Too Deep 96 #22-#26: Singers, Gamers and Short-Armed Blockers

In which Nic Scourton plays Fortnite, Will Campbell survives the Tale of the Tape and more.

This edition of the Too Deep 96 features one guard, two edge rushers, a cornerback and a linebacker. It’s that kind of draft, folks! But just because these prospects play non-glamour positions, it does not make their backstories or profiles any less interesting!

#22 Will Campbell, Tackle/Guard, LSU

The following draft profile will not obsess over the length of Campbell’s arms. It will, however, include a video of a cartoon T-Rex because that will make for a fun/conversation-sparking image for social posts.

Campbell was a three-year starter at LSU. He earned first-team all-SEC notice in 2023 and 2024 and was a consensus All America selection in 2024.

Some scouting profiles begin with “awards roundups” like the one above as part of a template. Others, like this one, start with the accolades because the best thing about Campbell is that he has gotten the job done at an award-winning level against top competition for several years.

Campbell lacks any one outstanding trait. He’s not long, huge or OMG athletic. Edge rushers with elite quickness or moves can get around him. Powerful defenders can bull-rush him. Campbell is effective on the second level as a run blocker but whiffs at times.

Campbell has great balance – he bends his knees and keeps his center of gravity over his feet like he is posing for a blocking textbook – and he uses technique and tenacity to stay latched to defenders who appear to have beaten him. The issue is whether those skills will translate to the NFL, when edge rushers like Mykel Williams or Princely Umanmielen go from the toughest opponents on the schedule to perhaps the easiest. Raw traits – including arm length – matter more as the level of competition increases.

Many evaluators consider Campbell a guard at the NFL level. That makes sense: he can excel as a tough technician on the inside without worrying about what happens when Myles Garrett beats him in the first three steps. But Campbell was also incongruously high on many media draft boards entering the Combine, in part because of his recruiting status and major-program accolades.

Campbell is a low-risk pick who can anchor an interior line. His upside, however, appears capped at “an anchor on the interior line.” He’ll be a much better value late in the first round than at the top.

Quote of Note: Campbell, discussing his 32.625-inch arms at the Combine. "I think that I've shown everything I need to on tape to show that I can play tackle at an elite level. You can go look at my tape, there's not one when I get beat and you say, 'Oh, that's because he has shorter arms.' Obviously I don't have stereotypical offensive tackle arm length. I'm aware of that and that's something that I use every week to game plan and prepare how to attack different defenders."

OK, About Arm Length

NFL evaluators set minimum benchmarks and “ideal” measurements for players at certain positions. Those figures serve as guardrails, because scouts and other experts are just as likely as YouTube draftniks to fall in love with a player after a few reps at the Shrine Game and begin excusing details like the fact that he weighs 131 pounds.

Thirty-three inches is around the minimum benchmark for an offensive tackle; Andrew Thomas represents the ideal at about 36 inches. Arm length impacts how great a radius a blocker can impact without reaching or lunging, allows him to apply a punch over a greater distance and do all sorts of other little things that can make a big difference in close combat. No one questioned boxing experts when they focused on “reach” for about a century, but draft analysts are treated like weirdos for obsessing over such matters.

A Campbell type with shorter arms can compensate with quickness and outstanding technique. But a lineman with quickness, outstanding technique AND longer arms could use that skill set to dominate instead of compensating. So arm length is not a huge deal, but it interacts with other traits in a way that can become a big deal. Thank you for attending my Ted Talk.

#23 Jalon Walker, Edge Rusher, Georgia

Walker may have the best voice in the 2024 draft class. He sang in his church choir and played the Tin Man in a high school production of The Wizard of Oz. He sang the national anthem before a few sporting events. He was even the voice of an SEC promo.

It’s worth noting here that prospects with great voices sometimes get overdrafted. Anthony Richardson sounds like Barry White. Panthers tackle Ickey Ekwonu was a theater kid. Both were Top 10 draft picks. Neither has lived up to those selections. REAL FOOTBALL PLAYERS CANNOT CARRY A TUNE. Terry Bradshaw is not the exception.

Walker is well-built, quick-footed and twitchy. Kirby Smart used him as a hybrid stand-up edge defender and inside linebacker. Walker’s primary role when playing linebacker was to attack the line of scrimmage, often on a delayed blitz. Sports Info Solutions lists 183 snaps in pass coverage for Walker but just three targets; “coverage” usually meant the short middle zone, a few steps back from the center, where Walker could spy on the opposing quarterback. We’re talking about a pure pass rusher who can play Mike in a package, not someone to play a Fred Warner-type role.

Walker’s hybrid role on a defense full of playmakers creates an evaluation challenge. He was deployed to exploit the weak links in the opponent’s offensive line. His biggest plays appear to have been schemed up for him. Many wins come from just shooting a gap or from a blitz package or front designed to create a mismatch for him. Blockers who do latch onto him can sometimes drive him out to the parking lot.

Walker reminds me of the sort of defender the Steelers draft and develop over a season or two into a superstar outside linebacker. Carter won’t be effective if aligned head-up against NFL tackles for 30 pass rushes per game. But in the right scheme, given time to refine his moves, he could be special.

#24 Nic Scourton, Edge Rusher, Texas A&M

Scourton is an avid Fortnite player, as this October profile by Carter Yates for Dave Campbell’s Texas Football reveals:

The only thing scarier than Nic Scourton on the football field is Nic Scourton in the Fortnite video game.

Before being the anchor of Texas A&M’s defensive line with 11 tackles-for-loss and 4.5 sacks in seven games, Scourton was the best gamer in the Bryan, Texas, area. On Saturday, the adrenaline surge LSU quarterback Garrett Nussmeier gets when he sees Scourton chasing will mirror how Scourton’s best friend, Andrew Buban, feels when he tries to shoot Scourton’s “Fortnite” character, only to watch him build a protective castle the instant he loses some health points.

“In two seconds, you’d be in a box,” Andrew said. “I used to play pretty intensely, too, and I don’t think I could ever beat him.”

Outstanding lede work, Carter Yates; no notes. It’s also refreshing, if disorienting, to see a writer for Dave Campbell’s Texas Football start a player profile by praising his gaming prowess. It’s like opening the Roman Catholic Star-Herald and reading, “Polecules are fun and fulfilling!”

Yates’ profile of Scouton goes on to note that Scourton moved in with Buban’s family to escape a complicated home situation, which probably reassured readers a bit. Don’t worry about the vidja games, Hank and Boomhauer; it’s football that will ultimately save him.

Scourton shared the Aggies defensive line with Shemar Stewart. Scourton was more productive, with five sacks to Stewart’s 1.5. Scourton recorded 10 sacks for Purdue in 2023 before portalling. He weighed 257 pounds at the Combine but looks like a thiccer fellow on tape. Stewart, meanwhile, was a workout rock star in Indy. Stewart is considered the better prospect because, as gamers might say, toolz r00l when it comes to evaluating edge rushers*.

Scourton’s best attributes are his ability to fight through blocks and make tackles or pick up second-effort clean-up sacks. He’s also very young, having turned 20 last November. His initial quickness is fine, but he’s a lumbering open-field runner, and he doesn’t often defeat blockers with his initial move.

Scourton looks more like the rotational end who plays on rushing downs than a future double-digit sack producer. He may still be a work in progress, however, due to his age, the Purdue transfer and what may be a changing body type. I like his upside and his ability to start his career as someone who can be useful on early downs.

#25 Maxwell Hairston, CB, Kentucky

Hairston is a 5-foot-11 cornerback with three career pick-6s who ran a 4.28-second forty at the Combine. He picked off five passes in 2023 and was off to a strong start last year before suffering a shoulder injury which wiped out most of the season.

Against Georgia early last season, Hairston was targeted four times in 27 coverage snaps, allowing just one 13-yard reception.

Against Ohio (a slightly less dangerous opponent) the following week, Hairston jumped a route for a pick-6 and forced a fumble in run support.

When he returned from injury late in the season against Texas, Hairston allowed two catches on four targets while on the field for 32 coverage snaps. He recorded two passes defensed in the end zone, one by outjumping Isaiah Bond (perhaps with a wee smidge of contact) and swatting a potential touchdown away.

Hairston handles man coverage well but is at his best in underneath zones, where he can jump routes, blow up screens and hold his own in run support. But his tape mostly shows a cornerback dropping back over and over again while quarterbacks look for open receivers on the opposite side of the field. That’s often a sign the cornerback you are watching is really good.

#26 Carson Schwesinger, LB, UCLA

Schwesinger is one of those linebackers whose biggest flaw is that he is a linebacker entering an NFL that prefers to build all of its defenses around two pure pass rushers, two 320-pound juggernauts, six cornerbacks and one overtaxed designated Saquon Barkley chaser.

Schwesinger led all power-conference defenders with 83 solo tackles in 2024; Buffalo’s Shaun Dolac (whom we will meet next week) also notched 83. Sports Info Solutions charged Schwesinger with just two missed and two broken tackles; his broken/missed tackle rate of 2.9% was best in the nation.

Schwesinger is a little lean but quick and has excellent off-ball linebacker soft skills. He triggers quickly when he diagnoses the play. He finds the most direct route to the football. He’s alert in coverage and picks up receivers trying to slip into the flat quickly, often taking away easy bootleg or RPO plays. He drops into zone coverage effectively. He bursts through the line suddenly as a delayed blitzer.

The bigger, splashier Jihaad Campbell ranked ahead of Schwesinger on many media boards before the Combine. Campbell may have slipped due to injury concerns, but Schwesinger may have risen simply because more eyes look at more film and tape after the college football season ends. Schwesinger was also a UCLA walk-on who spent two years on the bench before blossoming in 2024, whereas recruiters were practically circling the parking lot of Campbell’s middle school. Recruiting reputations cast a long shadow on scouting reports.

Schwesinger could also max out as a package defender because lots of talented linebackers end up as package defenders. Then again, the NFL also needs more Saquon/Derrick Henry/Jahmyr Gibbs deterrents, and that's a role Schwesinger could play.

*Sources inform me that “gamers” say nothing that remotely looks or sounds like toolz r00l. No, they didn’t say things like that in 2006, either.

In the next installment of the Too Deep 96: Finally, some skill position players!