Deangelo
Malone.
Deangelo
Malone.
Western Kentucky· 6'3"· 243 lb
Malone was Western Kentucky's stand-up rush linebacker and the engine of the defense, a wide-nine edge who chased plays from the backside. The organizing trait is motor and range: he finished with 348 career tackles, a number no edge rusher compiles without running down ball carriers 20 yards downfield.
The second trait is bend and hand speed off the arc. He wins with a quick get-off and a long-arm to swipe combination rather than power, converting speed to the corner without redirecting inside. The limit is mass — at 240 pounds he gets caught on down blocks and washed by tackles who land first. The signature is volume: 57.5 tackles for loss and 32.5 sacks, with C-USA Defensive Player of the Year honors at both ends of his career.
DeAngelo Malone is ideally suited for a varied and aggressive 3-4 defensive scheme that prioritizes edge rushers with sideline-to-sideline range and pass-rushing upside.
Year 1 rotational pass rusher with special teams contributions, with the ceiling to develop into a starting 3-4 outside linebacker.
He would be a poor fit as a hand-in-the-dirt 4-3 defensive end tasked with consistently holding his ground against the run without substantial support.
Malone's athleticism and pass-rushing potential make him a valuable asset in schemes that allow him to attack the backfield.
Western Kentucky DL DeAngelo Malone Highlight Reel - 2019 Season
His first C-USA Defensive Player of the Year campaign: 99 tackles, 20.5 tackles for loss and 11 sacks, with the pursuit range on full display.
DeAngelo Malone highlights | 2022 NFL Draft | Atlanta Falcons
The team's own draft reel, focused on the get-off, the swipe-and-rip and the flat finish around the corner.
Atlanta Falcons Edge DeAngelo Malone Senior Bowl Highlights
Senior Bowl week in Mobile, where he was named American Team MVP and answered part of the level-of-competition question in one-on-ones.
Malone is a five-year starter and a career-long producer, which in a Group of Five evaluation is both the selling point and the caveat. He started as a true freshman in 2017, was named C-USA Defensive Player of the Year in 2019, turned down the draft to return, and won the award again in 2021. The tape shows a genuinely fast edge with quick hands and elite pursuit range, a player who never takes a snap off and finishes plays most rushers concede.
The concern is the body. At 6-4 and 240 pounds he lacks the anchor to set an edge against NFL tackles, and his production came against a conference where he was consistently the best athlete on the field. He answered that partially at the Senior Bowl, where he was named American Team MVP, but a week of practice does not resolve a frame question. There is also a role question: he is a stand-up rusher who is not big enough for a hand-down 4-3 end and not a coverage linebacker.
The board treated him as a day-two developmental rusher with a special-teams floor — a bet on motor and hand quickness with an obvious weight-room caveat. Atlanta took him at 82 after already spending pick 38 on Arnold Ebiketie, doubling down on undersized edge speed. For a defense that had generated almost no pressure the year before, it was a volume play.
- 01
Pursuit range
Compiled 348 career tackles from the edge, a number that only happens when a rusher chases plays to the far sideline on every snap rather than coasting once he is blocked.
- 02
Get-off and hand speed
Times the snap as well as anyone in the class and pairs it with a quick swipe-and-rip combination that beats tackles before their punch lands.
- 03
Bend to the corner
Turns the arc without needing to redirect inside, flattening to the quarterback from a wide alignment and finishing at the top of the rush.
- 04
Backfield volume
Posted 20.5 tackles for loss in 2019 and 16.5 in 2021, disruption totals among the national leaders rather than the product of one big afternoon.
- 05
Sustained production
Started as a true freshman and won C-USA Defensive Player of the Year twice, two years apart, with no injury-driven gap in his five-year body of work.
- 01
Play mass
At 240 pounds he lacks the anchor to hold an edge against NFL tackles, gets sealed by down blocks, and can be moved off his gap once a blocker gets into his chest.
- 02
Level of competition
The disruption totals came against Conference USA lines where he was regularly the best athlete on the field; the tape against Power Five fronts is thinner.
- 03
Counter rush plan
Leans heavily on the speed rush and the swipe; when tackles kick-slide cleanly he has no reliable inside counter or bull to fall back on.
- 04
Positional definition
Not big enough to play with a hand down in a four-man front and not fluid enough in space to be a true off-ball linebacker, which narrows the schemes that fit.
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| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | Western Kentucky | 11 | 25 | 1.5 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| 2018 | Western Kentucky | 12 | 59 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| 2019 | Western Kentucky | 13 | 99 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2020 | Western Kentucky | 12 | 71 | 6 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| 2021 | Western Kentucky | 14 | 94 | 9 | 0 | 4 | 4 |
| Career | — | 62 | 348 | 32.5 | 1 | 7 | 0 |
2020 and 2021 lines read directly from cfbstats (2020: 12 G, 71 tk, 11.0 TFL, 6.0 sacks, 1 PBU, 2 FF; 2021: 14 G, 94 tk, 16.5 TFL, 9.0 sacks, 4 PBU, 4 FF). Season totals sum to the career line shown: 348 tackles, 57.5 TFL, 32.5 sacks. Aggregators that credit 58.5 career TFL add a bowl tackle for loss in 2021 that cfbstats does not carry. 2019 passes defended and 2017/2019 forced fumbles are not itemized by source and are left null rather than zero-filled; the career PD total of 7 is fully accounted for by the four itemized seasons.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
The realistic day-two outcome: a rotational edge whose college production never scales, who hangs on through a rookie deal without claiming a starting role.
The ceiling: a light, speed-first edge who adds functional strength, earns a full-time job in an odd front, and turns pressure volume into double-digit sacks.
The floor, and close to what happened: a college producer whose value in the league is almost entirely on special teams, with defensive snaps as an emergency.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
DeAngelo Malone has played two seasons for the Atlanta Falcons, contributing as a rotational edge rusher and on special teams. He has yet to secure a full-time starting role.
Atlanta never found a defensive role for him. Malone played 15 games as a rookie in 2022 with 23 tackles and a sack, all of it in rotation, and then his defensive snaps collapsed: five tackles in 17 games in 2023, 11 tackles and two sacks in 17 games in 2024 including his first multi-sack game in a Week 15 win at Las Vegas, and nine games in 2025 with four tackles and the first interception of his career, a game-sealing pick against Buffalo in Week 6. Four seasons, 58 appearances, zero starts, three sacks. His real value has been on special teams, where the Falcons credit him with 25 career tackles.
In hindsight the frame question was the whole evaluation and the board underweighted it. Everything the tape promised in terms of motor and effort transferred — he is a genuinely good special-teams player because of it — but a 240-pound edge who wins with speed and a swipe needs either elite bend or added mass to survive against NFL tackles, and he added neither. It did not help that Atlanta had already spent pick 38 on Arnold Ebiketie, so Malone was drafted into a depth chart that did not need a second version of the same archetype. The pick is a miss, but a defensible one: this was the value range for exactly this profile.
Data note: from Indianapolis