Calen

Bullock

He landed awkwardly on a tackle against Jonathan Taylor and left the game shortly thereafter. M.J. Stewart is set for more defensive snaps in his absence. The rookie third-rounder Bullock had three interceptions in four starts.

A steady ascender, Bullock (6’2/188) spread his 2023 reps more evenly between the box, slot and free safety while forcing incompletions on 25% of his targets and holding wideouts to 0.47 yards per coverage snaps as a First Team All-Pac-12 performer. The Pasadena native checked in at a perilously light 188, which is a seventh percentile weight, and was only able to bench 225 pounds eight times. His trademark speed showed up with a 4.48s 40-yard dash that ranked in the 92nd%, but his 33” vertical (41st%) was disappointing for a respectable 6.37 RAS. A spindly-built cover-oriented safety who could end up as a slot corner given his length and speed, Bullock moves with an urgency with the ability to go up and challenge for the ball like a wideout. He has some coverage breaks and mental errors on tape that need to be cleaned up, and he’s never going to be mistaken for a linebacker-type in run support, but Bullock is a young early enrollee who still has plenty of room to grow into a quality cover safety.

There are multiple second-year players across the college football landscape who could be in for standout seasons in 2022 and Bullock (6'3/180) is one of them. When Mike Renner of PFF released his list of potential breakout candidates at defensive back, he included Bullock alongside the likes of Jason Marshall Jr. (Florida), Tony Grimes (North Carolina) and more. Bullock finished out the 2021 season with 39 total tackles (25 solo), three passes defended and two interceptions.

While Bullock gets the “Athlete” designation because he’s capable of contributing at multiple positions, it’d be an upset if the 6-foot-2, 170-pounder was playing anywhere but defensive back for the Trojans. The four-star prospect also had offers from Oregon, Ohio State and Texas -- just to name a select few -- and rated as the 23rd best prospect in the state of California in Rivals rankings. After a horrific recruiting class in 2020, the Trojans are off to a very nice start, and now have the fifth-overall ranked class according to 247Sports.

Bullock (6'2/170) ticked off the above three programs while speaking with Rivals, but there’s at least one other biggie out there that could make serious hay in this recruitment before all is said and done. That would be Ohio State -- the Buckeyes have already offered to Bullock and he currently plans on taking a late March visit to Columbus to check out the program. The Pasadena native is long and covers a lot of ground, profiling as a likely safety for college. Rivals ranks Bullock as the No. 23 prospect in the state of California for the 2021 cycle.