Aaron Donald – From Small Fry to NFL Elite

Los Angeles Rams defensive tackle Aaron Donald is the perfect example of how NFL draft players can surprise you.

Aaron Donald was drafted by the then St. Louis Rams in 2014. Then,  commentators said that he was undersized, and would struggle to adapt to the NFL. As a result, Aaron Donald dropped to 13th in the draft that year. 

Fast forward to 2019, and those concerns seem utterly ridiculous. Donald has grown into one of the best defensive players in the league, and arguably one of the best outright. 

Donald has made five Pro-Bowls in 5 NFL season. As well as that, he’s earned four first team All-Pros. He’s the reigning NFL sacks leader and has won back-to-back Defensive Player of the Year Awards. 

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His former teammate, Chris Long, said it was obvious from the start that Donald would be a great player.

“I’d like to credit myself with being the first person to know he was going to be amazing,” Long jokingly told Gus Frerotte of the “Huddle Up with Gus” podcast. 

“We used to joke his rookie camp that he was going to be in the Hall of Fame, but I kind of wasn’t joking.”

Now, Long believes that Donald is “the best football player in the world, in my opinion.”

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“I’ve never seen anybody work so hard, who had so much talent and play so violent and play with such tenacity,” he said. “This guy would fight you on the field at the drop of a hat, and I respect that about him, and outworks everybody.

“I would be the last person in the film room usually at the end of camp, and I would go in there and watch tape once everybody was at home. I started going in there and opening the door and turning the lights on to find my pen or notebook, and he was in there every night.”