Every draft cycle, there’s a handful of edge rushers that get hyped up because of what they might become. The traits are there, the testing pops, and you can talk yourself into the upside pretty easily.

David Bailey isn’t really that kind of projection.

Turn on the Texas Tech tape and it hits you pretty quickly — this guy already knows how to rush the passer. Not in a “he’s athletic enough to figure it out” way, but in a real, repeatable, week-to-week production kind of way. Big 12 tackles weren’t dealing with flashes from him… they were dealing with it all game.

And what stands out first isn’t even the speed — it’s how natural everything looks. Some guys feel like they’re thinking through a rush. Bailey doesn’t. It’s instinctive. The timing, the angles, the way he sets guys up — it all feels second nature, like he’s been doing it forever.

In a class built on projection, Bailey looks ready to step in and produce right away.

The Bag: Speed, Spin, and Leverage

The first thing I noticed on tape was how much he leans on speed early in reps. That’s not a crutch — it’s the entire foundation of how he wins. Bailey’s first step is legitimately different (1.62-second 10-yard split at the Combine), and tackles feel it immediately. They’re opening their hips a half-second too early just trying to survive the play, and that’s exactly where he wants them.

Because once he gets you thinking speed, that’s when the spin shows up — and it hits fast. Not rushed, not out of control, but timed. That’s the difference. A lot of college guys spin because they’re stuck. Bailey spins because he knows he’s already won the rep mentally.

That move really only works because of the outside arm hook. He’s not just turning his body; he’s grabbing leverage. He latches onto that outside shoulder, uses it as a pivot point, and suddenly he’s not running around the tackle anymore — he’s slingshotting off him.

You can also see how much he understands pacing within a rush. He’s not just flooring it every snap. There are reps where he’ll threaten with depth, hesitate just enough to freeze the tackle, then snap back inside with that spin or a quick rip. It’s controlled chaos, and it’s why his pressure numbers were so consistent week to week, even against better tackles.

Now, the trade-off right now is power. His speed-to-power isn’t there yet in a consistent way. When he tries to convert, he can get a little tall, and bigger tackles can sit on it if they’re ready. You’ll see some reps where he hits a wall against 320-pound anchors and has to reset. That’s real, and it’s part of why some teams hesitate to call him a true three-down lock right away.

But even with that, his ability to dip, rip, and flatten the arc is something you just can’t teach. He doesn’t take the long way around — he trims the corner tight, makes himself slippery, and gets on the quarterback in a hurry.

Ready Now, Scary Later

The crux of the Bailey evaluation is pretty simple once you strip everything else away: he already does the hardest part of the job at a high level, and he’s still not a finished product.

That’s a dangerous combination.

He’s currently sitting at 6’3”, 251 lbs, which is going to scare off some teams that want their edges to look like 270-pound power ends. But the league’s been shifting for a while now. That frame actually fits perfectly in a 3-4 outside linebacker role where you can just let him hunt — think more in that “Micah Parsons-lite” lane than a traditional hand-in-the-dirt every-down anchor.

And when you actually look at the production, it backs it up. More than a sack a game — and did that in games where teams were throwing a ton at him. That’s the part that matters. It’s one thing to rack up sacks against bad tackles. It’s another to consistently affect the quarterback when offenses are actively trying to avoid you.

What makes it even more interesting is how much room he still has to grow as a rusher. Right now, if his first move gets slowed down, you’ll see him win with effort, second effort, and just pure burst to recover. It works — but it’s not the finished product yet.

Once he adds a more consistent counter — whether that’s a tighter hand swipe, a more reliable long-arm, or just better sequencing between moves — you’re not just talking about a guy who gets 8–10 sacks. You’re talking about someone offenses have to gameplan around every single week.

And when you combine that with the production, the testing, and the fact that he’s still adding to his game? That’s where it starts to separate him from the rest of the class.