By Brady Henderson

Not too long ago, Manti Te'o was considered to be one of the sterling prospects in this year's draft class. There were no major concerns about his football ability and no known questions about his off-field behavior.

Manti Te'o

That was before a poor performance in the BCS title game and, of course, the revelation that the Notre Dame linebacker was duped into falling in love with a woman who never existed.

Tony Softli, a former NFL scout and front-office executive, thinks the absence of any criminal behavior on Te'o's part should ease some teams' concerns about his involvement in the hoax. A bigger issue, Softli thinks, is how Te'o was "exposed" in the blowout loss to Alabama.

"Nick Saban's offense is more like a pro-style offense, it's a downhill, run, smashmouth-type offense, and [Te'o] was exposed a little bit in that scenario, so that would be more of my concern than the off-the-field, that strange situation he went through ... ," Softli told "Bob and Groz" on Tuesday.

"I would really have to just hone in on the DNA, his film, and really look at that game, and then go back and study the rest of the tapes – even last year's – and see if you see the same type of scenarios happening in that national championship game."

The consensus among draft analysts seems to be that those two factors could drop Te'o into the second half of the first round. If Te'o is still around when it comes time for the Seahawks to make the 25th pick, he would likely be at least a consideration for Seattle.

In the video below, Bob Stelton and Dave Grosby weigh in on the possibility of the Seahawks taking Te'o if he's available at No. 25.

You can listen to Tuesday's show here.

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