Nehemiah
Pritchett.
Nehemiah
Pritchett.
Auburn· 6'0"· 190 lb· 4.36s 40
"Pritchett can run with anybody on the boundary and still finish a season with one interception — the coverage is the product, the ball production never was."Pre-draft read
Pritchett is a boundary press corner at 6-0, 190, and his game starts at the line. He is patient in press, uses length to disrupt the release, then runs. Auburn asked him to travel with the opponent's best perimeter receiver in man for four seasons, often with no help over the top, and he stayed in phase down the sideline better than the ball production suggests.
The second trait is pure speed: 4.36 with a 1.49 ten-yard split, which lets him recover when he opens his hips a beat early. In zone he is functional, not instinctive, keying the quarterback late instead of driving early. Against the run he comes downhill to tackle, though the frame limits him at the point. The signature is length plus long speed on an island.
Press-man heavy defense with single-high or two-deep man-match structures
Year 1 as CB4 and a four-phase special-teamer; ceiling is a starting boundary corner in a man-heavy scheme who erases one side of the field vertically without producing takeaways.
A pattern-match zone defense that asks corners to read route combinations and drive on the throw from off alignment; also a bad match against divisions full of 220-pound X receivers who win on contact.
Value is tied directly to how often the defense lets him press; off-coverage snaps waste his best trait.
Nehemiah Pritchett | CB | Auburn | 2023 Highlights
Senior tape at Auburn: press reps and vertical coverage on the boundary.
NFL Draft Film: Nehemiah Pritchett / CB / Auburn / 2023 Full Highlights
Full-game cutups from his final college season.
Nehemiah Pritchett College Highlights
Seahawks draft-day reel covering his four years of Auburn coverage snaps.
Pritchett is a long-limbed boundary corner whose identity is man coverage on the perimeter. He is a four-year SEC starter who spent his career shadowing size on the outside, and the traits are easy to see: press technique, hip fluidity to turn and run, and elite straight-line speed that keeps him attached on nine routes.
The production never matched the coverage. Across 2020-2023 he logged 111 tackles, 26 pass breakups and only three interceptions in 45 games, and the 2022 season — 37 tackles, 4.5 tackles for loss, eight breakups — was the closest he came to a complete year before a 2023 campaign shortened to nine games. Auburn's defense left him isolated often, which flattered the tape and exposed the flags at the same time: he plays grabby at the top of the route, his short-area quickness lags his long speed, and the play strength is thin enough that bigger receivers can box him out on stalks and back-shoulder throws.
Boards had him as a Day 3 corner in the fourth-to-sixth range, a developmental press body with core special-teams value. Seattle taking him at 136 was a scheme buy, not a projection to start.
- 01
Press technique
Patient at the line with a strong two-hand punch; he disrupts timing on the release without lunging and stays square long enough to force a declared stem.
- 02
Recovery speed
4.36 speed and a 1.49 ten-yard split let him make up ground when a receiver stacks him, which keeps vertical mistakes from becoming touchdowns.
- 03
Man coverage on an island
Auburn asked him to travel with the opponent's top perimeter target with no safety help, and he handled the assignment for four straight seasons.
- 04
Length in the phase
Uses his frame to squeeze the catch point on fades and comebacks, contesting throws he does not intercept and knocking down 26 passes in college.
- 05
Special-teams profile
Willing gunner and cover man; the speed and toughness give him a defined path to snaps on all four units from day one.
- 01
Ball production
Three interceptions in 45 games; he plays through hands more often than he plays the ball, and the takeaway rate never grew.
- 02
Grabby at the top
Late hands at the break point drew flags in the SEC and will draw more against NFL officiating on dig and comeback routes.
- 03
Play strength
At 190 pounds he gets stacked by bigger receivers on back-shoulder throws and struggles to disengage from perimeter blocks.
- 04
Zone feel
Reads the quarterback a step late in spot-drop coverage; he drifts instead of driving and gives up throws underneath his zone.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.36sp50
- Vertical
- 34.5inp50
- Broad jump
- —in
- Three-cone
- —s
- Shuttle
- —s
- Bench
- —rep
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | Auburn | 11 | 25 | 0 | 1 | 10 | 0 |
| 2021 | Auburn | 13 | 27 | 0 | 1 | 5 | 0 |
| 2022 | Auburn | 12 | 37 | 1 | 0 | 8 | 1 |
| 2023 | Auburn | 9 | 22 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 0 |
| Career | — | 45 | 111 | 1 | 3 | 26 | 1 |
Verified against cfbstats; 2020-2023 seasons sum exactly to the career line. His 2019 true-freshman year has no individual cfbstats page and is not itemized here rather than estimated. Fumble recoveries are not broken out by cfbstats and are left unreported.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Long press corner who sticks around for years as a special-teamer and spot starter.
Day 2/3 corner who grew into starter snaps on traits and scheme fit rather than ball production.
Toolsy Seattle boundary corner whose penalties and lack of ball skills capped him as a fill-in.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Seattle used him exactly the way a fifth-round corner usually gets used. As a 2024 rookie he appeared in 10 games with one start, logged 11 tackles and lived on special teams, where the staff publicly credited his coverage work. Year two brought availability: 17 games in 2025, 12 tackles and two pass defenses, still mostly special teams and rotational corner snaps, with a fourth-down breakup on Marvin Harrison Jr. in Week 10 as the signature defensive rep of his season. He was on the roster through Seattle's Super Bowl LX run and came back for a third camp in 2026 taking first-team outside reps and pushing for a real defensive role behind Devon Witherspoon.
In hindsight this is what a good Day 3 corner pick looks like at the two-year mark, even without box-score evidence. Nothing about the evaluation was wrong — the coverage traits were real, the ball skills never arrived, and the frame still limits him against bigger receivers. What Seattle bought was three years of cheap special-teams value with an outside chance the press ability grows into starter snaps, and by 2026 that outside chance is live rather than dead.
Data note: Verified against cfbstats; 2020-2023 seasons sum exactly to the career line. His 2019 true-freshman year has no individual cfbstats page and is not itemized here rather than estimated. Fumble recoveries are not broken out by cfbstats and are left unreported.