How long is the combine

Get the full and detailed NFL combine schedule. The Cincinnati Bengals have the No. Skip to main content Skip to navigation. NFL scouting combine What it is, how to watch, dates. Cincinnati Bengals. Los Angeles Rams. Las Vegas Raiders. Carroll: Wilson to play, Carson out for Seahawks. Seattle Seahawks. Saints rule out Kamara, Armstead vs. New Orleans Saints.

Browns rule out Chubb; Johnson to start vs. Cleveland Browns. QB Newton 'still floating' over return to Panthers. Carolina Panthers.

Love ready, but Packers expecting Rodgers back. Let's pinpoint the four ways the absence of this year's combine will affect this draft class as a whole. And while veteran reporters and analysts will tell you the creation of this event mostly had streamlined medical checks in mind, the combine absolutely carries sizable weight in the pre-draft evaluation of every single prospect.

For about two decades now, pro days have been the little brother of the combine, frustratingly parked in its shadow, and while occasionally causing a stir, never really taken seriously or grabbing everyone's undivided attention.

Until now. Without the combine, pro days will be the exclusive holder of prospect's yard dash, and vertical, broad jump, and three-cone times. They'll serve as the one place for teams and draft analysts to get all those figures to be plugged into predictive models and to compare to workouts in the past. It's been difficult to trust pro days because of their exaggerating tendencies. This year, they're really all we have along with any "combines" held by workout facilities.

And we all know college programs love pumping out those 4. The smart draft fan knows full well to take pro day figures with a grain of salt, but this year, those are the only number prospects will boast for their profiles.

The Senior Bowl does a bang-up job bringing diamonds in the rough to the surface every year, and this year was no different, with the likes of Wisconsin-Whitewater blocker Quinn Meinerz, Northern Illinois edge rusher Elerson Smith, North Dakota State tackle Dillon Radunz and a few other small-school prospects excelling in their chance to compete "up" a level of competition.

But the combine always unearths more NFL -caliber talents who played at lower levels in college. Now, it is worth noting that the vast majority of the small-school prospects drafted early are typically Senior Bowl attendees, but the combine invites well over prospects and late-round and undrafted free agent gems who played at the FCS level, in Division II or III, typically hit the field in Indianapolis so everyone can see if they truly have NFL athletic traits.

As a draft analyst, I don't know how I feel about this. Given that the Combine has been occupying Earth for nearly twenty years, the humans Gordon Freeman sees throughout the game are possibly the last humans born naturally. Evidence such as the ghostly laughs and screams of children heard in the playground outside one of the apartments in the first chapter of Half-Life 2 a crying couple showed shortly after.

The player does not see any children in the most human-populated areas, remarks by Resistance members such as "I'm glad there are no kids around to see this. According to Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar , children were present in the early stages of the game development in City 17, called the Combine Factories. Adults and children were to work in this area closely watched by Metrocops and Combots.

In the Cremator Factory , children were supposed to build enemies called Cremators. As the concept of human reproduction disabled by the Suppression Field evolved, children finally got cut with the whole area, along with the Cremator.

A Combine soldier connected to a memory replacement device. Comments at a train station at Half-Life 2's start suggest the Combine has been drugging the populace through their water supply. One of the citizens' remarks, "Don't drink the water I don't even remember how I got here. Plus, this citizen sounds a bit crazed. This drugging may be reinforced by the numerous soda machines stocked with " Dr.

Breen's Private Reserve ," which freely dispenses water in a standard ounce can. The insinuated reason for this supposed mind control is humans forget why they hate the Combine. This mind control makes the Humans accede to the Combine's and Breen's demands. This mind control creates a fresh mental template for forced re-education.

A Combine radio transmission to Civil Protection officers states: "Reminder, memory replacement is the first step to rank privileges. Their memories may either forbid them from harboring any negative thoughts toward their Combine overlords or program them to believe in protecting the Combine.

However, Barney suggests the opposite when, during Episode One , he states that "now it looks like we're gonna have to cut a path through every chicken-shit Metrocop who's having second thoughts about defending City 17! Indications that the Combine are capable of, and regularly perform, forced memory replacement are present in the game's data files—specifically, the model above named "soldier bed," seen later inside the Citadel during Episode One.

This model closely resembles that of concept art in Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar. The machine itself consists of Combine emitters and equipment; attached is an arm-like device holding a human body. Lastly, a shell-like apparatus containing three different screens and panels envelops the head. Accompanying this model is a small group of sounds resembling harsh subliminal messaging; this audiovisual messaging system explains the military training used by normal post-human individuals. This model, in addition to several bizarre sounds of voices in the data files, suggest that this "brainwashing" memory replacement is an important part of Transhuman orientation.

The process of instilling Combine propaganda, erasing and, eventually, replacing memories results in a soldier incapable of rebelling against Combine influence, as well as enabling Transhumans with no military background to become part of the highly specialized Overwatch forces.

Graffiti sprayed near Black Mesa East and other places such as Matt 's home , with a Combine or possibly Resistance, or even a recycled Conscript soldier holding a baby next to the word 'Caste'. The Combine does not flinch at committing acts of extreme brutality and even genocide to maintain control over the human populace.

In the Half-Life 2 Chapter Route Kanal , a refugee base is raided, and a few members of the post are lined up against the wall and shot just as Gordon arrives. The town of Ravenholm was extensively shelled resulting in the zombification of nearly all its residents.

Throughout the Highway 17 chapter, the player encounters numerous bodies in the coast houses. Some bodies in these houses have been burnt in bonfires by the Combine. The draining of Earth's oceans is easily the most striking sign of the Combine's rule on the planet. It is evident at several points in the game that the Combine is depleting Earth's natural resources.

One of the official Half-Life 2 descriptions details how Gordon Freeman must return to "an Earth infested with aliens and being picked to the bone. One of the most noticeable signs is that Earth's ocean levels have dropped dramatically is during the coastal chapters Highway 17 and Sandtraps and the waterways of City 17 in Route Kanal and Water Hazard. The coastline is littered with boats and ships resting on what was once seabed, and various docks and piers are no longer standing in water, but are instead towering over the now traversable landscape.

At Highway 17's beginning, Gordon arrives at a harbor a distance from the water's edge. Indications of the previous sea level judged by moss gathered on harbor structures although the moss levels are somewhat inconsistent places the former sea level several feet higher than what is now the ground. The book Half-Life 2: Raising the Bar mentioned that this massive, planet-wide water drainage is accomplished through the presence of a giant Combine "drain," actually a teleporter, which sends the water to other Combine-enslaved planets.

More generally, parts of the game world are flooded with parasitic Headcrabs and toxic waste, making them inhospitable to human life. Infrastructure is either decaying as with Highway 17, which is in a state of incredible disrepair and littered with old rusting cars , or rendered useless as with Nova Prospekt, where the traditional prison area is mostly flooded and run down.

Animals are rarely seen inside and outside of City 17, suggesting that they are critically endangered; although strangely, birds are seen regularly throughout Half-Life 2. The Fisherman in Lost Coast comments that there is no fish left to eat, only leeches that devour anyone who steps into the ocean, posing a further threat to humanity.

Agriculture seems to also have been greatly diminished, as Russell 's comments during Half-Life: Alyx indicate most species of livestock have been driven extinct. Additionally, City 17 itself is becoming devoured, as Combine Walls spread outward from the Citadel, consuming the city's buildings. It is unknown whether the Combine is purely using this method to destroy the city, or whether the Combine is gathering raw materials from the city's structures. During the development of Half-Life 2 , the Combine originally had an industrial facility called the Air Exchange , which gradually absorbed Earth's air and replaced it with chemicals and other murky gases.

These gases were harmful to humans but most likely ideal for an environment that the Combine master race could inhabit. Gordon's actions at the Air Exchange were to trigger the human insurrection against the Combine in City 17 but dropped and made to happen due to Gordon's actions at Nova Prospekt. The Combine heavily relies on propaganda to assure their influence on Earth and remind its residents of their presence.

Combine units - humanoid and Synth - bear insignias, logos, and other Combine markings. Most of the time poster includes two common Combine symbols, with variants in color and image backgrounds. Most Combine imagery is quite abstract, and the intended messages can be very subtle.