Kind Of A Damning Review Of Emanuel Hall

[soulman]

Stephen Letizia / May 1, 2019

https://www.chicagoaudible.com/emanuel-hall-undrafted-impact-bears/

Why Emanuel Hall Went Undrafted and How He Can Impact the Bears

When the Bears signed Emanuel Hall as an undrafted free agent, I was thrilled, to say the least. I came away from my initial viewing of Hall pre-draft thinking very highly of him and expecting him to be drafted in the third or fourth round.

I even went as far to say on The Chicago Audible Podcast that I preferred him to Bears fourth-round pick Riley Ridley.

When I watched more of his tape after the draft, I came away slightly disappointed. He clearly has the athleticism for the position and is a threat to score a touchdown as soon as he steps on the field, but the subtle nuances of the position are where he needs to improve.

So let’s look into the reasons he went undrafted.

Route Running

Hall really only ran three routes in college: go, slant and curl. He would occasionally run other routes but they were few and far between.

His game is predicated on his 4.39 40-yard speed. His slant and curl route successes are a result of defenders having to provide a huge cushion in off-man coverage out of respect for that speed.

While his linear speed is great and will be an asset in the NFL, Hall needs to develop more refined routes in order to become the receiver some think he can be.

Below is a great example. He gets out of his comfort zone and runs a post route. His break at the stem is extremely rounded instead of a sharp, quick 45-degree angle to the goal posts. But what is more concerning is what Hall does when the ball is in the air. He starts to drift upfield instead of running through the ball, allowing the cornerback to make a play.

It is the little things that I missed in my first viewing that separate the good receivers from the great ones.

Hands

Hall has the ability to get open. No questions there. But he isn’t always a natural hands catcher. Choosing instead to pin the ball against his body as seen below, which leads to more drops than what teams felt comfortable drafting.

In 2018, Hall had a drop rate of 9.8 percent (four drops on 41 catchable targets), which was 119th best amongst draft-eligible wide receivers according to Pro Football Focus. In 2017, he had eight drops (PFF did not list catchable targets for 2017).

I have hopes he can continue improving in this regard. On slants and hitches, he usually does use his hands more. It is on posts and go routes where he chooses to pin the ball against his body.

This leads us into another thing that stood out on tape …

He isn’t great in contested catch situations. Most of Hall’s big plays come when he has a step, or five, on the cornerback and he can catch it in stride. He has a 43.5-inch vertical leap but doesn’t use it to make leaping grabs. He also struggles on slants and hitches if the corner is able to stay with him.

Effort and Injuries

When Hall isn’t involved in the play, he can be very lackadaisical in his effort. As the play-side receiver, at times, he does not put in the effort to be an effective blocker. It is little things like this that can have coaches and general managers sour on a prospect.

Then there is the issue of his injuries. Hall had multiple soft tissue injuries in his career and many believed he could have played through some of them. That being said, I can see why a player with NFL aspirations, who is playing for free, wouldn’t want to risk further injury and potentially millions of dollars.

Still, Hall Can Make an Impact in 2019

Currently, the Bears do not have a true speed and deep threat on the roster. Yes, Gabriel is fast, and he did catch some deep balls in 2018, but I would not classify him as a “deep threat.”

Hall has game-changing speed that needs to be accounted for with safety help over the top whenever he is on the field. This will open up the intermediate passing game where guys like Allen Robinson, Trey Burton and Anthony Miller can shine.

The ball is overthrown here, but you can see how deadly his speed is. He gets up to his top speed so quickly that he instantly eats into the cushion provided by defenders.

If teams choose not to have safety help over the top, then Hall can make them pay:

And that is with his speed. Yes, Hall is a one-trick pony, but if you’re only going to have one trick, speed isn’t a bad one to have.

Hall will probably never be a high volume receiver. Even if he doesn’t improve as a route runner, he can still have a role in the NFL. You can live with a few drops if he also is hitting on big plays.

Which is what he has proven he can do.

First step is making the final 53-man roster. If Hall can do that, he should be good for a couple long touchdowns and be a guy teams have to gameplan against.

Filed Under: 2019 NFL Draft, Featured, Our Articles Tagged With: Eman

Edited May 2, 2019 by soulman

[soulman]

He says he's coming in with a chip on his shoulder for not being drafted so I hope Nagy and Furrey are ready to sober him up a bit.

The kid has blinding speed.  Anyone can see that.  But even Kevin White had more going for him than Hall.  White couldn't run the route tree with precision either but he could catch and high point a ball.

And for what it's worth I don't buy into that " You can live with a few drops if he also is hitting on big plays" at all.  This ain't college.  In the pros you may get only one or two shots at long passes a game and if the QB lays it out there for you then you better damn well be able to track it, run through the catch, and most importantly hold onto the ball.

If these clips are good examples of some of his issues he should be shocked he wasn't drafted.  He's has a lot of work ahead of him.

[dll2000]

This review is crap.  I just watched him. This dude is constantly open.  Constantly. He would have had incredible stats if his QB wasn’t  constantly missing him or under throwing him.

He fell because apparently he is an a hole and his coaches hated him and told that to every NFL scout. 

Edited May 2, 2019 by dll2000
Double word

[dll2000]

This guy is a top talent.  He is going to make things real interesting.  

[dll2000]

I  think Ridley, as good as he is, is redundant to what they have.  This guy brings juice. 

No way they are cutting Ridley though. 

[dll2000]

He was dumb to sign with Bears. I have no idea why top UDFA sign with teams loaded at their position.  I don’t know who is advising them. 

[Superman(DH23)]

This could very well be a Kevin Tolliver type situation.  A guy who should have been drafted early based on talent alone, now playing to earn a payday bc of issues not related to football.  For a rookie CB to plugged in the way Tolliver was a few times last year and not be a weakness for the offense to exploit, he acquitted himself very nicely.

[Madmike90]

For me Hall is a one trick pony...but that one trick happens to be very important in the NFL...Hall is a true deep threat with some decent size to him...no one should expect an outstanding player but he could have a big role to play in certain situations.

[soulman]

So we have some differences of opinion and time will tell but this part stands out to as far as some changes he's gonna need to make.

Effort and Injuries

When Hall isn’t involved in the play, he can be very lackadaisical in his effort. As the play-side receiver, at times, he does not put in the effort to be an effective blocker. It is little things like this that can have coaches and general managers sour on a prospect.

Then there is the issue of his injuries. Hall had multiple soft tissue injuries in his career and many believed he could have played through some of them. That being said, I can see why a player with NFL aspirations, who is playing for free, wouldn’t want to risk further injury and potentially millions of dollars.

 

So he dogs it in college by not going all out and refusing to play with the little hurts and costs himself millions of dollars anyway.  That's called having a diva attitude and it won't fly on this team.  One reason Pace allowed AJ to leave was based on somewhat the same issue.  Being unavailable gets you on Pace's $hit List when comes time to talk contract.

50 minutes ago, dll2000 said:

This review is crap.  I just watched him. This dude is constantly open.  Constantly. He would have had incredible stats if his QB wasn’t  constantly missing him or under throwing him.

He fell because apparently he is an a hole and his coaches hated him and told that to every NFL scout. 

OK but his QB got drafted in round two and although Hall was graded that high he wasn't drafted at all.  Lock couldn't have been that bad and Hall that good.

And as for the other whatta ya' expect?  He dogs plays, won't play through minor injuries, and has a diva attitude.  Did you expect his coaches would give him glowing recommendations?  They have reputations to protect all up and down the line for other who come through their program.

In summary his scouting reports can't be all that inaccurate when 32 teams passed on drafting him.

I realize the article and videos are focusing on his negatives but they do exist and some good coaching and work on Hall's part to clean all that up.  If it didn't exist to the level it does even ***hole that he is someone would have nabbed him.  The NFL has been full of productive WRs who were or are ***holes.

He's not indicating the kid can't be successful at the next level only pointing out flaws in his game that will need to be corrected for him to do it,

[soulman]

17 minutes ago, Madmike90 said:

For me Hall is a one trick pony...but that one trick happens to be very important in the NFL...Hall is a true deep threat with some decent size to him...no one should expect an outstanding player but he could have a big role to play in certain situations.

If he's willing and able to use all of his tools yeah but his speed alone won't cut it.  He will seldom if ever be as open as he was in college.  We should realize that and so should he.  Defenses aren't gonna allow him to get free releases against man coverage with no deep help.  For starters his most valuable role might be as a decoy to help others open up provided he'll work to sell his routes even when he's not the primary receiver.

 

[dll2000]

26 minutes ago, soulman said:

So we have some differences of opinion and time will tell but this part stands out to as far as some changes he's gonna need to make.

Effort and Injuries

When Hall isn’t involved in the play, he can be very lackadaisical in his effort. As the play-side receiver, at times, he does not put in the effort to be an effective blocker. It is little things like this that can have coaches and general managers sour on a prospect.

Then there is the issue of his injuries. Hall had multiple soft tissue injuries in his career and many believed he could have played through some of them. That being said, I can see why a player with NFL aspirations, who is playing for free, wouldn’t want to risk further injury and potentially millions of dollars.

 

So he dogs it in college by not going all out and refusing to play with the little hurts and costs himself millions of dollars anyway.  That's called having a diva attitude and it won't fly on this team.  One reason Pace allowed AJ to leave was based on somewhat the same issue.  Being unavailable gets you on Pace's $hit List when comes time to talk contract.

OK but his QB got drafted in round two and although Hall was graded that high he wasn't drafted at all.  Lock couldn't have been that bad and Hall that good.

And as for the other whatta ya' expect?  He dogs plays, won't play through minor injuries, and has a diva attitude.  Did you expect his coaches would give him glowing recommendations?  They have reputations to protect all up and down the line for other who come through their program.

In summary his scouting reports can't be all that inaccurate when 32 teams passed on drafting him.

I realize the article and videos are focusing on his negatives but they do exist and some good coaching and work on Hall's part to clean all that up.  If it didn't exist to the level it does even ***hole that he is someone would have nabbed him.  The NFL has been full of productive WRs who were or are ***holes.

He's not indicating the kid can't be successful at the next level only pointing out flaws in his game that will need to be corrected for him to do it,

Yes.  Dogging it when you are not in the play is part of being an a hole. 

 He cost himself big money by pissing off someone or someone’s.  He is a 2nd or 3rd round talent.   That is clear to me from tape.

Most of time coaches lie or just omit truth for fear of hurting recruiting. 

Mizzu told truth.  Or someone did. 

These are all young people. Never know if they are going to see light or not. 

I haven’t looked at his QB much.  All I know is this guy is open about 90% of time and ball isn’t there.  

 

 

[soulman]

1 hour ago, dll2000 said:

Yes.  Dogging it when you are not in the play is part of being an a hole. 

 He cost himself big money by pissing off someone or someone’s.  He is a 2nd or 3rd round talent.   That is clear to me from tape.

Most of time coaches lie or just omit truth for fear of hurting recruiting. 

Mizzu told truth.  Or someone did. 

These are all young people. Never know if they are going to see light or not. 

I haven’t looked at his QB much.  All I know is this guy is open about 90% of time and ball isn’t there.  

 

 

There could be many reasons but typically the number one reason is a lack of trust that guy will be where he's supposed to be when he's supposed to be there.  Mike Furrey had some of those problems with Miller last season describing him as freelancing a bit too much.

As a QB is going through his progressions at that level and reading coverages isn't he expecting certain routes to come open?  That's where he's probably looking and even if one of his guys breaks open elsewhere he may not see him in time to reset to make that throw.

I guess all I'm saying is even at a major college level it's no longer "go down 10 steps and cut left before the black Chevy".  These guys have assigned routes to run that should line up with where a QB expects to deliver his throw. If the WR is off his mark it's incomplete or maybe a pick.  That's the part I feel Nagy and Furrey will be most concerned with.  How much can Hall be trusted to run his route well.

I think that first clip was a good example.  He's supposed to run a post route but his break his weak, rounded off, and he's not taking the proper angle leaving the DB in his trail and giving the QB a clean target.  Then on top of that he allows himself to drift back towards the hash and gives the DB room to get in front of him and break up the pass.  And that's only what we see in one clip.

It's not so much that I'm down on the guy as I'm simply tempering expectations that he'll even make the roster this year.  The speed is there but he's still a very raw WR by NFL standards.  So I hope he accepts coaching and improves.  We can use him.

[dll2000]

UDFA are always behind 8 ball regardless of talent.   Pro bowlers and even HOfers have been cut several times.

Guy has had some drops.  That also had a lot to do with him falling. 

 I just don't see a guy who runs poor routes.  I also see a guy with elite seperation speed. 

This guy has NFL talent. Whether he makes it or not is another story.  Anytime you are an UDFA you are a long shot. 

[beardown3231]

At best he makes the PS. @dll2000 said it best- WR is too stacked

[dll2000]

2 hours ago, soulman said:I think that first clip was a good example.  He's supposed to run a post route but his break his weak, rounded off, and he's not taking the proper angle leaving the DB in his trail and giving the QB a clean target.  Then on top of that he allows himself to drift back towards the hash and gives the DB room to get in front of him and break up the pass.  And that's only what we see in one clip.

We dont know that was supposed to be a straight post.  That is speculation without the play call. All I know is he set the DB up to outside making it look like a GO and then went to his inside creating seperation.    Depending on assignment it may have been a little too rounded and maybe he could have sold it a bit better with his head or arms, but he was OPEN.  He had to stay in seam more in any event because safety was coming  

QB underthrew the ball allowing DB to make a play.  His 'drifting' is adjusting to a poorly thrown ball that is behind his speed.   QB puts it out in front that is 6. QB allowed that break up.  If he's even he's leaving.