Mykal
Walker.
Mykal
Walker.
Fresno St.· 6'3"· 230 lb· 4.65s 40
"A Division II transfer who spent two years at Fresno State and left as a two-time all-conference linebacker, built on range and coverage instead of the ability to take on a block."Pre-draft read
Walker is a long, rangy off-ball linebacker who closes ground fast. At 6-3 and 230 pounds, he covers width sideline to sideline, shoots gaps on run fits and arrives with intent, which is how he piled up 22.5 tackles for loss in two Mountain West seasons.
His coverage work separates him. He carries seams, reads the quarterback in zone and has the length to knock down throws over the middle, and Fresno State also used him as a blitzer, where he collected 6.5 sacks. The limitation is taking on blocks: he can get swallowed when guards climb to him and he plays a little upright, so he wins by avoiding contact rather than shedding it. The signature is speed plus length in space, a chase-and-cover linebacker for a spread league.
A nickel-heavy zone defense that keeps its linebackers clean and asks them to run and cover rather than stack blockers.
Year 1 sub-package coverage linebacker and core special-teamer, with a ceiling as a three-down weakside starter in a defense that protects him with big bodies up front.
A two-gap, run-first front that asks its inside linebackers to stack and shed guards in the A-gap on early downs.
Fresno State LB Mykal Walker Highlight Reel - 2019 Season
Full senior-season cutup showing the range, blitz work and coverage snaps that defined his evaluation.
Mykal Walker (Linebacker) - 2020 NFL Draft Prospect
Pre-draft prospect breakdown covering the Division II start and the projection to the NFL.
Mykal Walker (Fresno State #3) vs Toledo 2018
Single-game all-22 study from the championship season in which he was named conference title game defensive MVP.
Walker took the long road. He spent two seasons at Azusa Pacific, a Division II program, before transferring to Fresno State and sitting out 2017 as a redshirt. He grew up in Northern California and lost his father to colon cancer as a high school freshman, a loss he has spoken about publicly and credited for the way he plays.
Once he got on the field he was immediately one of the best defenders in his conference. He earned first-team All-Mountain West honors in both 2018 and 2019 and was named defensive MVP of the 2018 Mountain West Championship Game, in which Fresno State beat Boise State in overtime. Across those two seasons he recorded 182 tackles, 22.5 tackles for loss, 6.5 sacks and ten passes defended, including 91 tackles, 11.5 for loss and five pass breakups as a senior.
The board treated him as a coverage linebacker with athletic questions. He ran 4.65 at the Combine with 20 bench reps and a 33-inch vertical, numbers that read as good rather than special, and the small-school start plus only two years of FBS tape gave teams pause. What everyone agreed on was the range, the ball production and the football character. Atlanta took him with the thirteenth pick of the fourth round, the first Fresno State linebacker drafted since 2003.
- 01
Sideline-to-sideline range
Covers width as well as any linebacker in the class, chasing down plays that start outside his gap.
- 02
Coverage instincts
Carries seams, reads the quarterback in zone and uses his length to break up throws over the middle.
- 03
Disruption production
22.5 tackles for loss and 6.5 sacks in just two FBS seasons, with a nose for plays behind the line.
- 04
Blitz value
Fresno State rushed him off the edge and through gaps, and he converted those chances into real pressure.
- 05
Proven leadership and resilience
Two-time first-team All-Mountain West and championship game defensive MVP after transferring up from Division II.
- 01
Struggles taking on blocks
Gets swallowed when guards climb to the second level, since he avoids contact rather than shedding it.
- 02
Ordinary testing
A 4.65 forty and a 33-inch vertical read as solid but not the elite athleticism his college tape suggested.
- 03
Only two FBS seasons
Started his career at Division II Azusa Pacific and redshirted in 2017, leaving a short high-level résumé.
- 04
Plays upright
A tall pad level costs him leverage in short-yardage fits and against downhill interior runs between the tackles.
Relative Athletic Score (Kent Lee Platte) benchmarks combine/pro-day numbers against every measured prospect at the position since 1987. 10.00 is elite; 5.00 is average.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.65sp50
- Vertical
- 33inp50
- Broad jump
- 122inp50
- Three-cone
- 7.09sp50
- Shuttle
- 4.25sp50
- Bench
- 20repp50
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 | Fresno State | — | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2019 | Fresno State | — | 91 | 0 | 0 | 5 | 0 |
| Career | — | — | 182 | 6.5 | 0 | 10 | 0 |
Career figures cover only his two Fresno State seasons (2018-2019); his two years at Division II Azusa Pacific are not included in the FBS record and he redshirted in 2017. One tracking site lists 96 tackles for 2019 instead of 91, so the 2018 line is left empty rather than derived by subtraction from a disputed number. Sacks, interceptions, forced fumbles and recoveries are published only as career totals.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
A rangy sub-package linebacker and special-teams core piece who starts in stretches across several teams.
The ceiling: an athletic coverage linebacker who grows into a full-time three-down starter and a big payday.
A linebacker whose block-shedding limits keep him to early-down rotation and special teams.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
He became exactly the kind of linebacker teams keep. Walker played all sixteen games as a rookie in 2020 with six starts, appeared in seventeen games in 2021 and returned an interception of Cam Newton 66 yards for a touchdown in Week 14, then started twelve of sixteen games for Atlanta in 2022, his most substantial season.
The Falcons waived him in August 2023 and his career turned into a tour. Chicago claimed and released him, Las Vegas signed him to the practice squad, and Pittsburgh brought him up in November, where he played eight games with five starts. He spent 2024 in Washington appearing in all seventeen games as a core special-teams player without a start, then signed with the Jets and played fourteen games with five starts in 2025, earning a solid PFF run-defense grade before returning to New York for 2026. Six seasons in he has 88 games and 30 starts. In hindsight the pick returned real value: never a signature starter, but a durable, coverage-capable linebacker who has held a job on five teams.