Darnell Wright’s meteoric pre-draft rise began long before he blew people away at the NFL Scouting Combine when he registered the second-best athleticism score among tackles while weighing in at 6-foot-5, 333 pounds.
Wright’s rise has been more than a year in the making. It’s the product of growth, maturity, learned experience, and a constant commitment to make sure he created the best possible version of himself.
“I think it was just the constant evaluation of myself and making sure that – I wasn’t just out there free balling,” Wright told NBC Sports Chicago in an exclusive interview. “I knew the reasons why I’d lose a rep. I had something to build off. I wasn’t just out there free balling anymore. I was really focusing on honing in on my craft. Knowing why I lost, how to win the next rep.”
The result? A damn near perfect senior season at Tennessee in which Wright allowed just eight total pressures and did not surrender a sack. His 1.7 percent pressure rate allowed ranked third among all Division 1 tackles, per Pro Football Focus, trailing only Ohio State’s Dawand Jones and Northwestern’s Peter Skoronski.
Wright’s eye-opening season, which has seen him skyrocket from a Round 3-4 pick to a potential top-10 selection, included clean sheets against LSU and eventual national champion Georgia. Wright had 88 pass-blocking opportunities in those two games and didn’t allow pressure. Against Georgia, Wright had 21 true pass-blocking opportunities and pitched a perfect game.
But his Mona Lisa, the game that grabbed scouts’ attention, came in Week 7 against Alabama and projected top-5 pick Will Anderson. Wright stonewalled the two-time Nagurski Award winner, allowing just one pressure in Tennessee’s last-second win over the Crimson Tide.
That matchup against Anderson and how Wright won it decisively highlights his cerebral growth as a tackle and shows how high his ceiling is at the next level.
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To Wright, things clicking in the film room was the catalyst for his ascension. The 21-year-old would show up to the facility every Sunday and comb through tape to understand the tendencies of the players and scheme he'd be facing. Wright’s first watch doesn’t involve notes. It’s a fluid process in which he immerses himself to get a feel for what he’s about to face and how he needs to react.
Then, on the second watch, he dissects his main matchup for that week. It’s an exhaustive process, but one that Wright believes gives him a clear edge over whomever he faces.
“When I start diving into ‘OK, who am I going against? What do they do? What does their defense do good?’ That’s the start,” Wright told NBC Sports Chicago. “But I’ll take a guy, depends on who it is, but I’ll break him down into three categories. I’ll put him into – if he’s like a speed guy, if he’s a power guy, a finesse guy. I try to take away his A and B. I think I can dance with anybody’s C. Me and that person’s C, we can dance, you know what I mean? And we’ll see who is the better player.”
Anderson checks the speed and power box, so Wright ensured the two would only dance against the Alabama star’s finesse game. The preparation and execution were flawless, as Anderson rarely got a chance to breathe on Tennessee quarterback Hendon Hooker.
But what makes Wright’s suffocation of Anderson so impressive isn’t just the physical domination or meticulous film work that led to it. It’s how Wright mentally approached a matchup that had significant ramifications for his draft stock and would determine if Tennessee would snap a 15-game losing streak to rival Alabama.
Wright was acutely aware of Anderson’s talent and how much hinged on his ability to hold off one of the best players in the country. But by Wednesday of that week, Wright knew he had the upper hand,
“At first, I was a little bit scared,” Wright said. “You hear all about the player, how good they are, blah, blah, blah. But then as you game plan and start breaking them down and you realize they are just like any player; they have weaknesses and things you can take advantage of my confidence just starts building and building and building. By the time we get to the game I just know I’m more prepared and I know I’m better than the player I’m going to go against.”
That game sparked a draft rise with no detours to the top. Wright finished the season with questions about his athleticism at his size, but after dominating the Senior Bowl and putting on a show at the combine, the Tennessee tackle was firmly in the conversation to be one of the first tackles taken in the 2023 NFL Draft.
Wright took 17 pre-draft visits and did Zoom interviews with several other teams. He’s on almost every team’s radar, including the Bears, who hosted Wright for a top-30 visit and have a massive need at tackle.
The visit to Halas Hall wasn’t about scheme fit or positional preference. The Bears hosted Wright and focused their inquiries on who he is as a person. What are his hobbies? How does he decompress from football? What makes him tick?
Top-30 visits are the final phase of intel gathering. They’ve seen the tape and watched the workouts but want more time with the player to ensure culture fit.
Always comfortable in his own skin, Wright aced his Halas Hall exam.
“You walk into the GM’s office and they want to really ask you some questions, they want to get to know you, and they want to dig a little bit to see what you’re about,” Wright told NBC Sports Chicago. “I remember going in there and it was good, [general manager Ryan Poles] asked me some questions, dug a little bit. I just knew – I think they were impressed because I could just be myself. I don’t have anything to hide. I don’t have to sit in there and try to be this perfect person or make these perfect sentences to sound like the perfect person. I could just be myself. They respected that.”
The highlight of Wright’s pre-draft visit to Chicago, which could be a sign of things to come, was an instant connection with offensive line coach Chris Morgan – one that saw the two bond over on- and off-field topics.
“I talked to coach C-Mo for a long time,” Wright said. “It was funny, he was talking to me about what are some of your pet peeves? It’s funny, right off the bat, his No. 1 pet peeve and my No. 1 pet peeve are both the same thing. So, it’s going to be fun working with him if I end up with the Bears.”
The pet peeves can be boiled down to complacency.
“He said I want players that come in and have talent and don’t just get by,” Wright said. “He kind of explained, you know, ‘you’ve done good up to this point, but you’ve got so much more in you.’ My pet peeve is like when I feel like I can do something and I’ll establish that foundation with the team – you know you have to establish that trust before you can do anything extra – I told him how after I establish that I want to try some things and see what works best for me.
“He was like, ‘I’m going to make sure you got the foundation first.’ We got some things to work out and if that’s the only thing to work out, I think we’ll have a good relationship. He’s a good coach.”
Poles, head coach Matt Eberflus, and the Bears’ staff are on the hunt for talent in the 2023 draft. They need to inject as much of it as they can into a roster still in the early stages of a rebuild. But they also want scheme and culture fits. The Bears have emphasized finding players that eat, sleep, sweat, bleed, and breathe football. Those who won’t go home until the tank has been emptied past E.
Wide receiver Velus Jones Jr. was Wright’s teammate at Tennessee. He has already given the offensive tackle a crash course on the H.I.T.S (hustle, intensity, takeaways, smart football) principle that governs life at Halas Hall.
It’s something Wright is prepared to fully adopt if given the opportunity.
“The main thing he was saying is that there’s going to be a lot asked of you but embrace it because if there’s not a lot asked of you then they probably don’t think you are deserving,” Wright said. “What did Spider-Man say? With great power comes great responsibility. That’s kind of what he was hitting on.”
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Wright enters draft week as one of four elite tackles atop the 2023 draft.
Ohio State’s Paris Johnson Jr., Georgia’s Broderick Jones, and Northwestern’s Peter Skoronski all have legitimate claims to be the first tackle taken.
As for Wright, he is seen as a plug-and-play right tackle with All-Pro potential. His selling point to teams debating between him and the other top tackles is just as flawless as his senior year tape.
“The main thing I tell them is: You see what I have done in a year and a half of just really, really focusing in and really trying to be my best self. You see what I did at the combine. You see the pro day. You see Senior Bowl,” Wright said. “You see, like, with just a little more attention to detail and a little more focus, you can see how far I’ve gotten. I don’t even feel like I’ve scratched the surface. If this is where I’m at now, I’m excited to see where I’ll be at when I’m 25, 24.
“There’s nothing really that I can’t do. It’s just a matter of teaching it to me. Once I learn it, I steal it. It’s like, ‘Don’t teach it to me if you don’t want me to take it. It’s mine now.’ Then I just implement it into my game. I’m just, you see on tape that I have some stuff – you say it’s good or you say it’s advanced. But I don’t even know. Sometimes I feel like I’m just really out there free balling, off instincts. If that’s where I’m at right now, I don’t know. If I get around some of these NFL vets and they can really teach me, I don’t know how good I can be.”
Wright’s film study obsession has seen him pour over tape from the top tackles in the NFL to make their strengths his own.
“I like to watch Trent Williams a lot,” Wright said. “His snatch and trap is as good as anybody. I’ve took that. In the Alabama game, Lane Johnson, he likes to go double under a lot, so I do that. Jason Peters, he loads up really heavy on that front foot, which I don’t do as much because I think there’s a time and a place for it, he kind of does it a lot. I took that. Tristan Wirfs, his right hand is so accurate sometimes, I try to be as accurate and I just feel like I just watched him do it, and I did in practice a few times and it’s in my repertoire.”
He describes himself as big, athletic, and violent. He has all the physical tools to be an elite NFL tackle and is already sharpening his fundamentals with the technical greatness of some of the NFL’s best.
Combine that with the right mental makeup to thrive under the immense pressure that would come with being the first first-round pick of a regime tasked with rebuilding a marquee NFL franchise into a perennial contender.
“I would embrace it,” Wright said. “You want to be in the position to where a lot is asked of you because you feel like you can rise to the challenge. I honestly do better when I’m in situations where I have to rise to the challenge. I’m looking forward to that if I’m in that position.”
The Bears’ rebuild desperately needs a strong, sturdy foundational pillar on the offensive line – one that can start on Day 1, has limitless potential, and is wired to be the catalyst for a rise from the NFC cellar to the penthouse suite.
Darnell Wright just might check all of those boxes.