Darius Robinson scouting report: Exploring the Missouri edge defender's strengths and weaknesses

One of the 1,000 top recruits in the nation in 2019, Darius Robinson has to earn his stripes early on at Missouri, increasing his playing time throughout the first three years (34 combined tackles, only one sack), before establishing himself as a starter in 2022 (35 stops, 5.5 TFLs and 3.5 sacks).

However, it was this past season that he truly broke out, making first-team All-SEC thanks to 43 total stops, 14.5 TFLs, 8.5 sacks, a fumble forced and recovered each.

Profile: 6-foot-5, 290 pounds; RS SR.

Breaking down Darius Robinson's scouting report

Run defense:

Plays with heavy hands at the point of attack and presses off blockers in the run game with authority
Frequently will outreach opposite blockers with 34.5-inch hands and massive (10 and 5/8-inch) hands, in order to maintain leverage on the gap
Asking tight-ends to seal him on the backside is a recipe for disaster unless you aim off-tackle the other way, since Robinson might put that guy on roller-skates and eliminate any cutback opportunities
Has the physicality to slide into the 4i spot for certain matchups and deal with combos
Showcases the contact and upper-body strength to fight off multiple blockers and own his space near the point of attack
You see Darius Robinson mess up power/counter plays single-handedly, where locks out against the down-block, pulls the man forward to face-plant as he feels him lean in too much and takes on the first puller in order to create traffic
Regularly stonewalled pulling linemen tasked with kick-outs against him in general
Does a great job of patiently playing the mesh-point on read-option plays and not giving the quarterback a clean key to read

Pass-rush:

There’s some real violence in his hands and you just know linemen facing him will have bruises all across their arms the day after facing Robinson
Frequently buries those paws inside the chest of tackles and works the depth of pocket with them, really testing their ability to anchor
When he sells out for the bull-rush, you see him take that guy in front of him all most of the way there, then disengage late by pulling cloth or push off and get hits on the quarterback
Blockers who try sit on power will be surprised with how quickly he can get by them with a rapid swim-move
Has more lateral agility to stress the edges of blockers’ frames than you’d anticipate
Will stress blockers up the B-gap when given the freedom to do so or slanting across on E-T twists, being able to contort his upper body away from contact and crash through their reach
Powers through tight-ends and chips by backs as if they’re just road-bumps
Regularly chops down or lifts up one arm of blockers straining to hold their ground in order to create angles towards the quarterback, with the sudden burst to run them down
Logged 42 total pressures across 277 pass-rush snaps last season despite having an extra hand coming his way regularly

Weaknesses:

There’s certainly room for improvement with Darius Robinson when it comes to block recognition, not allowing guys to seal/wall him off away from the point of attack
Can get a little reckless with his run fits and rush lanes in general, forcing the rest of the defense to make up for it
Needs to do a better job of countering the outside hand of tackles and not allow them to stab at his chest in order to take control of reps, along with setting up his speed-to-power moves more effectively instead of immediately reaching out those arms
Doesn’t have a comprehensive rush plan or ability to access counters when needed at this stage
May be labelled as a tweener by some teams, lacking the speed in his second and third step to win around the hoop but also not showing the mental capacity to ID and counter the first steps of and place his hands accordingly onto offensive linemen in that more condensed space on the interior

Darius Robinson's 2024 NFL Draft prospect

Some of the hype around Darius Robinson coming out of Senior Bowl week – where he flashed the things you also saw on tape but wasn’t dominant by any means – cooled off at the combine, when his 4.95 in the 40 was a 10th of a second slower than any other edge defender and his 9’3” broad jump was also at the bottom of the list.

I don’t think those numbers quite represent the type of athlete he is, because seeing his first step explosion off the snap at 290 pounds is still rare. Darius Robinson pairs that with incredible jolt and great length to give him the potential of becoming an elite run-defender if he increases his awareness for blocking schemes and how to respond to them.

As a pass-rusher, he’s stil more of a one-trick, relying heavily on his power to take charge of reps early and then find openings later on. However, becoming more pro-active with actually defeating the hands and attacking one half of blockers will be key if he wants to find long-term success coming off the edge.

I look at Darius Robinson more as a base D-end on the strong-side, potentially for odd or even fronts and to make his living inside on passing downs, along with using his force to condense the pocket from tilted, wider alignments occasionally. Early second round seems appropriate.

Grade: Early second round