Hurst at the Combine: Playing for Muschamp prepared him for NFL

Former South Carolina tight end Hayden Hurst took the NFL combine podium Friday afternoon, and amid questions about his baseball career, his age and some of the other standard things came one about his old coach.

Wherever he goes in the NFL, he’ll likely have a coach not shy about voicing his displeasure. But after two years of the kind of blisterings Will Muschamp can deliver, is he already prepared?

“I won’t tell y’all what he says to players verbatim,” Hurst said. “But I couldn’t imagine it being any worse.”

Hurst described Muschamp as exactly what he appears on TV, but the players like it. The 6-foot-5 Hurst, who is considered by some the top tight end in the 2018 draft, said soon after Muschamp arrived on campus, the coach challenged him.

“He challenged me as a man,” Hurst said. “Challenged me as a player.”

It came soon after the staff had permanently installed Hurst as a tight end, moving him from wide receiver.

“We were in a 2-minute drive going down the field and I did not come out. I went I think 12 plays in a row, up and down the field. I was dog tired,” Hurst said. “Threw me a flat route, I just kind of reached one handed out for it. Kind of just bounced off my hand at the first-down marker. He grabbed me, in his way, let me know it wasn’t acceptable at South Carolina.”

The former walk-on went on to break numerous records for his position and post 1,175 yards, 92 catches and three touchdowns his final two seasons.

Hurst said he’d formally met with the Dolphins, Falcons, Bears, and had 11 more teams on the docket Friday. He also met with the Cowboys informally.

He’ll go through much of his testing Saturday and expects to be in the 4.5-second range in the 40-yard dash (that’s where he’s been during his training).

When trying to pitch himself, he pointed out he only dropped one pass in three seasons in Columbia and enjoys the physicality of run blocking (it’s part of the reason he left baseball). He said he modeled himself after the Panthers’ Greg Olsen.

He also said he can draw from the experience of the failed baseball career, where the yips derailed him and frustrated every attempt he made to get back on track.

“It taught me how resilient I am,” Hurst said. “I kind of had something taken away from me that I was really, really good at and really passionate about. I was able to dig myself out of it, make a life change.”

This story was originally published March 2, 2018 at 4:43 PM with the headline "Hurst at the Combine: Playing for Muschamp prepared him for NFL."