Rookie Spotlight: Seth Williams, Auburn
Height: 6’ 3”
Weight: 211
Hands: 9 ⅞”
Arm: 33 ½”
40 yard dash: 4.54
NFL Comparison: Tim Patrick, Keyarris Garrett, Marvin McNutt

Pros
– effective in the end-zone
– adjusts well to poorly thrown balls
– hands catcher
– creates missed tackles
– wins at catch point
– 98th percentile breakout age

Cons
– drops catchable balls on occasion
– little to no release
– trouble creating separation
– lacks burst
– inconsistent effort

Scouting Notes: A 4-star recruit out of high school, Williams developed into Auburn’s primary pass-catcher over his 3 seasons there, having his best season in 2019 with 830 yards and 8 TDs, having already broken out as an 18-year-old freshman. A natural athlete, Williams competed and won at the state level in basketball, the high jump and the long jump. It should suffice to say that with such athletic prowess, Williams is dominant when it comes to contested catches. In fact that’s what he’s become known for in scouting circles, as he made numerous highlight catches in traffic during his tenure at Auburn. A hands catcher, Williams is adept at adjusting to poorly thrown balls, which there were many of at Auburn. He was particularly savvy in the red-zone, where he was a popular target for the Tigers. This is not to say that Williams doesn’t have issues with getting open. He has little release at all off the line, other than some foot shuffling, as he lacks explosion and takes a while to get to top speed. He also has trouble creating separation downfield, as evidenced by his numerous contested catches – The fact that he comes down with them much of the time helps to mitigate that fact. It’s only fair to note that he has been working in Dallas at MJP with Coach David Robinson of Alwayz Open alongside Terrace Marshall during his pre-draft training, and having seen him live, he presents as a much smoother route-runner live and after training with D-Rob than he looks like on the college tape. That is one side of the coin, but an inconvenient side is that he doesn’t even come down with the ball all that consistently – He had a 16% drop rate in 2020. In fact consistency, or the lack thereof, might be Williams’ biggest kink in his armor, as he’s also spotty with his blocking, and he even half-asses on plays he’s involved on occasion. All in all, Williams has lots of potential, but he’s going to have to give more effort to get on and stay on the field at the next level.

Fantasy Outlook: Williams’ impressive highlight reel and decent 40 time for a big guy (4.54) has him on a lot of teams’ radars right now, though if they look closely, they’ll see he has a long way to go to be a premier receiver. As is, he’s a possession type of guy who can break open the big play here and there and knows how to find the end-zone. A lot of teams have him as a perimeter player, but his inability to create separation might relegate him to be a big slot type which clearly isn’t ideal. His TD upside makes Williams a decent get in dynasty sometime in the third round of traditional rookie drafts, but it’s 50/50 on whether he’ll be an every down player in the NFL.