New York Jets have an undrafted steal in Hamilcar Rashed

The New York Jets have a potential undrafted free agent steal on their hands in Oregon State pass rusher Hamilcar Rashed. Can he crack the roster early?

It’s a brand-new era for the New York Jets in 2021. Excitement is back with the Jets faithful, and understandably so. The Jets made arguably the top head coach hire of the 2021 circuit when they brought in Robert Saleh from the San Francisco 49ers.

Saleh has a background working with the Seattle Seahawks Legion of Boom as it ascended from 2011-13 and he also maximized the talent he was given with the San Francisco 49ers, taking them from the 32nd-ranked defense in 2016 to the 8th-best defense (scoring) in 2019 en route to an NFC Championship.

The way that Saleh was able to rake the 49ers from the league’s worst defense in 2016 to a top-10 unit just three years later was through the development of players who were both highly touted prospects as well as guys who were picked on day two, three, or not at all.

The New York Jets are definitely going to be hoping for much of the same in 2021 and beyond with the plethora of new players they have added to the roster, whether during the draft or after.

One player for the Jets to keep an eye on this offseason and going forward is undrafted free agent pass rusher Hamilcar Rashed, who will play defensive end in Robert Saleh’s defense.

New York Jets stole Hamilcar Rashed as an undrafted free agent

Rashed is a plus athlete with pretty well below average size for the defensive end position. In terms of an EDGE player, his size seems pretty average at just under 6-foot-3, 251 pounds.

Despite his lack of ideal height and weight, Rashed has plenty of length (80th percentile in wingspan) and upper body strength to go along with it at 25 bench press reps (65th percentile).

What’s really enticing about Rashed as a prospect? His speed and explosiveness. He tested in the top 11 percent in speed, the top 23 percent in the vertical jump, and the top five percent in his broad jump. This guy is explosive and twitchy, and that’s something Saleh can certainly work with.

Although his production was down in 2020 (and many players had “down” 2020 seasons), Rashed was outstanding in 2019 with 62 total tackles, 22.5 tackles for loss, and a whopping 14 sacks.

The problem is, in the 19 games he played between the 2018 and 2020 seasons he had just 14.5 tackles for loss and 2.5 sacks.

Based on the way he exploded onto the scene in 2019, some thought he might eventually factor into the first-round conversation, but obviously, that never materialized.

As it stands now, the New York Jets simply got a great value and may have a steal on their hands. It’s worth wondering why Rashed’s production was so vastly different in the 19 games he played in 2018 and 2020 compared to the 11 games he played in 2019.

It’s also fair to wonder how a guy with that kind of production that he had in 2019 with outstanding speed and explosiveness metrics lasted past seven rounds of the NFL Draft.