NFL Draft Prospects 2019: Edge rusher - Joe Jackson, Miami
Joe Jackson, a former four-star recruit, was a standout in football, basketball and track at his hometown high school in Miami. While he only made honorable mention All-ACC last season due to a loaded class of defensive ends and the fact that the Hurricanes couldn’t quite break through these last few years, Jackson was highly productive in his three years with the program.
During his collegiate career, he amassed 35.5 tackles for loss, 22.5 sacks, five forced fumbles, five pass-knockdowns and a pick-six.
Jackson’s frenetic style of play serves him well as a run defender. He consistently gets under the pads of his blocker and pulls that guy off to chase after the ball.
He takes the inside path when it opens up to make a play in the backfield every once in a while, while taking tight-ends and smashing them into the play to blow things up. Jackson shows a lot of urgency as the unblocked defender to either chase from the backside, run into the puller or beat H-backs to the spot coming over from the opposite side, trying to seal him.
His motor is off the charts for 60 minutes and he gets involved in plenty of plays outside his area. That led to 24 defensive stops last season.
The 6’4”, 275-pound defensive end was a dominant pass rusher for the Hurricanes last season, recording 22 combined quarterback sacks and hits, while also adding 31 hurries – all on less than 300(!) pass rush snaps.
Jackson comes out of a low three- or four-point stance with good pad-level. He has strong swipe-arm on that rip move to clear himself and allow a direct angle towards the quarterback, while also being able to throw off the blocker late and jump back inside.
Jackson shows pretty good flexibility to get around the blocker, but also has the ability to convert speed to power and flatten his angle at the top of the rush. He can rip underneath the inside arm of the offensive tackle and reduce the shoulder to give him less area to grab.
However, the former Hurricane can get a little out of control in the run game, where he pushes somebody backwards but loses vision on the backfield. He gets body-to-body on too many occasions as a pass rusher.
I would like to see Jackson use the long-arm and rush half the man more often, while developing some type of inside counter. I love his hair-on-fire style of play, but because of that he has no recognition for screen passes over his head.
His change of direction is below par and he lets some quarterbacks get outside of him on zone-read plays, where it clearly looked like he had contain responsibility. He also tries to spin inside on some occasions, which allows the running back to bounce the run.
Jackson was asked to run with guys out of the backfield in the Virginia game and showed good speed to do it, but he doesn’t look as comfortable operating in space and I would leave him with his hand in the dirt as a 4-3 defensive end.
I want to see better extension in the run game and more of a feel for the sets of his tackle, but there is clearly talent to work wit. It might take him some time to reach his potential whilst being somebody who is primarily going to overpower people early on, but I really enjoyed watching him run around like a maniac.
Grade: Late second