2019 Pre-Season Outlook/Poll: Rookie Bobby Okereke

[EastStreet]

NFL.com's Profile

 

Draft Grade: 5.48  NFL BACKUP OR SPECIAL TEAMS POTENTIAL

Draft Projection: Rounds 4-5

College: Stanford 

Position: LB

Height: 6-1

Weight: 239

40 Time: 4.58

 

Quote

BIO:

Okereke (pronounced oh-kuh-REE-kee) earned major accomplishments before arriving to Palo Alto, achieving Eagle Scout status and winning the prestigious Watkins Award in 2014 as the nation's top African-American high school player in terms of academic and athletic excellence. He has steadily grown in his achievements with the Cardinal, going from a reserve defender his redshirt freshman season (seven tackles in 11 games) to a 13-game starter in 2016 (41 tackles, four for loss, three sacks) to an honorable mention All-Pac-12 selection (14 starts, 96 tackles, 7.5 for loss, four sacks, one INT). Okereke finished his junior year well, making five tackles, one for loss, and a pass breakup against TCU in the Alamo Bowl. He was an honorable mention all-conference pick in 2018, leading Stanford with 96 tackles, 7.5 for losses, including 3.5 sacks. He also broke up five passes, forced two fumbles and scored a safety in 13 starts.

 

Overview:

Undersized but instinctive and rangy, Okerke plays fast and is generally on the right track with his initial reads and response to play development. While he's fairly sound from a technical standpoint, his lack of size and strength shows up in both tackling and downhill duties against blockers. He has adequate talent to drop and cover in space and his experience on special teams gives him a shot to become a quality NFL backup.

 

Strengths:

Productive linebacker who finds the football

Plays with consistent football smarts

Quick to diagnose and out-race runner to designed rush path

Long, loose slides when scraping to the football

Long-armed with ability to punch and separate from climbing blocks

Burst to prevent runner from splitting linebackers up to third level

Good recognition of screen development

Able to slip blocks in space and get into tackles

Rangy with sideline-to-sideline speed

Good awareness and communication from zone

Athleticism to handle short-area man coverage

Experience as a core special-teams player

 

Weaknesses:

Undersized as inside linebacker

Absorbs majority of force when meeting lead blocks in hole

Needs earlier counter-attack to handle climbing blocks

Below-average base to maintain contact balance

Gets too froggy racing to his spot and loses leverage

Play will get out of control in space

Comes in hot rather than coming to balance

Sluggish in change of direction

Excessive number of missed and broken tackles

Too many arm tackles and not enough squared strikes

Needs to bring feet with him as a tackler to prevent sliding off

 

 

 

[EastStreet]

I'm torn on Okereke. I think he's better suited for OLB. He could play SAM, but he's not going to get many reps at WILL. I think he'll end up playing on obvious passing downs at MIKE, and will be a backup to WILL god forbid Leonard gets dinged up. He should be a strong special teams contributor day 1.

 

[EastStreet]

I don't get it.... 3 people say he will start (Question 1) either day one or at some point during the year, but none (Question 3) thinks he takes over the starting position at MLB. He's not starting at WILL, and we use a SAM sparingly. 

[VaAllDay757]

I see him at SAM because we lost goode to the jags so that position will have to be filled....eventually he will be a starter