2022 NFL Draft Prospect Profile: Breece Hall, Running Back, Iowa State

One of top 500 overall recruits in 2019 and the cousin of 49ers legend Roger Craig, Hall put up 1150 scrimmage yards and 12 TDs in 12 games as a true freshman.

He already exceeded those statistics through seven games in 2020 and ended the year with 1752 yards and 23 touchdowns from scrimmage, powering the Cyclones to a Big-12 title game appearance and finishing sixth in the Heisman voting.

This past season, the ISU program took a big step back, going 7-6 overall, but Hall put up basically identical numbers, with slightly better averages and more of it coming in the receiving game (36-302-three), which made him a first-team All-American.

Breece Hall's strengths

Hall is a tremendously patient runner, who will let creases develop and slice through them. Thanks to that, combined with high-level vision, he can make linebackers pay for shooting the gap too quickly on several occasions, routinely coming up with answers against quick penetration.

Seeing the kind of start-stop quickness Hall has for being a big back is absurd. You routinely watch defenders trying to desperately reach out for him, as he makes them come up with nothing but air in tight spaces. Hall can literally move completely sideways as he tries to get the defense to flow and then gets vertically without any pause.

If you give him a runway out to the edge, he will take it even if the cutback is more so the designed option. Like he’s deceptive with his speed out to the sideline almost.

At the same time he has the peripheral vision to see the end-man on the backside crash inside, jump-cut behind that, but stay tight enough for the edge-setting defender to not get a clean shot at him.

Hall usually gets more than what is there and is one of the very best at getting something when nothing is available.

What’s apparent when you watch Hall’s tape is how balanced he is within himself, even when making more drastic direction-changes. He has the contact balance to spin off defenders and regain his momentum.

So many times you see him stumble momentarily and he doesn’t go down, often times not even needing to put a hand in the ground. He makes the first defender miss with the dead-leg or force himm to stop his feet with a little stutter step on several occasions or hitting a little one-two on the safety to make him do the splits.

That ability to string moves together seamlessly has an artistic element to it. Yet, he also has great balance and power to run through arm-tackles and break wraps. That always shows up in his ability to convert in short-yardage situations.

Along with that, he has much better breakaway ability than you would expect when you see him take the handoff, with 25 and 22 carries of 15+ yards respectively over these past two season.

The Cyclone standout steps up into his blitz pick-ups with urgency and he has that girth in the lower body to hold his ground. He gets the job done as a personal protector on rollout concepts, at times getting wide edge defenders to the turf with technically sound cut-blocks.

Hall was designated with a lot of check-releases, where he would work out to the flats if he didn’t have anybody to pick up and produced positive plays consistently when nothing was available downfield.

He has that shake to him to get linebackers to have their feet stuck in the turf and then he creates an angle for the ball breaking either way on option routes.

Hall finds the open space as a receiver and displays fluid transitional skills after the catch. Plus then as a defender sprints at him, he can dip underneath and get positive yardage quickly.

Breece Hall's weaknesses

On the negative side, Hall certainly needs some room to build up speed, as doesn’t have that zero-to-100 in-the-flash-of-an-eye ability. And it’s not like he’s trying to hit the hole at full speed a whole lot anyway.

There’s potential for Hall to utilize the stiff-arm more frequently and at times I’d like him to just drop the pads instead of trying to work around guys.

In pass-pro he needs to be alert for green-dog blitzes for a little longer, before committing to help out his offensive line and giving up the inside position, and he tries to mid-point it when there’s two rushers coming his way.

While his drop numbers wouldn’t suggest any issue, as a receiver down the field, he claps at the ball rather than letting it drop into his hands usually, which makes it more likely that it’ll squirt out.

Draft projection

There were a lot of eyes on Hall in that Iowa State offense, with some of the struggles his quarterback Brock Purdy has had, but he continued to produce in a big way time and time again, handling the most touches of any back in college football over these last two years (590 times).

He has that slow to it – blow through it type of approach, while being able to put some wicked moves on defenders, but also the power to drive ahead for yards after contact.

At the combine he finished top-three in the 40 (4.39), vert (40 inches) and broad jump (10’6”).

Hall has the potential to be a special player at the next level, because he has impeccable quicks in short areas, along with has the size to gain yards through contact and top-end speed to finish long runs.

Final grade: Late 1st round

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