The top high school football recruits have gathered in Beaverton, Ore. for The Opening. The five-day recruiting event is a showcase of athleticism, and Nike quantifies that with its Nike Football Rating Championship.
The Opening used to be televised on ESPN, but in 2017, only Monday, July 3’s 7-on-7 championship will be aired on the NFL Network. You can also follow along with all of the action by following @SBNRecruiting on Twitter, and our live blog for The Opening, which begins Friday afternoon ET.
If you’ve heard of the SPARQ testing that Nike did for a few years (and was even featured in the NCAA Football video game series), then you’re familiar with the format of the Nike Football Ratings. It’s essentially the same thing with a different name. It encompasses these events, and was Nike’s attempt to standardize test results for the best high school athletes with some sport-specific exercises:
40-yard dash: A measure of off-the-mark quickness and transition to top speed.
Vertical jump: Your vertical jump height and body weight are factored together to assess your peak power.
5-10-5 shuttle (also known as the 20-yard shuttle run): a drill demanding split second changes of posture, direction, and speed.
Kneeling powerball toss: a test designed to measure the ability to develop and deliver coordinated power.
A player's results in those four exercises, when normalized by weight, gives a number that measures the player's power, agility, speed, explosiveness, and overall athleticism.
Nike put its resources behind a rating initiative, and this was the result. It was also more than just football, as there were rating systems for five other sports as well.
Nike Football Rating national champions
| Player | Position | Most recent college team | Rating | Year |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Player | Position | Most recent college team | Rating | Year |
| J.K. Dobbins | RB | Ohio State | 146.76 | 2016 |
| Donovon Peoples-Jones | WR | Michigan | 148.83 | 2015 |
| Kirk Merritt | WR | East Mississippi CC | 147.6 | 2014 |
| Speedy Noil | WR | Texas A&M | 153.9 | 2013 |
| Mike Mitchell | LB | Southeastern | 154.47 | 2012 |
| Landon Collins | DB | LSU | 143.76 | 2011 |
| Ryan Henderson | DB | USC | 134.79 | 2010 |
They’ve gotten away from the SPARQ branding, but the nuts and bolts remain the same.
There are a couple of notable names in the former winners list, but besides Landon Collins, none of these players made huge splashes at the college level. We’ll see if Peoples-Jones or Dobbins will end up having the careers that their testing numbers promise.
We’ll also update this list after 2017’s Nike Football Ratings Championship.