Brayden
Willis.
Brayden
Willis.
Oklahoma· 6'4"· 241 lb
"A move tight end drafted into the deepest tight-end room in football, Willis was always a long shot in San Francisco — a journeyman career is the honest outcome of a crowded fit."Pre-draft read
Willis is a movement blocker first. At 6-3 and 241 pounds he is nine pounds heavier than almost no tight end in the league, so he cannot anchor as an inline Y, but he can lead from the backfield, wrap around on split zone and hit a linebacker in space with real force. Oklahoma aligned him at H-back, in the slot, in the wing and occasionally at fullback, and he was competent everywhere.
As a receiver he is a red zone specialist rather than a field-stretcher. Seven touchdowns on 39 catches as a senior tells the story: he has strong hands, tracks the ball well in traffic and boxes out inside the ten, but he does not threaten a seam and he does not separate from man coverage. Everything he catches is schemed or contested.
Wide zone offense with a true H-back or fullback role, heavy motion and split-zone blocking
Year 1: special teams core and blocking H-back; ceiling: fullback-hybrid with 15-20 red zone targets
Spread passing offense that asks its tight ends to detach and win vertically
San Francisco drafted him precisely because that role exists in Kyle Shanahan''s offense.
It took him five years to produce. Willis caught one pass in four games as a freshman, 11 for 168 and three scores in 2019, nine in a shortened 2020, then 15 for 177 in 2021. The breakout came at the end: 39 catches for 514 yards and seven touchdowns in 2022 with 10 carries mixed in, finally showing what a full-time role looked like.
The testing said tweener. A 6.52 Relative Athletic Score, a 32-inch vertical, a 7.30 three-cone and a weight that sits in the ninth percentile for the position. He is a good athlete for a fullback and an ordinary one for a tight end, which is exactly the problem the position label created.
So the comparison everyone reached for was Kyle Juszczyk, and everyone landed on the sixth or seventh round. The versatility was genuine, the blocking effort was genuine, the special teams value was genuine, and none of it added up to a defined NFL role unless the offense had a fullback-adjacent job open. San Francisco, which invented the modern version of that job, took him with the 247th pick.
- 01
Genuine positional versatility
Oklahoma used him at H-back, wing, slot and fullback, and he handled the assignment at each spot.
- 02
High-effort space blocker
Wraps and finishes on linebackers and safeties, which is the exact skill a split-zone offense needs.
- 03
Red zone finisher
Seven touchdowns on 39 catches as a senior, built on strong hands and body positioning inside the ten.
- 04
Special teams value
Size, willingness and role flexibility gave him an immediate path onto all four coverage units.
- 05
Five-year Power Five experience
Forty-nine games at Oklahoma meant he arrived understanding formation and protection language.
- 01
Undersized for inline work
At 241 pounds he sits in the ninth percentile by weight and cannot anchor against NFL defensive ends.
- 02
No vertical speed
He does not threaten the seam, so defenses never have to account for him beyond the intermediate level.
- 03
Cannot separate in man
Every reception has to be schemed or contested because he does not create space on his own.
- 04
Scheme-dependent profile
Without a fullback-adjacent role in the offense there is no snap count for him at all.
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
- —s
- Vertical
- 32inp50
- Broad jump
- 117inp50
- Three-cone
- 7.30sp50
- Shuttle
- 4.36sp50
- Bench
- 20repp50
| Yr | Team | G | Rec | Yds | TD |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 | Oklahoma | 4 | 1 | 29 | 0 |
| 2019 | Oklahoma | 14 | 11 | 168 | 3 |
| 2020 | Oklahoma | 5 | 9 | 110 | 1 |
| 2021 | Oklahoma | 13 | 15 | 177 | 2 |
| 2022 | Oklahoma | 13 | 39 | 514 | 7 |
| Career | — | 49 | 75 | 998 | 13 |
Season lines verified against cfbstats. Rushing lines are listed only for the seasons in which he carried the ball.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Honors
- Five-year Oklahoma contributor across H-back, tight end and fullback
- Seven receiving touchdowns as a fifth-year senior (2022)
Blocking-first tight end whose value is real but shows up in almost no receiving statistics.
Undersized hybrid who becomes indispensable by mastering a specialized offensive role.
Too small to block inline, too slow to detach, waived every time the roster tightens.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Willis played seven games as a rookie in 2023 on special teams and was on the roster for San Francisco's Super Bowl LVIII run. He appeared in 10 games in 2024 without a reception on two targets, then played six games in 2025 before being waived on November 18 and returning to the practice squad on December 10. San Francisco signed him to the active roster on January 14, 2026 for the postseason, waived him after the 2026 preseason and re-signed him to the practice squad on September 6, 2026.
The fit was the pick, and the fit never quite converted. Willis appeared in seven games as a rookie in 2023, almost entirely on special teams, and stayed on the roster through San Francisco's Super Bowl LVIII run. He played 10 games in 2024 as a blocker and coverage-unit player and did not record a catch on his two targets, which is about as literal a description of his NFL role as exists.
The last two years have been roster churn. Six games in 2025, waived on November 18, back on the practice squad December 10, signed to the active roster on January 14, 2026 for the postseason, then waived again after the 2026 preseason and re-signed to the practice squad on September 6. He was there in September 2026. Four seasons in the same building without ever locking down a spot is a real career for pick 247, and it is also proof of the original concern: when a player's value is versatility rather than a position, he is always the roster's easiest cut.