Top 10 offensive tackles in the 2021 NFL Draft

#10 2021 NFL Draft Prospect: James Hudson III (Cincinnati)

6’ 4” ½, 300 pounds; RS JR

James Hudson III

Starting his career at Michigan as a top 250 overall defensive tackle recruit, Hudson redshirted his first year on campus and transitioned to the offensive side of the ball. He appeared in three games of his debut season, but decided to transfer to Cincinnati at the end of it.

There he had to sit out another season due to NCAA rules and started the only game he was eligible to play. Last season in his first year as a starter however, he made first-team All-AAC and showed enough talent to enter the draft already.

When you look at Hudson physically, he may be on the smaller side in terms of weight and 33-inch arms aren’t overly impressive, but those 11-inch hands are just massive. They allow him to excel at torquing the pads of defenders and opening lanes that way. Hudson is one of the most impressive athletes in this draft regardless of position and the Bearcats coaches really made use of that.

The mobility he has to get to second level defenders in the snap of a finger is absolutely stunning and linebackers almost appear shocked at times with how quickly he has them walled off or sealed on the backside, plus he can deal with guys who try to get avoid him with sudden movement. He is one of the very few offensive linemen that consistently gave Tulsa’s All-American linebacker Zaven Collins issues with his quickness to get in the defender’s grill.

I love watching Hudson get on the move as a puller, where he executes wrap-arounds with ease and almost outraces the guard on GT power at times, or when he gets out in front of sweep plays. Even more impressive is the way he flies around the field in the screen game and how simple he makes it look to put hands on smaller defenders in wide open spaces. Hudson also does a nice job of inviting rushers upfield on draw plays, where he actually does a pretty nice pass-set straight back and then rides the defender upfield.

Looking at Hudson in the pass game, there are things he needs to work on when executing vertical kick-slides, but just know he has enough foot speed to deal even with wide nine rushers despite that. He is consistently first to land his hands in pass-pro and he has a really strong grip with those massive paws, which enables him to control reps from that point on.

When rushers attack too aggressively upfield, he will ride them past the arc, or he can knock them off track when they try to use hesitation moves back to the outside. Hudson has the quickness in his lower body to deal with sudden defenders in that area and the fluidity in the hips to smoothly transition on twists. And when rushers do get into his chest with a long-arm maneuver, he is pretty nifty with the way he knocks down their reach and makes them land on their chest at times.

Last season, he didn’t surrender a single sack or hit on the quarterback (six hurries overall). The game I would reference to, when talking about Hudson’s potential as a pass-protector is actually the last one he ever played, when Cincinnati was so close to pulling off the upset over Georgia and finish the season with a perfect record.

I will also mention it with UGA rusher Azeez Ojulari for racking up three sacks, but they all came in the second half, when Hudson was out of the game, after the only pressure he had surrendered came on a twist, where he and the guard couldn’t switch responsibilities quickly enough. I also was very impressed with what I saw from Hudson during Senior Bowl week. I’ll get to some of the issues that reoccurred for him there, but while he made himself very tall because of the way he galloped out of his size, I saw a kick-set that he can actually carry to the NFL, while his athleticism, foot quickness and recovery ability were highly encouraging.

Nevertheless, there are certainly things he needs to clean up about his vertical pass-sets and until what I saw down in Mobile, I would have said he almost needs to completely overhaul them, for it to be sustainable at the next level. I would think getting lower overall as he starts getting more depth in kicks should not present a big problem because he has the mobility in his lower body to do so.

But his punch is still too wide and high, plus he tends to lunge or almost kind of jump out to rushers, which makes him vulnerable to quick up-and-unders and just shifts his way too much to the edge.

While his inside foot gets off the ground too much and therefore he can’t really post against those inside moves consistently, plus he has to learn how to make his cleats eat more grass, to be able to anchor down, especially against guys who can convert to power.

In the run game, I would say he is more of a positional blocker, rather than overwhelm anybody at the point of attack. And he has only played 760 career snaps, which shows in his inconsistency with getting off the ball, exploding out of his stance one snap and then being way late on the very next at times.

Hudson is still a very raw prospect, but has a lot of desirable qualities, to make a team want to develop him into a tackle with Pro Bowl potential. He will have to really clean up his true drop-back sets and firm up his base through an NFL training program, but just the athletic tools and ability to recover, while already having had such a great first season as a starter are highly impressive. I think somebody will grab him in the middle of day two and depending on the coaching they have up front, could turn him into a star.