Malik Muhammad is calm, cool, and collected at the NFL Combine
Texas defensive back Malik Muhammad is set to go through testing and drills on Friday and Saturday at the NFL Combine in Indianapolis. For most NFL prospects, this is an extremely trying week filled with mental and physical testing courtesy of the 32 NFL franchises.
Muhammad didn’t show any signs of being nervous when speaking with Chris Simms and Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk yesterday. In Muhammad’s words, the interviews were “just talking football.”
A number of Longhorns helped the three-year Texas defensive back prepare for what was to come in Indianapolis this week. He mentioned Jahdae Barron, Matthew Golden, Andrew Mukuba, Xavier Worthy, Adonai Mitchell, Byron Murphy, and Barryn Sorrell helped him prepare for all the different things a defensive back prospect would be asked to do at Lucas Oil Stadium.
“It’s not as taxing and tiring as former people that I talked to said,” Muhammad said.
But in a different life, Muhammad would have been at the NFL Combine as a receiver.
Muhammad, who logged two touchdown catches as a junior at South Oak Cliff, said it took some family influence for him to realize defensive back was the right call for him.
“Originally, I liked receiver over corner. But you have conversations with your uncle and being realistic on there’s 1000 receivers out here that play receiver and are good at receiver,” Muhammad said. “Super athletic, this and that. Over 6 feet, those types of things. Then you’re like, where’s the money-maker at? A lot of people don’t want to play corner. So if you can master corner, master techniques, and master IQ and what the instincts are along with it, with your receiver skills that you have, why not go play corner and make money where a lot of people don’t want to play?”
He had some family influence as well. Relatives Jabbar, EJ, and Khairi Muhammad all played defensive back at the Division I level. His family produced great football players and some high level women’s college basketball standouts, too.
There were plenty of influences from his South Oak Cliff community. Muhammad said he believes he had 21 players from his SOC teams go to Division I programs.
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“And the whole secondary went D1,” Muhammad added.
When asked by Simms some of the players he models his game after, Muhammad went old-school with names like Darrelle Revis, Charles Woodson, Deion Sanders, Patrick Peterson, and Champ Bailey. That prompted Simms to say that he played against a fair amount of those players.
Muhammad will do everything but the bench and the three-cone drill in Indianapolis. He told Florio and Simms that he’s hoping to run in the 4.35-4.4 range in the 40-yard dash.
The next step after the combine and the draft will be picking a jersey number.
“I know it’s going to be a good number,” Muhammad said. “I like 1, 5, 7, and in the 20s I like 21, 23. Numbers like that.”
Simms said Muhammad may have to pay for numbers like those.
With a good day in Indianapolis, he’ll have a nice check come late April to help him pay the price for one of those numbers on a NFL team.
