NFL Combine: Teams wonder if Ryan Ramczyk loves football — report

The two top offensive tackles in the 2017 NFL Draft class may be moving in opposite directions on some draft boards. While Utah’s Garett Bolles has been wowing scouts at the 2017 NFL Combine, questions may have arisen about Wisconsin’s Ryan Ramczyk relating to his passion for football.

We already knew that teams like the New York Giants would have to assess the impact of Ramczyk’s offseason hip surgery. Now, Walter Football is reporting that some teams are questioning Ramczyk’s love for football:

Sources said that Ramczyk seems like a good kid and they don't have any off-the-field concerns about him. They don't worry at all that he could get into any trouble or fail tests. However, Ramczyk only played one season of big-time Division I football, and they said that his football knowledge reflected that lack of experience. He is behind [Cam] Robinson in that regard after Robinson started three seasons at Alabama.

The other issue for Ramczyk that rubbed some teams the wrong direction is a lack of love for football. It didn't sit well with some team sources that Ramczyk quit playing football after high school. They got the impression that he returned to the field not necessarily out of love for the game, but because he could get special opportunities by playing the game. Those sources have real questions if Ramczyk really loves football, and if he will be fully committed to doing everything in his power to max out as a player.

Is there something to that? After Ramczyk stepped away from football for a year following high school and then played a season at a Division III school it is a fair question. There is no way for us to know the answer. This could be a legitimate concern. It could be a couple of teams trying to raise a red flag about Ramczyk in the hopes interested teams above them in the draft will pass on him.

Here is how Ramczyk addressed that issue while speaking with the media this week:

“At 18 years old, I didn’t really know what I wanted to do at the time. Being out of the game a little bit made me realize what I had given up,” he said “It’s been a big question in interviews [with teams], like I said took a year off and realized what I had given up and ever since then I’ve been competing and just playing football and loving it.”