Mohamed Kamara scouting report: Exploring the Colorado State edge defender's strengths and weaknesses

A zero-star recruit in 2019, Mohamed Kamara was fairly quiet as a rotational player for the Rams his first two years, but started to emerge as a junior, as he recorded 80 tackles, 25.5 for loss and 15 sacks over the next two.

This past season he put up career-highs across the board in tackles (56), TFLs (17), sacks (13), with two forced fumbles and one scooped up for a touchdown. That made him the Mountain West Defensive Player of the Year.

Details: 6-foot-1, 245 pounds; RS SR.

Breaking down Mohamed Kamara's scouting report

Strengths

Run defense

Mohamed Kamara comes in with his hands ready to strike in the run game.
Being on the shorter end, Kamara consistently wins the leverage battle, showcases good hand-placement and strength to extend against blockers on the front-side (of zone concepts).
Against tight-ends trying to drive-block against him at the point of attack, at best this creates stalemates usually.
The Rams asked Mohamed Kamara to stunt inside and make plays on early downs, where he’d find ways to deconstruct blocks on an angle and get the initial wrap on the running back.
If unblocked, he doesn’t decelerate as big bodies are moving behind the line of scrimmage and will bang around with them, showcasing the contact balance and because he plays that low, being able to stay on his feet.
Works hard from the backside, to work over the top of or circle around opponents and trip up ball-carriers before they can really get going.
Showcases tremendous awareness against screen passes to the back and is able to run them down single-handedly on a couple of occasions.
Was peeled off the edge occasionally and forced quarterbacks to turn down stick or hook curls.

Pass-rush

Mohamed Kamara turns the corner by attacking the outside hand of tackles with a strong rip-move, and you see him change up his stance in accordance to which pass-sets he expects and how he intends on countering them.
Even when those guys are able to fit into his chest, Kamara feels when that outside hand isn’t firm, so he rip through and flatten at the top of the rush.
Will throw in hard jabs with the inside foot to create a softer corner for himself to win outside and then times up how he attacks that near-hand of blockers.
Generally does well to counter two-handed strike either swiping down or grabbing and lifting up to keep his frame clean.
Effectively converts speed to power, angling more directly at tackles after threatening up the field and then burying his hands into their chest to create displacement.
Brings the force to crash through one shoulder of interior linemen on slants/stunts.
CSU stood up Kamara on the interior and showed the ability to power through helping hands as the set-up man on twists, still getting home himself.
Was asked to quasi-spy the quarterback and control rush over guards, to shut down attempted scrambles.
Finished tied for fourth among all FBS edge defenders with 64 total pressures (on 323 pass-rush snaps) in 2023.

Weaknesses

Mohamed Kamara would much rather dip underneath or attack up the field than trying to anchor against tackles on inside runs, in part because he probably doesn’t want to lose vision on the ball either.
Needs to do a better job of recognizing pin-downs and other angular blocks from tight-ends, where he gets washed down the line.
That third and fourth step towards the top of the rush don’t cover the type of ground you’d like to see in order to get to a spot where he can flip the hips at the top of his rush, if he’s not driving through contact.
Only has 32.5-inch arms and a miniscule 8.5-inch hands, which leads to him being out-reached and allows tackles to establish first meaningful contact to stall his rush.
Not the twitchiest rusher, who will cleanly beat blockers with cross-face moves or go power-to-speed regularly.

Mohamed Kamara's 2024 NFL Draft projection

Mohamed Kamara is one of the easiest defensive players in this draft to become a fan of. His breakout game came against Colorado last season, where everybody was tuning in to see Deion Sanders and family, yet this guy nearly ruined the party, since their O-line could simply not block the guy.

He went on to be one of the most productive pass-rushers in the country and probably surprised some people when he ran the second-fastest 40 time among all defensive linemen at the combine (4.57), along with showing that pop in his hands clubbing the bags.

There are certainly some limitations that come with Mohamed Kamara's stature, whether it’s not being able to maintain vision on the ball through blocks or tackles having those couple of inches in terms of arm length to challenge him in his approach, while not being the most fluid or twitched-up mover necessarily.

With that being said, he already has a pretty defined plan of how he can win as a pass-rusher, showcases tremendous competitive toughness and I could see a path for him to ben Elvis Dumervil-type of player.

Mohamed Kamara Grade: Third round.