What to Expect From 49ers Newest Linebacker De'Vondre Campbell

Intro time for the 49ers Rush podcast you know one of the most common takeaways I I was at you know training camp as much as I could be uh all the ones that were open and whatnot it it was awesome but you know I'd go there with different friends and you know media members and you'd be around other people and you hear people talk and all those things and one of the most common um kind of phrases was who is that gigantic guy it was number 59 uh New Edition linebacker DeAndre Campbell like he's huge and you look at you know linebacker metrics and whatever else he's 64 232 and like all right that's pretty big there's no doubt about it but whenever he's standing next to Fred Warner he's bigger than Fred like the size just jumps up cuz you've always had Fred Fred Warner and Dre Greenlaw and Greenlaw is much shorter much stouter like Thumper like he's he's smaller he's a lot smaller VRE Campbell bigger and I mean longer arms taller ways more all those different things than Fred Warner so it was just and very wide shoulders too like got the dreads he's going like he's just a big dude and it didn't matter how many times I went I think it made 10 or 11 practices like it's shocking that is a big dude and because used to it was that with Eric Armstead and Javon kinlaw right they were just these towers that you just from the sideline and I get at the broadcast views awesome and all those things but whenever you're there and you see everybody in skill and it's just like wow DeAndre Campbell's him and that dude's first one off the bus we always used to joke about that in the coaching world right like all right who's the biggest baddest looking dude you're off the bus first to intimidate the other school we're playing whatever it's dandre Campbell uh new addition for the 49ers he comes in number 19 first Linebacker year for the 49ers we put such a premium on that linebacker spot in this defense and you have to because the 49ers are a team whose scheme we are Light in the Box you know that tackle to tackle box seven yards deep we put six there yeah we play a number three linebacker on 20% of our snaps but we're mostly in the nickel we don't walk down our safeties very often we play six in the box and we ask guys and that those six guys the 4 d linemen and the two linebackers you got to play up so this is a position that the 49ers have invested heavily in obviously you have all the extensions to Dr Greenlaw you can go to draft Capital with the drafting of you know trading up in the first round for Ruben Foster that didn't work out luckily you got Fred Warner next year luckily you got Dr Greenlaw the year after that and those are huge things but green law is not playing playing this year now I think he will come back at least at the start of the Year let me preface that when he tore his Achilles he's going to miss 9 months period so I think he comes back best case scenario middle of November but you can't plan on that you have to move forward for a defense that is so reliant on the linebacker position and that's why they brought in dandre Campbell uh comes to number 19 on our list on our four ballots rank 1 through 91 his highest rank was 11 his lowest rank was 25 how important is he going to be he's taken all the first team reps and he's looked really really good through training camp I doubt we'll see too much of him in the preseason he he's 30 plus years old he's played a long time he's going into I think year nine uh been around for a while and so that's that's an addition because he's played so much shout out to my man Josh executive producer of this show so jersey number 59 64232 33 and 5 Hance arms he has longer arms and C mckivitz that's top 90th Stats percentile of linebackers the NFL ran a 4.58 40 now I doubt he's that fast now you know North at 30 years old that was 82 percentile so he's fast he could move 34in vertical 16 bench press reps and you plug in all of his measurables there are no linebackers that big all of his comps are outside pass rushers Chris Clemens Kevin Bernett derell Washington that's just kind of what he is and kind of what it was now he's from Fort Meyers Florida son of Luther and Katherine Campbell um went to Cypress Lake High School and was a three star recruit but the grades and didn't get the spot he wanted so he went to Hutchinson Community College first in 2012 then transferred to Minnesota was there for um three years did pretty well ended up getting drafted I think yeah fourth round of 2016 um we we'll talk about that here in a second now he did have one all proo year Fred Warner was second Team all proo um you had Darius sha Leonard and sure enough DeAndre Campbell were the first team all Pros Fred Warner was second that year and was a captain of their team so this is somebody that has been paid a lot of money he got that huge second contract joins Green Bay dominates plays Incredible then things went aai they went really really bad um also he's the first Packers l linebacker to win a all proo all the way back since Ray nitki back in 1966 talk about the 49ers linebacker position is as hollowed as exist I mean you just talk about the top four and you're just like good Lord you know going back with you know mulus inducted Hall of Famer Patrick Willis Navaro Bowman Fred Warner obviously you got to put green law up there Ken Norton Jr Woodall I mean you can go there you can Timeline go back there's a bunch more there too like you're talking about this is the first time the Green Bay Packers had an all proo linebacker for what 60 year 50 plus years that ain't happening in the 49ers world that's just not who we are right um now here's where things kind of went all right we're going to jump back and forth of the timeline here this is how we joined the ners late last year Campbell um went posted on social media that he is no longer going to play hurt and they kept forcing him and this is these are his words the play injured and he just didn't feel it eventually started arguing with the Green Bay coaching staff um said that they made him look quote clueless on the field and constantly put him in bad spots in quote uh played his fewest games last year with 11 and was released he had three years left on his deal it was a 5year $50 million deal signed in 2022 he got released a year later what that looks like I I don't know and whenever they released him he said quote they didn't even tell me and this was after they said that Aaron Jones and him were part of their future plans end quote both those players got released without even having a conversation I don't know what's going on at Green Bay uh it's just weird but he came out this year and put on Twitter quote I can't even lie I'm having so much fun playing football again the situation I was in was making me lose my love for the game but I'm back having fun and I love that for myself thank you God end quote he put that on Twitter um on the 5th I'm sorry the 20th of May this year and let's go now just to Johnny Holland this is Johnny Holland talking about dandre Campbell and how he's been since he joined the 49ers well he he's been awesome man you know I've been watching him play for a long time and when he was a rookie in I think 2016 at Atlanta and and uh you know it's his Run Defense ninth year in the league now and he's gravitating to our system and and uh he's just such a good awareness and coverage and you know his ability to still run and play and so we're excited about having him and he will fit good in us you know my biggest concern for our defense is against the run it really really is deantre Campbell's going to be solid again I'm not concerned about him I'm not concerned about Warner I'm concerned about the defensive tackles but having him and just that depth with Dr Green law out it's huge I mean this is a guy that has played over 6,000 career defensive snaps uh the exact number is 6,459 shout out to Josh that dude's a freaking boss um that's a lot of snaps he's played a lot um and will be a huge role for the 49ers even after green law comes back because when green law comes back there's going to be a revamping period I think green laww probably comes in as that number three three linebacker until he's 100% but if you have dandre Campbell playing at the peak of his game at his age and you got Dr Greenlaw play playing at the peak of his stage Dre Greenlaw is linebacker to then you'd kick Campbell to the linebacker three spot kind of like what we saw with the Z's but with Campbell there you don't have to rush green law back and remember the 49ers obviously regular season games matter but Campbell gives the 49ers the added benefit to allow green law to get to 100% because you're not playing for November you're not playing for December you're playing for January and February that's the 49ers goal and so they get to be a little bit more patient with that which I really really like um and throughout deantre Campbell's entire career he's always been better against the Run had 23 solo run stops last year just look at his PFF grades okay uh this is last season 65.3 overall and this is when he was playing hurt and fighting with the coaches which I don't like but whatever take it for what it is uh 67.7 Career Stats run defense 71.7 pass rush 61.0 coverage he's a he's a above average run Defender and you're betting on size traits veteran experience all those things now he's drafted the fourth round of the 2016 draft by the Atlanta Falcons um 49ers again I love this I would have never guessed it I I'll give you guys a quick second can you name the 49er that was draft in the fourth round of 2016 I'll give you 3 seconds 1 two three it was the Mantis the pre mantis Rashard Robinson pass interference man himself I don't know if you remember him but also in that round Dak Prescott was drafted Hassan Ridgeway uh was with the Niners Tyler higgy Sheldon day another Niners guy um and if you you know one of my favorite things on pro football reference you filter you can filter by so many things it's spreadsheets it's football nerd Heaven uh they should sponsor the show but whatever uh you could filter by weighted career approximated value basically how important their career has been he has a 49 score what's that mean there's two other players in that draft with the same score Ronnie Stanley larmy tunel injuries and all those things but that all pro that's going to boost that score up pretty high um and he's had a really cool career played his rookie years out his rookie contract out with the Falcons from 2016 to 2019 he was in Arizona for one year then got paid big time to go to Green Bay now he's with the 49ers listen to these career statistics good Lord he's played a lot of football 779 career tackles 40 career tackle for losses 22 quarterback hits 9 and a half sacks he could Blitz but that's not really what he's used for three Force fumbles eight fumble recoveries 28 pass breakups seven picks not bad not bad at all um now I do have to say this and I think this is important I didn't know Contract where to put it in on here so I thought contract talk would work it's important to note the 49ers went after somebody else and agreed to a deal with somebody else first before they settled on dandre Campbell they had a verbal agreement done with Eric Kendricks uh first but then he had some shake up down in Dallas they offered him to be the starting mik backer for a coach he's already played with and so then he jumped ship and so now he's down there in Dallas he didn't want to be the number two here he'd rather be the number one there that's what it is Dallas doesn't have nearly as deep a roster take that for what you will some people don't want to play for Super Bowl some people want to play for wild card burst Eric kendri Kendricks enjoy your Wild Card round U now so you do have to put that into perspective the 49ers signed him immediately after that oneyear $5 million deal 3.3 million of that as a signing bonus so he got paid almost all of it up front oneyear deal we'll see what happens you look at his career worth woo Packers paid him some buddy $ 38.3 million for the vet deantre Campbell have a day sir nothing makes me happier than seeing people make money um that is awesome 110 career starts he's you're getting a vet with Elite size what else do you want it's plug and play and he's taken every single rep with the ones it's not up for debate he is the number two backer until Dre comes back and I think even after Dre Greenlaw comes back he'll stay the number two until Dre's backb we'll see what that looks like and then the switch would take place but excited to have dandre Campbell out there and it's weird because you lose a top 10 linebacker and the 49ers still have guaranteed one of the top three linebacking cores in the NFL by going against deer Kamp a lot of that it's because Fred Warner's so head and shoulders above any other player in the NFL at the position but I mean you look across the NFL dandre Campbell he might not be a top five number two linebacker but whatever you're looking at Dre Greenlaw coming up you got D winners dff however you want to put that whatever there's just depth on depth and upside on upside in this room and I'm happy for it dandre Campbell I'm glad you're here glad you want to be here I'm glad you're loving football and I think it's going to be fun for him to play alongside another allpro we got two all proo linebackers um that's pretty cool that's pretty cool so for us number 19 deantre Campbell and for The 409ers Rush we'll just keep counting down