NFL Draft Profile: Baltimore Ravens Select Boston College WR Zay Flowers
Zay Flowers
Boston College Eagles
#4
Pos: WR
Ht: 5092
Wt: 182
Hand: 0928
Arm: 2928
Wing: 7228
40: 4.42
DOB: 9/11/2000
Hometown: Fort Lauderdale, FL
High School: University School
Eligibility: 2023
One-Liners
An undersized but twitchy athlete that creates separation up and down the route tree with his movement skills.
Evaluation:
X, Z, Y alignment. Lots of usage in jet, fast, and return motion. Smooth releases off the line, variety of skips, head movements, and fluidity. Easy speed to separate on overs, posts, and fades. Also points to his route running variety, with a tree that works through the vertical plane, intermediate areas, and underneath. Electric with the ball in his hands. Obvious burst to get up the field, with functional agility and quickness to allocate yards after the catch. Smaller frame, shorter, and slighter than your traditional boundary X or flanker. Shows up in his catch radius and when facing bigger corners. Questionable ability to elevate and highpoint the ball. Rounds off too many in-breaking routes. Not always sharp on his slants or in-breakers. Flowers may not be prototypical in terms of size, but neither is his athleticism. A rare blend of make-you-miss, with the speed to win vertically, Flowers carries an athletic profile that is noteworthy. Pairing this with an unlimited route tree and utility as a gadget guy, and we have a well-rounded skillset. The size element affects multiple portions of his game, but he can continue to elevate his draft stock come the All-star circuit and pre-draft testing.
Grades
3rd Round
Quotes:
Don't sleep on Zay Flowers as a first-round prospect. He's there for us (and more than one team). He's only going to further improve his NFL grades in Vegas at the ShrineBowl and during the draft process. Exactly what NFL teams are looking for on and off the field at WR.
Eric Galko, Director of the East-West Shrine Bowl via Twitter.
"Stories like Zay who had the opportunity to go get a ton of money to leave, as he is getting phone calls from other schools, but instead calls me and decides to stay because he cares about his team because he cares about a real degree and because he wants to finish what he started. We need to get this guy the ball more. I told him, he is not going to be able to go out after games this year he is going to be so damn tired. He is going to catch punts and return punts and touch the ball over and over again. That's my job as a head coach." -- Boston College Head Coach Jeff Haffley on WR Zay Flowers
Background:
Born in Fort Lauderdale, Florida to parents Willie Flowers and Jackie Walden, Xavien Kevonn Flowers has thirteen siblings. In high school, the Eagles playmaker was listed as a three-star recruit by 247Sports. The same outlet’s composite rankings listed him as the 1202nd best recruit in the nation, the 139th best wide receiver recruit in the country and the 165th best recruit in the state of Florida. A standout at wide receiver and defensive back at University School, Flowers helped lead his team to back-to-back Florida class 4A semifinal appearances as a junior and senior. A communication major in Boston College’s Morrissey College of the Arts & Sciences, Flowers has been an impact player for the Eagles since his freshman year. He played in all 13 games (starting two) in his freshman season and recorded 536 total yards on 49 total touches for four total touchdowns. In 2020, Flowers started all eleven games and put up 892 receiving yards and nine touchdowns on 56 receptions. He also recorded 41 rushing yards and a touchdown on 11 carries. Flowers models his game off of Antonio Brown and has trained with him in past offseasons.
