NFL Draft: Dickerson sure of position as NFL tight end

You didn’t hear his name called last night, but that’s no surprise.

Former… You didn’t hear his name called last night, but that’s no surprise.

Former Pitt tight end Dorin Dickerson didn’t expect to be taken in the first round of this year’s NFL Draft. He won’t stay undrafted for long.

How could an NFL team resist the temptation of drafting one of last season’s best tight ends, one who ran the fourth fastest time in the 40-yard dash and had the second-highest vertical leap of all players at March’s NFL Combine?

He’s tough to pass up.

Dickerson is coming off a breakout year at Pitt, one in which he caught 49 balls for 529 yards, including 10 touchdowns. It’s also clear, thanks to his 4.4 second 40-yard dash time and 43.5-inch vertical leap that he has the absurd athleticism to succeed in the NFL.

Yet NFL teams apparently will have the same predicament as Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt had when he recruited Dickerson out of West Allegheny High School in 2006: finding a place for him on the field.

“A couple teams have looked at me as a receiver, a couple are looking at me as an H-Back,” Dickerson said. “The tight end thing, I’m not sure about it, because at this point, I feel like the ideal size is guys that are 6-foot-6, 250 pounds. I’m not that mold.”

Nor does he fit any mold. Dickerson is what some experts call a “tweener,” a player that is in between positions requiring significant work to fit into either one. Size and skepticism over his blocking ability hold back NFL scouts from pegging Dickerson as an NFL tight end.

But some ignore his style of play at Pitt.

“People say I’m not the best blocker. I’m undersized, but if you look at the top five tight ends in the draft, none of them have blocked as much as I have,” Dickerson said. “I was in a pro-style offense, and other people ran the spread offense.”

In fact, depending on the rankings, four or five of the tight ends ranked ahead of Dickerson by experts played in spread offenses.

One such ranking by Joe Reedy, the Cincinnati Bengals beat writer at the Cincinnati Enquirer, pegs Dickerson as the fifth-best tight end in this year’s draft.

Dickerson ranks behind Ed Dickson (6-foot-4, 250 pounds from Oregon), Dennis Pitta (6-foot-4, 245 pounds from Brigham Young), Rob Gronkowski (6-foot-6, 258 pounds from Arizona) and top-ranked Jermaine Gresham (6-foot-5, 261 pounds from Oklahoma).

“I think Dickerson has the athleticism to be a good tight end depending on where he is picked,” Reedy said. “I also like the fact that he played a variety of positions at Pitt and has more upside.”

If Dickerson had his way, he would prove to analysts he could handle blocking with a weight room showdown.

“The Gresham’s and the guys who ran the spread offenses, I will take anyone into the weight room and show them what I can do on the bench,” Dickerson said. He bench pressed 225 pounds 24 times at the NFL Combine.

As far as which team’s weight room he’ll grace at this year’s training camp, that’s where Dickerson leaves it up to chance.

“It’s been interesting to me to sit here, because all the teams have been saying the same thing, ‘We’ll be really interested come draft day,’” Dickerson said. “It’s been kind of hard to tell anything about the draft. I don’t know where I’m going to go.”

He did, however, narrow down a list to three teams he felt were the most interested in him: the Washington Redskins, Arizona Cardinals and Baltimore Ravens.

Yet, as early as Wednesday morning, Reedy was reporting that Dickerson was on a list with Gresham and former Florida tight end Aaron Hernandez as the Cincinnati Bengals’ top three considerations at tight end. The same report mentions that Dickerson could go as high as round two in the draft.

Dickerson said he’s been told he will be drafted somewhere between rounds two and four. Either way, his former position coach is confident he’ll be a nightmare for defenses in the NFL.

“He’s just going to get better. His ceiling is high because he hasn’t played the position very long,” Pitt tight ends coach Brian Angelichio said. “From a speed standpoint, he’s going to be a matchup problem for any linebacker.”

Dickerson said he’s been talking with former Pitt offensive lineman C.J. Davis and linebacker Scott McKillop among others about being drafted, and he received the same message: Relax, and have fun on draft day.

That’s why he plans on enjoying the NFL Draft at his uncle’s house in Moon, Pa., surrounded by family and close friends. But the nerves might be too much for him to cope with.

“I don’t know what I’ll do while everyone is sitting there watching and having fun,” Dickerson said. “I might just go for a walk or something because I don’t want to be around everyone while it’s happening.”

Yet uncertainty is nothing new to Dickerson. After all, tight end is his fifth position in four years. He’s also played wide receiver, fullback, halfback and linebacker.

It seems once he enters the NFL, he’s poised to face it again.

“What I did to overcome all the adversity [at Pitt], I’ll just keep that in my back pocket. I’m prepared for it,” Dickerson said. “If it happens again, then I’ll know how to deal with it better this time.”

Whether it’s round one or round four, Dickerson plans to find a home in the NFL. He doesn’t care which position, so long as he gets to his final goal: a Super Bowl ring.