Derick
Hall.
Derick
Hall.
Auburn· 6'3"· 254 lb· 4.55s 40
"A captain-grade power edge who spent three years bullying SEC tackles without ever building a counter to finish them — the bet at 37 was that the plan would eventually arrive."Pre-draft read
Hall was Auburn's three-year starting edge, aligned as a wide-nine rusher on passing downs and a heavy-handed setter on early downs. He wins with density and a violent first punch: he arrives with his hands inside, jolts the outside shoulder of a tackle and converts contact into displacement rather than losing the rep and chasing.
The secondary trait is relentlessness — he strains through the whistle and finishes plays 15 yards downfield, which is why his tackle volume looks like a linebacker's. Against the run he is a true edge-setter who squeezes and spills. As a pass rusher the plan is thinner: power first, cross-chop second, and a long speed-to-power conversion that leans on effort more than a counter tree.
Attacking 3-4 / multiple front that plays its outside linebackers on the line of scrimmage
Year 1: base-down edge-setter and rotational power rusher on 45-55% of snaps, with core special-teams value. Ceiling: full-time SAM/rush end who wins early downs outright and delivers 8-10 sacks as a strength-based closer.
A wide-open speed-rush scheme that asks its edges to win from a two-point track with pure get-off and bend, or a system that pulls its rushers off the field on run downs, which strips away his best trait.
Needs a rush coach who scripts long-arm and cross-chop sequences for him; he does not self-generate counters.
Derick Hall Highlights
Auburn career reel showing the long-arm bull rush and edge-setting against SEC tackles.
Don't Sleep On Derick Hall! | 2023 NFL Draft Report & Scouting Profile
Pre-draft breakdown of the power base, motor and the missing counter tree.
Derick Hall 2024 Highlights
Year-two Seahawks reel: eight sacks, two forced fumbles and the fumble-return touchdown.
Hall is a big-bodied, high-motor SEC edge whose evaluation always came down to whether power and character would eventually turn into a repeatable pass-rush plan. He is a captain-type with elite play strength through his hands, a defined run-defense identity, and enough burst off the snap to threaten an edge when he times the ball.
The production climbed every year: 3.5 sacks and 3.5 TFL in 2020, then 9.0 sacks and 12.5 TFL in 2021, then 7.0 sacks and 12.0 TFL as a 2022 senior captain who also added an interception. But the tape showed the same wins over and over — bull rush, long-arm, effort — and the counters arrived late or not at all. He also played taller than ideal as rushes stretched, letting tackles ride him past the pocket.
Boards had him as a clean early Day 2 name, in the 30–50 range, with evaluators split between "safe rotational edge with special-teams and locker-room value" and "late-blooming starter if a staff can build him a plan." Taking him at 37 was a bet on the traits and the person, not on the current sack production.
- 01
Play strength
Genuinely powerful hands and hips; he stones tight ends, jolts tackles off their landmarks and rarely gets moved once his feet are set.
- 02
Run defense identity
A committed edge-setter who squeezes down on inside zone and spills the puller, which made him a three-down player long before he was a rusher.
- 03
Motor and finish
Chases across the formation and closes plays 15 yards downfield; his tackle volume for an edge is a direct product of that pursuit.
- 04
Physical profile
Thickly built at 6-3, 254 with the frame and length to hold up on early downs without needing to be schemed off the field.
- 05
Character and leadership
A team captain and community award winner whose practice habits and locker-room standing were consistently graded as premium by staffs.
- 01
Limited rush plan
Wins mostly with power and effort; the counter tree is short and he can be neutralized once a tackle absorbs the initial bull.
- 02
Bend and corner
Plays tall as reps extend and struggles to flatten the arc, letting protectors carry him beyond the quarterback's launch point.
- 03
Hand-placement consistency
When his punch lands wide his frame gets controlled and the rep is over; the strike quality slips as the game wears on.
- 04
Production vs. traits gap
Never posted a double-digit sack year despite three seasons of starting snaps in a pressure-friendly SEC scheme.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.55sp50
- Vertical
- 33.5inp50
- Broad jump
- 127inp50
- Three-cone
- —s
- Shuttle
- —s
- Bench
- —rep
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | Auburn | — | 13 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2020 | Auburn | 11 | 21 | 3.5 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| 2021 | Auburn | 13 | 54 | 9 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| 2022 | Auburn | 12 | 60 | 7 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
| Career | — | 36 | 148 | 19.5 | 1 | 0 | 5 |
Season totals verified on cfbstats.com (2020-2022 official pages). 2019 freshman line from season-by-season public ledger; games played that year not verified, left null rather than zero-filled. Career line is the sum of verified seasons.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Power-and-motor edge who needed a full season plus a rush plan before the sack production caught up to the traits.
Same build-and-bend tradeoff, but Nwosu turned effort into a consistent double-digit-pressure profile faster.
Heavy-handed SEC edge whose rush plan never expanded past the bull, capping him as a rotational run defender.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Hall played in all 17 games for the Seattle Seahawks in his rookie season, primarily as a rotational pass rusher and special teams contributor. He recorded one sack.
Seattle took him at 37 and asked for patience. Hall played all 17 games as a rookie in 2023 but never got off the ground as a rusher — 38 tackles and zero sacks in a rotational role behind veterans, and the film matched the box score. Year two flipped it: eight sacks, two forced fumbles and a fumble-return touchdown across 17 games in 2024, with power converting into real pressure once he trusted the long-arm. In 2025 the raw numbers dipped in a deeper front — 30 tackles and 2.0 sacks over 14 games — but the postseason changed the story. His third-quarter strip-sack of Drake Maye in Super Bowl LX cracked the game open in Seattle's title win, and in June 2026 the Seahawks handed him a three-year extension worth up to $42 million.
In hindsight the pick reads as correct, just on a longer runway. Hall was never going to be a plug-and-play sack producer; he was a strength-and-character bet that needed a rush plan built around him. Every pre-draft flag was real — the thin counter tree, the tall extended reps, the production that trailed the traits — and each one cost him a full season. What the board undersold was durability and the ability to keep a job on run downs while the pass rush caught up. He is not a star, but for a second-round edge he is exactly what that slot is supposed to buy: a durable multi-year starter who delivered the biggest defensive play of a Super Bowl.
Data note: Season totals verified on cfbstats.com (2020-2022 official pages). 2019 freshman line from season-by-season public ledger; games played that year not verified, left null rather than zero-filled. Career line is the sum of verified seasons.