BATON ROUGE, La. -- Although 20 of his former LSU teammates also worked out before NFL scouts at Wednesday’s pro day, Zach Mettenberger was the story.
The former Tigers quarterback seemed a bit displeased by his performance in his first public workout since undergoing surgery to repair the injured ACL and MCL in his left knee in early January. But his performance seemed to impress the pro scouts and coaches in the room, likely reinforcing his stock as a second-round pick in next month’s draft.
Mettenberger discussed the throwing session with a contingent of media members on Wednesday. Here is a portion of what he had to say:
Q: How do you think you showed what you can do in coming back from the knee surgery?
A: I have been saying for a couple weeks now that I’m healthy and good enough to know, and I don’t think all of y’all believed me. I think one thing I wanted to do is show that I could go out there and take an explosive drop and throw the ball downfield like everyone knows I can. It was great to get out there and throw the ball around with all my guys that I threw with for three years for one final time.
Q: What do you think this shows about your recovery?
A: I think people think it’s pretty remarkable at 13 weeks, where I’m at. I did a lot of good things today, but sometimes I just hold myself to almost an unrealistic standard. I wasn’t too pleased with myself on some of those throws today, but all things considered, I thought I did OK, but still a lot to improve on.
Q: How close are you to 100 percent?
A: Right now I’m probably 85, 90 percent. I think by rookie camp in May, I’ll be 100 percent.
Q: Have you had any private workouts with teams yet?
A: I haven’t had any private workouts with teams. Hopefully I’ll get more now since they’ve seen that I’m OK. You saw with the Clemson offensive lineman, he got hurt [Brandon Thomas tore his ACL in a private workout with the New Orleans Saints last week], I think, my feedback from teams, they’re afraid to work me out because they don’t want me to injure anything. So I haven’t had any private workouts, but I’ve been throwing every day with the guys here in town. We were able to jell, mesh kind of how we were, but we were still off a little bit on timing things. But I thought we did pretty well today.
Q: Do you have any workouts scheduled?
A: Yeah, I’ve got a few. I’m flying to the Jaguars tomorrow [and Saturday with the Lions]. I’ve got a couple the rest of this week and then next week. So I’m excited for all those.
Q: What do you think you’ve proven about your health?
A: I think I’ve shown that I’m not going to start the season on the PUP list. I think I showed that I’m healthy enough to go through practice, compete for a job and by the time the season rolls around in September, I should be fully healed, no question.
Q: Did you ever doubt that you’d be back so quickly?
A: You tear your ACL in late November and have surgery in early January, you kind of doubt being back in three months and throwing. But I had [LSU head trainer] Jack Marucci with me and Dr. [Brent] Bankston and they kept reminding me that I was going to be fine in three months. And here I am three months later and they were right. I probably should have stressed a little less and just listened to Jack.