Arizona Football Pro Day this week, No media allowed

It’s the season; the college football open practice pro day season, Arizona Football will invite NFL scouts to Tucson on March 24th.

Pro Days are former college football players final step for college players to show NFL Scouts what they are made of in front of their coaches and former teammates, a familiar setting.

The 2016 University of Arizona Pro Day will include a whole list of players including Scooby Wright, Will Parks, Jeff Worthy, Reggie Gilbert, Casey Skowron and Cayleb Jones. Cayleb and Scooby were invited to the NFL Combine, which took place in late February.

There were highlights. One highlight was Scooby’s bench pressing, and another was that Cayleb ranked in the top 15 in the 20-yard shuttle.

The good news is, there is more to the combine than the skills tests, there are also interviews and scouts meticulous tape review. Scooby was disappointed in his performance according to Michael Lev (Tucson.com) and is looking forward to Pro Day. More to come in Zona Zealots exclusive interview later this week.

Wright will draw a ton of NFL teams to Tucson. Wrights draw will benefit his teammates who may not have gotten this type of chance to show NFL scouts they are ready and can contribute as a pro. This year’s class was also a part of the team who won the Pac-12 South Championship, so one would hope that would be taken into consideration.

The list of 17 Wildcats performing on Pro Day (in alphabetical order):

Johnny Jackson (WR/RB)

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Two of those teammates are defensive lineman Jeff Worthy and safety Will Parks. We were fortunate to catch up with our beloved Wildcats a week ago, in the middle of their Pro Day training.  They joined me on the Livestream show The Sports Lounge Live, which is filmed in Los Angeles, California each Saturday at 2:00 p.m. PST.

I was already impressed with these two young men and felt both melancholy and proud when they both want to enter the NFL Draft post bowl game. I’ll never be able to point to their number for IMG Sports Network’s Brian Jeffries to call out a tackle again, but hopefully, will be pointing to the TV when they made a tackle or play in the NFL.

After spending the day with them, I came away completed impressed and more than I was already if that’s even possible. These Wildcats live for the game of football, their dreams to play in the NFL are motivation for eating right (5,500 calories a day for Worthy), working out, and training very hard for Arizona’s pro day.

Part of the preparation for this event is to choose a training facility and trainer.

Parks has been training at the Stars SoCal training facility owned by Jason David (former Washington State Cougar and Indianapolis SuperBowl winning Colt.) Worthy is working out with Joe Marino at MPF Training facility in Huntington Beach. His Trainer let us know he is ready for this week.

Worthy broke it down for myself and my co-hosts McCall Hall, Robert Lamar, and Farron Dozier; Pro Day’s are just like combines. The athletes are run through the same types of tests, and they can choose to take part in each test.

I asked Jeff and Will what they would be wearing for the day, would the be wearing Nike Gear? Adidas? They gave us a surprising and intelligent answer: although they both receive gear from these companies to wear, neither wants to commit to any one company and both want to wear their favorite cleats and workout clothes.

Very understandable.

Will’s motto is “Sometimes I win, sometimes I learn, but I never lose.” He’s very calm and always happy, in fact, he posted a tweet about International Happiness day and that he is always happy every day. His happiness rubs off on those around him, take it from yours truly.

Jeff explains, “I’m just a simple man, with an extraordinary mission in life..” He’s taken on that task with a vengeance, 100% focused. Jeff is everything you would want a defensive lineman to be; he loves to hit and tackle, especially quarterbacks.

To give you a flavor of what they will be doing this week, here are highlights of Arizona’s pro day 2015:

In case you missed the show, no problem, we have it right here for you. Jeff and Will have a message for Wildcats fans, as well as for their coaches, and they brought candor, honesty, and emotion into the studio. Note: They come in at the 00:30 mark.

Beardown Wildcats! Your fans and this one, in particular, are pulling for you 150%! May all your dreams come true!