It wasn't like Randy Fichtner couldn't have found another college town to spend his day at evaluating talent.

Put it this way: The wide receivers coach for the Pittsburgh Steelers wasn't in Baton Rouge on Monday for LSU's Pro Day. But he was in Lafayette on Tuesday for the one hosted by UL.

"Position coaches make choices at days like this for college programs, and my choice was to come here because I needed to know more about Jason (Chery)," Fichtner said. "Our scouts do a great job of identifying players with potential to play (in the NFL), but when it comes time to put together a book on a player, there's just a lot of intangibles you can't get off a tape.

"I needed to meet Jason. I think this was a good experience for him and it certainly was an informative one for me in my evaluation of Jason as a player and a person. There are a lot of scouts here today doing that exact same thing for their teams."

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Bob Heist • bheist@theadvertiser.com • March 18, 2009