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South Florida’s Pete Bommarito checks all boxes training NFL draft prospects for combine
AVENTURA — When an NFL draft prospect walks into the office at Bommarito Performance Systems for his first visit, there’s tangible evidence of the potential that can be achieved from working with South Florida-based trainer Pete Bommarito — just from a glance at the walls.
A few of the names of football players on those plaques: reigning NFL MVP Matthew Stafford, Frank Gore, Rob Gronkowski, Le’Veon Bell, Ezekiel Elliott, Vernon Davis, Jimmy Graham, NaVorro Bowman.
For prospects who recently completed their college careers and now hope to show their best when they test for professional teams at the upcoming NFL scouting combine in Indianapolis, that’s an impressive list.
As football players try to transform themselves into track athletes to run the 40-yard dash at Lucas Oil Stadium this coming week, Bommarito, who has been called “the 40, combine guru,” helps them navigate that unfamiliar territory.
“We’re training to be trackstars right now instead of being football players,” said Georgia and former Miami Hurricanes wide receiver Colbie Young, who has been back in South Florida training before the combine. “So just eliminating those little dips, anything that can clock a millisecond of a time, just eliminating that from our stances, our starts and making sure that we’re at top-end speed.”
And Bommarito does it by not just maximizing their sprint technique, but relying on his medical background to put his athletes in position to peak athletically when it’s time to perform with added emphasis on recovery, nutrition and joint alignment.
“There’s a difference between training hard and training smart,” said Bommarito, as he has been putting prospects in this year’s draft class through mock combines each of the past two weeks.
“I am a lunatic with recovery and regeneration.”
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That aspect of it is invaluable, especially since he has several prospects from both Miami and Indiana who were playing in the final college football game of the season, the Jan. 19 title game. Some of them may run at the combine, others may wait until their pro day to maximize their training on what’s ideally an eight-week program Bommarito puts them through.
“He’s got the right staff, the right medical and things like that to get me healthy,” Indiana cornerback D’Angelo Ponds said. “I feel like, as long as I’m healthy, I’m going to run fast, and I felt like Pete was the right person to go to for that.”
A mock combine day at Bommarito Performance Systems has prospects divided in groups by positions. They’ll line up for two runs each of either the 40-yard dash or the 20, depending on what they’re working on that day.
Bommarito positions himself at those markers, and he has cameras propped up every 10 yards, plus staffers both monitoring the start and taking video of each athlete’s sprint.
He holds his stopwatch up as each prospect crosses him to get as accurate a time as possible. All the while, Bommarito observes each runner, taking down meticulous notes he’ll bring back to the group as it gathers between runs.
This level of diligence is vital when these draft prospects have already completed their résumé of film on the field and has been given an initial draft grade by scouts and analysts. Now, it’s about optimizing the measurables that surface between combine and schools’ pro days before the late April draft.
Show Caption1 of 10Nebraska running back Emmett Johnson works out at Bommarito Performance Systems in Miami, Wednesday, Feb. 11, 2026. (Joe Cavaretta/South Florida Sun Sentinel)Expand“You can’t overdraft a workout warrior,” Bommarito said. “It’s proven to be right. Even linemen, they want athletic freaks. Whether it transfers or not, when you lay down elite athletic wins across the board, that’s what moves the needle. … If you’re winning in the 5, 10, 20, 40, broad jump, (vertical jump) and you’ve got wins across the board, it’s almost inevitable that you will go up to the top of your grade.
“You look at the positional average, and you see who beat it and you see who didn’t — and you see who really beat it and who laid an egg — look at their draft grade coming in, look at where they got picked. Ninety percent of guys who beat the average will move up at the top of the grade. … Ninety percent of the guys will rise or fall based on the numbers.”
Bommarito adjusts schedules for his athletes’ peak performance depending on whether they participated in postseason all-star games like the Senior Bowl or when their college season ended. Miami and Indiana players — like the Hoosiers’ Ponds or UM defensive end Akheem Mesidor and linebacker Wesley Bissainthe — will be on a different training timeline.
On the medical side, Bommarito tracks everything from nutrition to sleep and how his athletes can develop bodily symmetry between left and right.
“The technology we have today, we can not guess anymore. Everything is mathematically calculated,” he said.
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Word of mouth from past draft prospects, many of whom come back to do offseason training once they’re firmly in the NFL, spreads as far as the results seen by the athletes.
“I’ve heard a lot of good things about Bommarito’s, just from former players, my friends that I know,” Nebraska running back Emmett Johnson said. “I knew that this was a place to get my speed the fastest, and also just good recovery. The medical’s great here.”
Added Boston College offensive lineman Logan Taylor: “Just the track history that comes out of this place. It was kind of a no-brainer when I was looking at all the facilities, and Pete’s just a great overall coach to have on your side. Statistics that I was looking at, coming to this place was just a no-brainer for me.”
By the end of next week, when you survey a list of top performers at the combine, odds are you will read some names of players who trained in South Florida with Bommarito.
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MIAMI — Those Los Angeles Lakers players with statues outside of the team’s arena in downtown Los Angeles? They now will have a coach to guide them.
Sunday, Heat president Pat Riley, who guided the Lakers during their championship Showtime era in the ’80s, will become the first coach honored by the Lakers with an arena-front statue, in a ceremony scheduled before the team’s game against the Boston Celtics.
Among those scheduled to be alongside Riley are Heat scout Bob McAdoo, one of Riley’s championship Lakers players, and Heat vice president Alonzo Mourning.
Riley guided the Lakers from 1981 to 1990 as part of his Hall of Fame coaching career, with championships in 1982, ’85, ’87 and ’88. The Lakers went 533-194 (.733) over Riley’s tenure, winning at least 50 games in each of his nine seasons and at least 60 games in five consecutive seasons.
Current Lakers coach JJ Redick, 41, said Riley’s Lakers’ legacy came before his time, but is appreciative of what Riley has done for the profession and for the Lakers franchise.
“I grew up watching 90s basketball and those Knicks and Heat teams,” Redick said of Riley’s post-Lakers coaching stops, “and just how physical and tough minded they were and then obviously played against Riles in Orlando when he was still coaching — the culture word is overused, but the sustainable level of consistency that Miami has had since he’s been there.
“I wish I was alive and well to watch 1980s basketball. But when you don’t have a TV until 1992, it makes it tough nor the memory capacity of 2-6 years-old to really watch those (Lakers) games. But, what he was able to do as a head coach for the Lakers is, I think it’s the North Star for any coach to be at one place for basically close to a decade and win a bunch of championships. That’s all we can ask for.”
Riley, 80, joins Lakers statues honoring former Lakers players Kobe Bryant, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson, Elgin Baylor, Jerry West, Shaquille O’Neal and broadcaster Chick Hearn.
“My father, obviously, has had the biggest impact on me in my life,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said of Jon Spoelstra, a longtime former NBA executive, “but Pat has had the second-biggest impact, certainly professionally, but also in life. He’s the greatest mentor that I’ve had. And he continues to be that, not only for me but for so many in the organization.”
The Heat schedule precluded more organizational presence, with the team hosting the Memphis Grizzlies on Saturday night at Kaseya Center, where the court a year ago was named in Riley’s honor, and then returning for a practice there Monday ahead of a two-game trip.
Glue guyWith point guard Davion Mitchell having played through fever in Friday night’s victory in Atlanta, he was listed as doubtful for Saturday against the Grizzlies.
But no matter the lineup permutation, which included the Heat opening with a different lineup for the ninth consecutive game on Friday night, Spoelstra’s preference continues to be a role in that first five for Pelle Larsson.
“He’s the glue that really can help maximize lineups,” Spoelstra said of the second-year wing. “Whenever he’s been with that starting unit, it’s been incredibly dynamic. He does all the little things that aren’t seen or not really noticed on the outside, but we notice it. The cuts, the movement, taking charges, running the floor, just moving the basketball, being a ball mover, allowing the scorers to just focus on their strengths.”
On a rollWith Friday night’s 128-97 victory in Atlanta, the Heat now have four 30-point victories in calendar 2026.
As a matter of perspective, the Heat have had only 45 such wins over their 38 seasons, with the three in February the most in any month in franchise history. Six previous times, the Heat had a pair of such wins in a calendar month.
The only calendar year the Heat had more than four such wins were in 1994 and 2012.
