Myles Murphy

Pos: EDGE

School: Clemson

Ht. 6’5″ 

Wt. 268

Games Watched: Notre Dame, Syracuse, Florida State

One Liner: Well built edge rusher who wins with get off, strength, and rush technique

Strengths: 

  • Very good functional strength. Murphy has powerful arms and generates great shock when running the arc. He plays with a good anchor as a 5t and is thus able to maintain steady and stable positioning. 
  • Good get off/first step. Murphy displays an efficient first step off the line, and is able to convert this momentum into power with his arms and body movements. 
  • Good rush technique. Murphy is a technically refined rusher at the POA, and is able to maintain good body positioning with the use of good hand placement and usage in order to technically find a way to outleverage and beat the opposing tackle.
  • Good size. Murphy has the desired size of a versatile 5t, who has enough bulk on his frame to shade and reduce to a 4i. He has the athletic talent to be a 3-4 outside linebacker who can specialize as a rusher as well, while having the short area quicks to drop back into coverage when needed.
  • Good athleticism. Murphy is a solid athlete, who flashes the movements and quickness that you would love to see out of a rusher his size. However, these are flashes, and Murphy isn’t particularly explosive and doesn’t jump out the screen enough considering his highly touted athletic ability. 

Weaknesses:

  • Adequate rush counters. Murphy really wins with power and his first step at this point. He lacks inside or outside counters apart from a long arm, which will be predictable for NFL tackles, and needs to add elements of surprise and twitch to his game, especially as an every down 5t as his profile projects.
  • Marginal fluidity. Murphy is not a bendy rusher, and has some stiffness in his hips, removing another element of his pass rushing toolbag. He won’t be relied upon to flatten and bend around the edge, and lacks that fluidity in his game to provide ankle flexion and flattening as a rusher.
  • Adequate explosiveness/aggression. Murphy doesn’t explode off the line the way you would expect someone with his first step quickness to do so. He lacks aggression and violence in his rush once at the POA, and will need to be more explosive in order to have more frequent wins at the next level.

Overall Assessment:  Myles Murphy is a well built, athletic rusher who plays with the desired strength to stay competitive at the next level. Murphy has a solid first step, which allows him to smoothly convert his momentum into power to generate shock and pushback in his rush. However, Murphy lacks the element of surprise, and provides little to no twitch as an edge rusher and lacks the rush counters to keep lineman on their toes. I am not sure if his strength, first step and size will be enough to overcome this, so it will be critical for Murphy to continue working up with NFL coaching.  

Scheme Fit: 5t that could shade in in an even front

Pick Projection: Top 40

Grade: 6.44