Jaylin
Simpson.
Jaylin
Simpson.
Auburn· 6'0"· 179 lb· 4.45s 40
"Auburn moved him from corner to the post and he answered with four interceptions and first-team All-SEC honors, but 179 pounds decides how many NFL snaps that ball production ever gets to matter."Pre-draft read
Simpson played corner for three seasons at Auburn before sliding to free safety as a senior, and the tape carries both jobs. He works from single-high or the deep half in quarters, reads the quarterback's front shoulder, and drives on out-breaking throws with corner footwork most safeties never own. The pedal is loose, the transition is clean, and he eats ground once the ball leaves the hand.
Against the run he is a fill-and-force player, not a thumper: good angles from depth, on-time arrival, ankle-level tackles. At 179 pounds he wins with placement, never power. Speed and ball production are the separators — seven career picks, a pick-six on the opening drive of his senior year, and the recovery burst to erase a bust underneath.
Single-high zone shells (Cover 3, Cover 1) that let a rangy free safety play the post and keep him out of the box
Year 1: core special teamer and third safety in dime, playing the deep middle on obvious passing downs. Ceiling: starting single-high free safety in a coverage-first defense that never asks him to fit the run alone.
Split-safety defenses that rotate the free safety into the box as an eighth defender, or man-heavy schemes that ask him to travel with tight ends and physical slots
The Colts' immediate move to cornerback showed how the league graded the frame: coverage asset first, run-support defender never.
Jaylin Simpson | Safety | Auburn | 2023 Highlights
Senior year at free safety: four interceptions, the opening-week pick-six and the range that made him a Thorpe semifinalist.
Jaylin Simpson / CB / Auburn / 2022 / Full Highlights
Junior season on the boundary — the corner footwork and press-bail reps that later showed up at safety.
Jaylin Simpson / CB / Auburn / 2021 / Full Highlights
Sophomore tape as a rotational corner, first career interception and early special teams work.
Simpson is a converted cornerback playing the deep middle, and that is the entire identity of the evaluation. Five years in the program, two positions, one constant: he tracks the football better than almost anyone in the class at his weight. Auburn asked him to play the post, rotate down into the slot, and carry vertical seams, and he handled all three without a change in speed.
The senior production tells the story — 36 tackles, four interceptions, 87 return yards and a score, a 13-yard fumble return, first-team All-SEC honors and a Jim Thorpe Award semifinal nod. The flags are just as loud. He is listed at 179 pounds and plays there, which shows up in the alley against downhill backs and on stalk blocks he cannot shed. Missed tackles come in bunches when he has to take on mass instead of angle.
Boards had him as a Day 3 developmental safety with special teams value: a two-year contributor with real coverage instincts and a body that had not caught up to the job. At 164, Indianapolis was buying range and ball skills late, then immediately moved him back to corner — a tell that the league saw the frame as a coverage-only asset.
- 01
Ball tracking
plays the deep ball like a receiver, times the leap, and turned four senior interceptions into 87 return yards and a touchdown.
- 02
Corner feet at safety
three years on the boundary gave him a pedal and transition most single-high defenders simply do not have.
- 03
Range from the post
legitimate 4.45 speed that lets him play the middle of the field alone and still cap the far hash.
- 04
Diagnosis speed
reads the quarterback's shoulders and route stems early, which is why he arrives on throws he has no business reaching.
- 05
Special teams value
covered kicks at Auburn and profiles as a gunner, the exact trait that keeps a light DB on a 53-man roster.
- 01
Play strength
at 179 pounds he cannot stack blocks or take on pulling guards, and offenses attacked him in the alley all season.
- 02
Tackling volume
an angle-and-ankles finisher who slides off contact when ball carriers run through his chest.
- 03
Zone-to-man translation
asked to travel in the slot, his transition gets grabby and he leans on contact he will not get in the NFL.
- 04
Ball production over technique
several of the interceptions came from quarterback error rather than perfect leverage or pattern match.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.45sp50
- Vertical
- 39.5inp50
- Broad jump
- 133inp50
- Three-cone
- —s
- Shuttle
- —s
- Bench
- —rep
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | Auburn | 8 | 14 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 0 |
| 2021 | Auburn | 11 | 27 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 0 |
| 2022 | Auburn | 12 | 38 | 0 | 2 | 5 | 0 |
| 2023 | Auburn | 13 | 36 | 0 | 4 | 3 | 0 |
| Career | — | 44 | 115 | 0 | 7 | 14 | 0 |
Auburn 2019-2023 (redshirt 2019, no recorded stats). Season lines verified against cfbstats.com; career totals are the sum of recorded seasons (Auburn bio lists 118 career tackles and 7 INT).
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Honors
- First-team All-SEC (2023, coaches)
- Jim Thorpe Award semifinalist (2023)
- Auburn team interceptions leader (2023)
- Five-year Auburn contributor at corner and safety
Light, fast DB who lives on the practice-squad-to-gameday shuttle and earns snaps on kick coverage.
Undersized safety who survived on angles and range and turned into a long-term starter.
Athletic-testing college safety whose body never held up to an NFL positional fit.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Two years after being drafted, Simpson has appeared in one NFL game with eight tackles, having bounced across three organizations that all developed him as a corner rather than a safety. Green Bay's two-year deal and his 2026 camp reps are the first sign the coverage traits may finally get snaps.
Indianapolis drafted him as a safety and moved him to cornerback before the first camp practice, which set the tone for everything after. He was waived on August 27 of his rookie year, re-signed to the Colts practice squad, and was poached by the Jets off that squad in December 2024 without playing a defensive snap for either club. New York waived him in August 2025. Green Bay signed him days later, cut him at the roster deadline, kept him on the practice squad, elevated him for Week 13, and signed him to the active roster on December 30 — one game, eight tackles, his entire NFL production through 2025.
The retrospective is straightforward: the interception tape got him drafted and the weight kept him off the field. Every stop asked the same question — can a 179-pound defender hold up in the run fits and on special teams long enough to let the ball skills matter — and three organizations answered by developing him as a corner instead. Green Bay finally handed him a two-year deal and a real camp, and by August 2026 Matt LaFleur was publicly crediting him with making an impact in the secondary. For pick 164 that is a fair outcome rather than a failure, but the range that made him a Thorpe semifinalist still has not been trusted with a full season of defensive snaps.
Data note: Auburn 2019-2023 (redshirt 2019, no recorded stats). Season lines verified against cfbstats.com; career totals are the sum of recorded seasons (Auburn bio lists 118 career tackles and 7 INT).