ANALYSIS

While Fincher seems to have "flown under the radar" during his first three years at Connecticut, scouts took notice of his ability in 2004. This is an athlete with excellent body control and hand usage. He uses his compact frame with force and is very active with his hands to stun and jolt. He sees the ball immediately and gets to the point of attack with good urgency.

Fincher has fluid hips and a smooth running motion to squeeze through trash and make negative-yardage tackles in the backfield. He has very good field vision, quickly making reads and reacting to the play. Fincher has the ability to distinguish between running and passing plays quickly and has the ability to sift through traffic to make the tackle.

Fincher is very effective making plays on the move and has enough short-area burst to reach and explode into ball carriers on the corner. He gets good depth in his pass drops and can mirror and re-route tight ends in the short area, but does not have the sustained speed to stay with receivers on deep routes. His lateral range makes him appear faster than his timed speed. He has a good flow to the ball and displays the ability to squeeze through tight quarters and sift through trash to make the play.

Fincher shows good zone awareness and can cover runners coming out of the backfield. He is a good take-on type who is very physical around the ball. He does a very good job of protecting his feet against cut blocks and can separate from offensive linemen with his hand punch. He is not used much as a pass rusher, but has good acceleration to collapse the pocket. He will generally stay low in his pads, and even when he gets high in his stance, he rarely struggles to disengage. His strong hand usage upon contact allows him to stun, jolt and stack at the point of attack.

His tackling skills and lateral agility make him a very interesting prospect. While some teams project him as a mid-rounder, there are very few middle linebackers in this draft with his upside. He has very good body control in the open and excellent hip snap to explode into ball carriers. His quickness to the edge lets him force the action back inside and he shows good awareness, handling the switch-off in zone coverage. In a 3-4 defense, he could be just as effective as Pittsburgh's Kendrell Bell or Baltimore's Ed Hartwell, two players that quietly go about their job but make the players around them look better.