Jermaine Cunningham set for his private workout
91031 Jacksonville, FL. Georgia quarterback Joe Cox gets up after being sacked by Florida defensive end Jermaine Cunningham at Jacksonville Municipal Stadium in Jacksonville, FL. Brant Sanderlin bsanderlin@ajc.com
Florida defensive end Jermaine Cunningham, of Stephenson High, has recovered from shoulder surgery and will hold a private workout for NFL teams at 11 a.m. Wednesday in Gainesville.
He suffered a torn labrum in practice. The injury forced him to miss the Senior Bowl and he couldn’t work out at the NFL scouting combine.
“I feel 100 percent,” said Cunningham, who started 38 of 45 games over his college career.
Cunningham had surgery on Jan. 5. Dr. James Andrews did the surgery and projected a full recovery.
Cunningham is 6-foot-3 3/8 and 266 pounds. Some teams consider him a defensive end and others like him as an outside linebacker.
“To me, it’s all the same,” Cunningham said. “I see myself as a football player. As long as I get on the field, when the ball is snapped, I’m going for the person with the ball.”
Cunningham said he played both with his hand in the ground and standing up in a linebacker stance for the Gators.
Jermaine Cunningham back in his Stephenson High days.
“I’m very comfortable with both of them,” Cunningham said.
In addition to the private workout, Cunningham has a visit set up with the St. Louis Rams and has been receiving interest from nearly 20 teams in the league.
Cunningham plans to put on a show for the scouts who come see his private workout. He still hates that he had to pull out of the Senior Bowl and couldn’t perform any drills at the combine.
“It was real tough because I was looking forward to it,” Cunningham said. “At the end of the day, I had to worry about myself. I just had to get healthy and go on from there.”
Cunningham is happy with his choice to attend Florida. He picked the Gators over Georgia and Auburn.
At Florida, Cunningham had 34 tackles for loss, 19.5 sacks, seven pass deflections, five forced fumbles, one interception and a fumble recovery.
“I felt it went pretty good, coming out with two national championship rings, two SEC championship rings and a college degree,” Cunningham said. “It was more than I expected.”
It’s unlikely, that Cunningham will stay at home and play for the Falcons. He’s projected as a second round pick and the Falcons don’t have a pick in the second round.
SHAPRTON GETS WORKOUT: The Falcons held a personal workout for Miami linebacker Darryl Sharpton, who is 5-foot-11 3/8 and 236 pounds. He’s a run-and-hit, undersized linebacker. He’s projected to go in the fourth or fifth round.
Last season, the Falcons took Miami linebacker Spencer Adkins (5-11,242) in the sixth round.
Tell us what you think about the site
Customer Care »
Vacation stops, manage subscriptions and more
AJC Services
Sections
Other Editions
Visitor Agreement | Privacy Statement
© 2013 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
58 comments Add your comment
D. Orlando Ledbetter
April 7th, 2010
8:13 am
Big Ray — Pouncey is starting to move up and past the Falcons. So that scenario is playing out as we speak/writer.
Chris Taylor — I can just get you the facts. You don’t have to like them. Let’s look at the Hall of Fame Centers and see where they were drafted.
D. Orlando Ledbetter
April 7th, 2010
8:34 am
CT — There are no first round centers in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Dwight Stephenson was a second round pick. Mike Webster was a fifth round pick. Jim Langer was a free agent. Jim Ringo was a seventh round pick. Jim Otto was undrafted by the NFL and went to the AFL. Couldn’t find the draft position of the perhaps the greatest center of all-time, Frank Gatski (11 championship games over 12 seasons).
chris taylor
April 7th, 2010
11:44 am
Yea, guess it’s hard to predict HOF status just based on draft position for a C. Guess i’m just trying to get behind the Pouncy pick. I just want us to return to 2008 form rushing wise. Ryan didn’t seem to have to throw it as much when we could run at will. You could trace the 9-7 record back to injuries on he O-line.
Terrell
April 7th, 2010
1:31 pm
Sly Ty,
Of all the guys you mention that you claim look like busts what do they all have in common? They’ve only been in the league at a maxium 2 years. How can you call somebody a bust in that short period of time?
Terrell
April 7th, 2010
1:32 pm
chris taylor,
why isn’t Baker a LT? When he is healthy he is tough to beat. Last year when he had his struggles he was injured.
Terrell
April 7th, 2010
1:38 pm
south ga boy in the ATL,
You’re right when you talk about those 2 defenses as having elite players, but do you remember the Jets last year? Name one player that was “elite”. They had the best defense in the league last year. All we need is for everybody to their jobs and do them consistently and you will see a big improvement.
Terrell
April 7th, 2010
1:42 pm
FalconsFan284,
I disagree with you to a certain extent on the lack of blitzing. There wasn’t a lack of the blitz. The problem was we never got to the passer. There were a lot of times that we did blitz but you couldn’t tell because our guys were getting swallowed up at the LOS
chris taylor
April 7th, 2010
1:44 pm
You said it all Terrell, he can’t stay healthy. even had problems in his first year i believe. If you are the best LT in the leage what good are you if you can only play half a season at a time. We need some consistancy at LT. Maybe this will be his year to prove he can mantain throughout a whole season.