Saints coaches and scouts are busy hitting the road for this year’s pro day circuit ahead of the upcoming 2021 NFL draft, but Ryan Nielsen didn’t have to travel far. The Saints hosted Tulane’s football team to their indoor facility to host draft prospects and attendees from around the league in a recent workouts session.
And Nielsen, the Saints’ defensive line coach, personally ran Tulane’s Cameron Sample through drills. Sample is a good athlete for the position, though undersized at 6-foot-3 and just 267 pounds. He’ll benefit from an NFL strength and conditioning program. In the meantime, he offers help as a disruptive presence up front with 10.5 career sacks and 7 pass deflections in his career, with 20.5 tackles for loss in 41 games played. That would be a welcome addition to a defensive line that has lost several pieces this offseason.
Sample is projected to be picked in the later rounds during the draft’s third day, so he’d be a solid pickup if the Saints aren’t able to add a high-end prospect early on. They’ve done their homework on him; Sample told WWL’s Amos Morale III that he met the team at the Senior Bowl, where he won Defensive MVP in the all-star game, and followed up later with further conversations. Nielsen has done a great job rebuilding the New Orleans defensive front since arriving in 2017. Maybe Sample ends up staying in the city after turning pro.
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