NFL Prospect Breakdown: Marquel Lee

Senior captain linebacker Marquel Lee finishes his career at Wake Forest with nearly 300 tackles during his four year career. After joining the team in the spring of 2013 and showcasing his abilities, Lee managed to impress enough to earn reserve time and avoid the common Wake Forest redshirt, playing in nine games.

As Lee’s collegiate career developed, he added more tools and technique to his repertoire, adding pass rushing/block shedding/pass coverage skills as his role continued to grow and evolve over the years.

Lee’s abilities earned him an invitation to the NFL combine where he was a top performer in the bench press with 25 reps. The two time captain was also an all-conference selection.

In terms of NFL potential, Lee will face an uphill battle to guarantee a draft spot. While he impressed as an aggressive player with great size and physical strength, Lee isn’t considered to be an elite athlete compared to the other linebackers in the draft class.

As a strength, Lee has shown good instincts in the run game and having the ability to stay disciplined. However, he has a tendency to get “lost in traffic” and making misreads and getting sealed off easier than anticipated. The linebacker also hasn’t impressed in coverage, being considered “rigid” according some scouts.

One scout went as far to say that he had “great size” but has questions about his “speed and instincts”. Scouts seem to believe that Lee has the potential to be a backup/special teams contributor for the right team (think 3-4 team that would like a plug linebacker).

Regardless, it’s another success story of how Wake Forest has developed the young man. Coming in as a lanky 210 pound “three star” recruit to now potentially getting drafted, give credit to Lee and the Wake coaching staffs that developed him over the years.