More combine tomfoolery

The Blob has said this before: The NFL combine is what happens when you turn over the car keys to obsessive compulsives and let them do the driving for awhile.

What happens are moments of high hilarity, like making 300-pound linemen chug through 40s and then acting as if their times actually mattered, considering the last time a 300-pound lineman had to chug 40 yards was, like, never.  Better you should focus on how fast they run the 5, not the 40.

And then, of course, there's the interview process, which frequently gets downright weird and (as the Blob has also pointed out) reveals more about the character of the people asking the questions than it does about the people answering.

And so to this poor unfortunate nerd-nik from the Atlanta Falcons, who led off his questioning of Eli Apple of Ohio State by asking if he were gay.

Falcons officials immediately declared the question "inappropriate" and worthy of condemnation and scorn, but whether it's any more so than some of the other bizarre questions that get asked during the combine is debatable. The fact is, half the questions prospective players get asked are inappropriate and have nothing to do with how well they can, in Apple's case, man the Cover Two.

What I'd love to have seen is Apple coming back with an appropriate response. Which, in the Blob's world would have ranged from a straightforward "None of your damn business," to "That question is inappropriate and I refuse to answer it," to the classic turning-the-tables ploy:  "Hmm. Interesting you would lead off with that. Perhaps we should explore that some more."

Just to, you know, watch the nerd-nik's head explode.