.

He's slow out of his stance -- sometimes slower than others.  Flowers gets beat by guys with good initial bursts.  It doesn't matter how good your kickslide is if you get beat by two steps on the initial snap.  Take this play below.  Flowers has barely even moved and Eli Harold is already around him.  This happened more than once in this game alone.

Summary

Flowers doesn't have the feet to play on the left side in the NFL.  He's going to be limited to the right tackle position only.  He was playing out of place at Miami, which you have to keep in mind when evaluating him.  Flowers probably needs some time to develop before hitting the field in the NFL.  He needs to work on keeping his feet under him instead of lunging at defenders.  He's a project and will need to learn the fundamentals before he can even think about starting.  I'm not sure where the first round hype is coming from, but to me he's a mid round guy at best.

Draft projection

Late 1st, early 2nd