As we do every offseason, we'll be comparing each of the Philadelphia Eagles' rookies to current or former NFL players. Today we'll find a comp for seventh-round interior defensive lineman Uar Bernard.
EAGLES ROOKIE COMP SERIES
Makai Lemon | Eli Stowers | Markel Bell | Cole Payton
Micah Morris | Cole Wisniewski
Bernard is an International Player Program prospect from a small village in Nigeria who turned heads at the HBCU showcase. Here's what The Athletic's Bruce Feldman reported about him following his workout:
Bernard measured in earlier this week at the NFL’s HBCU showcase at 6-4 1/2, 306 pounds with 11-inch hands and almost 36-inch arms. Other people who have spent their lifetimes in football say Bernard looks like a Marvel creation. Bernard’s body fat: 6 percent. He vertical-jumped 39 inches and broad-jumped 10-10, which was 14 inches more than any other defensive tackle did at this year’s combine. His 40-yard dash: 4.63.
Here's that 4.63 40:
Bernard is jacked.
The Eagles took a flier on a freak athlete from Australia in Jordan Mailata who had never played American football, and that worked out. So, why not take another shot with a Day 3 pick?
Of course, as we noted in a recent mailbag, Bernard is an even more raw prospect than Mailata was when he entered the NFL. When Mailata was drafted, he had at least played a football-adjacent sport, and there were highlights:
You could see (a) that he had movement skills, (b) toughness, and (c) that he wasn't shy about using his enormous size to his advantage.
I swear I don't mean to poke fun at anyone here, but by comparison, here are the highlights we have of Bernard:
In my opinion, Mailata was significantly further along when he was drafted than Bernard is right now, at least from a scouting perspective, in that Mailata checked some boxes that Bernard hasn't had the opportunity to yet.
As such it's really hard to compare Bernard to a player who has actually made it in the NFL. Form a pure height/weight/speed perspective, here's how Bernard's athletic measurables compare with Myles Garrett, the best defensive player in the NFL:
But obviously, we're not going there.
The best comp for Bernard is a guy who never played a snap in the NFL, Lawrence Okoye.
Who's that?
Well, he was a British record-holding discus thrower who was 6'6, 304 pounds, with a 4.78 40 time, a 36" vertical jump, and a 10'7" broad jump. The 49ers signed him in 2013 as an undrafted free agent to play on the interior of their defensive line. He went on IR his rookie season (presumably with a hangnail injury), got cut in Year 2, and bounced around with five other NFL teams, before landing in the CFL and later the AAF.
I had actually considered comping Mailata to Okoye back in 2018, but decided that didn't make any sense since they didn't play the same position. I swear on my mother I thought of Okoye when the Eagles drafted Bernard, and had planned on comping them, like, literally on Day 3 of the draft 😂.
And then... Vic Fangio blew my sweet comp by bringing up Okoye unprompted during his most recent press conference. I hadn't considered that Okoye actually tried out for the Niners when Fangio was there.
"The guy's never played high school football, college football," Fangio said of Bernard. "I had a similar experience when I was with the Niners. We had a guy by the name of Lawrence Okoye who was an Olympic discus thrower for England. Looked a lot like Uar looks now and we kept him for a couple years. Other teams tried. It never worked for him, but patience will need to be a virtue both on his part and ours."
Bernard landing on IR his rookie season feels like a decent bet.
Next up: EDGE Keyshawn James-Newby