Jaren Hall 2023 NFL Draft profile: Scout report for the BYU QB
Jaren Hall, BYU: 6‘0“, 205 pounds; RS SR.
One of the top-1000 overall recruits back in 2016, Jaren Hall spent two years on a religious mission only saw real action in a couple of games through the first three years (46 pass and 33 rush attempts), including a medical redshirt in 2020.
He finally became the starter the following year, when he completed 63.9 percent of his pass attempts for nearly 2,600 yards and 20 touchdowns versus five INTs, along with another 300 yards and three more scores on the ground.
This past season, Jaren Hall was named the Independent Offensive Player of the Year, completing 66 percent of his passes for nearly 3,200 yards and 31 TDs versus six INTs, along with another 350 yards and three TDs rushing.
Jaren Hall scout report: Strengths
+ Shows good mechanics to get the ball out on time in the quick game against soft zones.
+ Love the way he gets to the top of his drop without a hitch and can let the ball fly down the field, dropping some dimes over the outside shoulder of the flanker on go routes.
+ BYU coaches had Jaren Hall throw blaze-outs to the single receiver all the way across the field, when they put the formation into the boundary.
+ Has the arm strength to release off his back-foot and put the ball in stride for his targets on 40-yard throws.
+ Combining the pace he can put on the ball and some of the high-level location allow him to defeat coverage even when he’s a beat late and his receivers regularly were able to bring it in, even as they had somebody right on their back.
+ His touch throws on deep crossers and stuff like that is about as good as for anybody in this class.
+ Throws some absolute strikes into voids in zone coverage, such as honey-hole shots versus cover-two. Jaren Hall regularly trusts himself to fit the ball between the corner and safety on the deep out of flood concepts or fire in skinny posts versus three-deep.
+ On deep balls, Hall puts the ball to where his receivers can take advantage of their size and make plays on the ball. He’s one of the best post throwers we have in college football.
+ Plays the position with a high level of poise and confidence.
+ Good timing-based passer, who regularly releases the ball before his receivers are out of their breaks.
+ Does a nice job of holding safeties in place in order to take shots outside the numbers against single-high looks or create enough of a window to bang in seam routes and in-cuts against two-deep coverages.
+ Is aware of and can layer balls over flat defenders to either side of the field.
+ Places the ball to where ancillary zone defenders can’t close in time on throws and his targets can work away from guys that end up matching them, when it looks like the coverage is there.
+ Understands the idea behind certain play-action concepts, to keep safeties occupied with the deep post and hitting a dig or crosser underneath it.
+ Jaren Hall shows the maturity to dump it off to his back if the deep concept isn’t there or the area underneath is voided. Has a career big-time throw percentage if 6.1% vs. a turnover-worthy play rate of just 2.4%, according to PFF.
+ Very comfortable executing rollouts, waiting for defenders to commit and hitting the right target.
+ Such an easy thrower on the move, who can deliver the ball on target off the wrong foot or both of them in the air at times. BYU heavily utilized that on bootlegs.
+ Has gotten so much better at avoiding negative plays, decreasing his time-to-throw and pressure-to-sack conversion rate in all three years of action (2.78 seconds and just 11.9% respectively this past year).
+ Jaren Hall shows the light feet to dove-tail around pressure point and slide back up, to re-find his platform.
+ Makes some plays that raise your eyebrows, trying to spin out to the left side and having to spot up because someone takes away the corner for him, yet he can still drive the ball to the opposite sideline.
+ However, he can also make a free nickel blitzer miss by dipping up as if he was stepping up and bubble around that guy.
+ Has that extra gear as a runner to beat edge defenders around the corner when he has to make something happen himself. You see the quick burst to take a lane opening up in front of him against zone coverage, to punish defenses with first downs (ran a 4.63 at his pro day).
+ Jaren Hall isn’t somebody you can keep leave unoccupied potentially pulling the ball on zone read plays. Just ask Baylor, who let him run untouched for a 55-yard touchdown in 2021, as everything tried to crash inside on a third-and-one, or Utah, who he got to the sideline against and outraced for a 66-yard score.
+ More than a third of his carries last season (32 of 86) resulted in first downs or touchdowns, in part because in the designed plays for him. He does a nice job of following and even partially guiding lead-blockers with the off-arm, along with the shiftiness once he gets to the open field.
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Jaren Hall scout report: Weaknesses
– You feel like Jaren Hall allows his height to affect his release point and you see a bunch of throws over the middle end up too high, along with allowing his arm angle to break. His worst passer rating came on those passes with 10-19 yards of depth between the numbers (27-of-45 for 457 yards, three TDs and INTs each).
– Tends to stare down his receiver when he waits for them to break open, which not allows coverage to close in, but also D-linemen to read his eyes and get their hands up. Had 11 passes batted down over the past two seasons (672 combined attempts).
– Jaren Hall needs to do a better job of feeling rushers closing in on him and holding onto the ball. He fumbled six times of the past two seasons (846 combined drop-backs and designed runs), resulting in a 41.1 PFF grade under pressure.
– While he did have a couple of splash throws, too often he would just overshoot some his receivers, who were open by quite a bit. He had a very inconsistent week overall at the Senior Bowl. Those showed up at BYU as well, when he had to rush his motion a little bit.
– 52 completions for 448 yards and five touchdowns this past season came off screens.
Jaren Hall scout report: Grade
Just on the surface, Jaren Hall came in smaller than I expected at the combine (right at the six-foot mark). He already turned 25 years old a couple of weeks ago and has an extensive injury history. That’s a rough combination before you get to the tape.
Whether it’s the inconsistency in release point, tipping off defenders with his eyes or not being aware of pressure off the edge, there are some things that worry you there too.
With that being said, there are a bunch of impressive throws with him to all levels of the field, along with start–stop quickness in and out of the pocket, some creativity for secondary windows and throwing opportunities opening up, as well as the capability of putting the ball where it needs to be off-platform.
Outside of the Hendon Hooker/Dorian Thompson-Robinson tier that I consider in the third-to-fourth round range, Jaren Hall is my favorite developmental option with some starter potential on day three, even though I could see some team take him a day earlier.
Grade: Fifth round
You might like other 2023 NFL Draft Scouting Reports: Tyree Wilson (EDGE), Texas Tech; Will Anderson Jr. (EDGE), Alabama; Jaxon Smith-Njigba (WR), Ohio; Zay Flowers (WR), Boston; Jordan Addison (WR), USC; Jordan Addison (WR), USC; Quentin Johnston (WR), TCU; Zach Charbonnet (RB), UCLA; Bijan Robinson (RB), Texas.
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