Craig
Woodson.
Craig
Woodson.
California· 6'0"· 200 lb· 4.45s 40
"A versatile, high-volume tackler with invaluable special teams acumen, Woodson’s NFL role hinges on whether his instincts and downhill trigger can offset his stiff hips and advanced age."Pre-draft read
Six-year Cal starter who lined up everywhere the defense needed him: deep-half free safety, box overhang, and nickel over the slot, with a downhill hard-edge demeanor as the connective trait. Best snaps come with the play in front of him, where he triggers on run keys, fills the alley with intent, and finishes as a wrap-and-drive tackler.
Coverage value is built on veteran feel instead of twitch: he disguises late, carries tight ends physically at the stem, and can body up in the slot without panicking. Hips are sturdy rather than sudden, so he plays to leverage and spacing instead of mirroring. The signature is assignment reliability across three alignments, and he covers kicks like he wants the job.
Split-safety base (quarters/Cover 2) that rotates safeties by call and asks the back end to play with vision and communication rather than isolated man technique.
Year 1: rotational third safety and four-phase special teams contributor who can start immediately if a starter goes down. Ceiling: durable multi-year starting safety and defensive communicator who plays 1,000 snaps across two alignments.
A single-high-only defense that leaves one safety on an island in the deep middle with no help, or a heavy man-match scheme that asks him to travel with slot receivers in isolation on third down.
Value spikes in defenses that treat their two safeties as interchangeable and rotate late, because his best trait is executing multiple assignments cleanly rather than winning one of them at an elite level.
Craig Woodson 2024 Regular Season Highlights | Cal S
2025 NFL DRAFT HIGHLIGHTS: Craig Woodson | S | California
Craig Woodson - Highlights - New England Patriots vs Chargers - NFL Wild Card Playoffs 2025
Woodson is the rare Day 3 safety whose evaluation rests almost entirely on operating volume. Cal asked him to be the deep post one snap, the extra hat against gap runs the next, and the nickel over a slot receiver after that, and he answered all three without the communication or leverage errors that usually undo multi-hat defenders. The football character was never in doubt: two-year captain, All-Academic honoree, four-phase teams player.
The production supports the tape. Seventy-plus tackles in each of his last three seasons, a career-high 81 in 2023, and a senior year with nine pass breakups, two interceptions and third-team All-ACC honors. The flags are also real. He is stiff through transition, gets moved by play-action and quarterback eye manipulation, and his ball production never matched his coverage grades. He also turned 24 before the draft after six years in Berkeley and a lost 2021 to a preseason knee injury.
Boards had him in the fourth-to-fifth-round range, with the athletic questions largely quieted by a 4.45 forty in Indianapolis. New England taking him at 106 was a bet on immediate defensive floor and special teams value rather than upside, which is what a secondary with two big-bodied strong safeties already rostered actually needed.
- 01
Multi-alignment operator
logged meaningful 2024 snap counts at free safety, in the box and over the slot, and never looked out of place or out of position in any of the three roles.
- 02
Downhill run defender
triggers on his key, fills the alley with intent and is a genuine short-yardage and goal-line asset for a 200-pound safety.
- 03
Reliable tackler
wraps and drives in tight quarters and in space, with the open-field discipline to take away the cutback instead of lunging for the highlight.
- 04
Physical against tight ends
comfortable getting hands on at the stem in man coverage and disrupting the timing of the release rather than conceding it.
- 05
Special teams volume
roughly 450 career special teams snaps across kick and punt phases, and he has publicly embraced staying in those roles as a pro.
- 01
Tight hips
stiff through transition and change of direction, which shows up when he has to flip and carry vertical routes from depth.
- 02
Manipulated by eyes
bites on play-action and quarterback misdirection from the free safety spot, and can be late triggering downhill as a result.
- 03
Thin ball production
five career interceptions and no history of punching the ball out, so the takeaway equity is limited for a deep defender.
- 04
Age and injury profile
turned 24 before the draft after six years on campus, including a 2021 season lost to a preseason knee injury.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.45sp50
- Vertical
- 36inp50
- Broad jump
- 127inp50
- Three-cone
- —s
- Shuttle
- —s
- Bench
- 13repp50
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | California | 4 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2020 | California | 4 | 18 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| 2022 | California | 12 | 76 | 0 | 2 | 3 | 0 |
| 2023 | California | 13 | 80 | 0.5 | 1 | 4 | 0 |
| 2024 | California | 13 | 70 | 0 | 2 | 7 | 0 |
| Career | — | 46 | 246 | 0.5 | 5 | 16 | 0 |
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Physical, box-first safety whose value comes from run support and volume rather than takeaway production.
Undersized multi-alignment safety who turned assignment reliability and downhill tackling into a long-term starting job.
Core special teams safety with real starting stretches but a career defined by rotation and situational deployment.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
New England did not treat him like a fourth-rounder. Woodson played all 17 games as a rookie and started 15 of them, finishing with 79 total tackles, 42 solo, 2.5 tackles for loss, three pass breakups and two fumble recoveries, and he became the first Patriots rookie defensive back with four tackles for loss in a season since the stat was tracked in 1999. He was on the field for the deep-safety snaps New England could not fill internally, then held the job through a run that ended in Super Bowl LX, adding 30 tackles, an interception and six stops across four postseason games.
In hindsight, this looks like the pick that quietly worked. The concerns about age and hip stiffness were legitimate, but they were priced into a fourth-round selection, and what New England bought instead was a rookie who could be assigned anything and executed it. The ball production ceiling is still the open question: zero regular-season interceptions is a real limitation for a safety asked to play deep. If he never becomes a takeaway creator, he is a long-term starter without a Pro Bowl case, which at pick 106 is a clear win.