Former UH players impress NFL scouts at Pro Day
STEPHEN TSAI / STSAI@STARADVERTISER.COM
Running back Pereese Joas, quarterback Max Wittek, offensive lineman Ben Clarke, and defensive back Gaetano DeMattei
AZUSA, CALIF. >> Pereese Joas today added another chapter to his storybook football career.
Joas, who conquered homelessness to play for the University of Hawaii football team the past two seasons, impressed NFL scouts in the Rainbow Warriors’ pro day on the Azusa Pacific campus.
Joas’ time of 4.54 seconds in the 40-yard dash was the best among the 11 former UH players participating in the combine-like audition before 18 NFL scouts.
At 5 feet 5 1/8, Joas was the shortest participant. But he had the best broad jump at 9 feet, 9 inches, and was third with a vertical jump of 33 1/2 inches.
Former UH cornerback Ne’Quan Phillips ran the 40 in the 4.55 seconds and tied for first with a vertical jump of 34 1/2 inches. Phillips, who trains in Florida, has been invited to a private workout with the Miami Dolphins next month.
Quarterback Max Wittek, who overcame injuries to both knees and a left (non-throwing) forearm, was the lone passer at the event shared with Azusa Pacific. Wittek showed arm strength with throws of various distances. Two NFL scouts arranged meetings with Wittek after the on-field session.
Offensive lineman Ben Clarke drew a private meeting with the Kansas City Chiefs.
Clarke was UH’s starting center for two years before playing left tackle the past two seasons. But it is widely believed his next-level potential is at center or guard. Clarke was asked to work out at center today.
15 responses to “Former UH players impress NFL scouts at Pro Day”
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This validates UH football had/has very good players. The previous coaching staff just had difficulty in putting together a winning team. Joas is a good example of a player that watched, for the most part, from the sidelines throughout his UH career, but can impress NFL scouts. Now its time to see what coach Rolovich and his staff can do with the talent on the team.
No it doesn’t. It just means Tsai is still full of BS. Tsai couldn’t see straight for 4 Chow years, he still can’t. It was Warriors pro day, which means there was dearth of talent to start with. Joas didn’t have a “storybook football career”, he had NO football career at UH, just like he’ll NEVER have a pro career (unless there’s a midget league I don’t know about). Read the article again, Tsai throws out all the “feel good” BS about Joas but never mentions that no NFL team showed any interest. Dahhhh!
exactly
agree…we gotta tell the truth
Not an impressive bunch and none will have an NFL career. But that said, I wish them luck. Thing is, playing a minor league conference makes it hard to be credible in any way.
Good luck, guys. Hope you can make it at the next level. IMUA…
Good luck to the Warriors. Chase your dreams!
SUPER impressive…..
Pereese Joas could be like that running back who played for New England and San Diego, what’s his name? Danny Woodhead?
This article validated for all time how blind, deaf, and dumb Tsai is.
His job is to drink the UH kool aid before writing and posting any article on UH sports. You are correct at 5’5″ Joas is just too small to make it in the NFL unless he was a spectacular kicker or punter. Hope it will not be necessary for massive kool aid drinking with an upcoming Rolo team. Think they will really struggle when his offensive coach already bailed on him and he has zero head coaching, much less successful, experience either at the Div1A, NFL or even high school level. With no name or NFL creds, the damage Chow has done to the football program and its reputation, Rolo will struggle to get the top blue chip recruits he needs to be competitive, which for his first year is just to try to win more than 1/2 their games to make the Hawaii homer bowl. If Rolo struggles, expect Tsai to also try to artificially prop him up as he did with Chow, which I would agree is not helpful in the long run for the UH program
Every UH coach struggled with getting blue chippers, locally and nationally. Frankly, at the level UH plays at, we really don’t need many of them. We just need number of “good” players at key positions coached to maximize their potentials. Believe Rolo is capable of doing that with a new offense more aligned with the talent we have. Clueless Chow insisted on trying to put square pegs into his round hole and let his “righteous “ways get in the way of doing “right” things. Don’t think Matlin is going to let things get further out of hand, the way clueless Jay did – look, UH is still suffering from his indecisions on Chow, Gib, and Trapasso. Just renewed our season tickets as well as convincing couple more to buy season tickets. If people enjoyed the season the basketball teams had, they should show their support by buying tickets to the program that is the primary economic engine for all UH sports. The thing is, I know why Tsai is the way he is but it will serve ALL UH fans better if he actually learned how to write stuffs that energizes the supporters instead of engaging in lathering on the BS.
That is all he knows how to do is lather. Disagree with your Rolo prediction but could be wrong. I was previously a heavy critic with Shoji but then his team did so well last season that shut me up and will not say anything negative against Shoji for a long while. Did what said I would do on a post and that is donate money specifically to the UH Wahine volleyball team for doing so well. Actually it was pretty easy as the UH foundation or Koa have a website where you can choose exactly what team you want the money to go and pay by Paypal or credit card. Later received a donation receipt in the mail, which can be used as a charitable tax deduction. I am going to wait to see how Rolo’s team performs before supporting the football team. Yes, it is ALL about performance as good performance should be rewarded and poor performance should be shunned.
Yep, thanks for this feel-good article. Now let’s do our best with what we have in reality!
Clarke has a good shot. Best of luck to all Warriors.