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Tarik Cohen is tiny, for a football player. Let’s just get that out of the way right off the bat.
Cohen measured in at 5 feet, 6-3/8 inches at the 2017 NFL Scouting Combine, and he weighed just 179 pounds. It is not his stature that has caught the eyes of NFL scouts, however; instead, his highlight reel, statistics, and athleticism on tape have teams looking at him as an intriguing option as a gadget player.
The Green Bay Packers are one of the teams that has shown clear interest in Cohen; they brought him in for a private workout, according to SiriusXM’s Alex Marvez. One likely reason for Cohen being asked to work out by multiple teams was the fact that he was unable to go through the full barrage of testing at the Combine or at his Pro Day.
Cohen did run the 40-yard dash in Indianapolis, posting a very good time of 4.42 seconds on both attempts, but he did not participate in either the 3-cone or shuttle drills. It is likely that those drills are a reason that teams like the Packers — who value getting a full picture of their draft targets’ athleticism — want to work Cohen out themselves.
What Cohen did at North Carolina A&T speaks for itself, however. Cohen rushed for over 1,100 yards in each of his four years with the Aggies, and he never had a yards-per-carry average lower than 5.8. He also had three seasons with 25 or more pass receptions. Click here for his full career stats.
Furthermore, what was arguably his best performance in 2016 came against an FBS team. In the second week of the college football season, A&T played at Kent State, and Cohen went off for 258 total yards from scrimmage: 133 rushing yards on 24 carries and 125 receiving yards on nine catches.
Click here for a profile on Cohen from SB Nation’s Harry Lyles, who spoke with the young runner at the Combine, and check out this highlight reel of Cohen: