GREEN BAY, Wis. – Third time was definitely the charm for cornerback Trey Amos.
After starting his career at Louisiana and spending one season at Alabama, Amos transferred to Mississippi for his final collegiate season. Having emerged as a potential first-round draft choice, he will have a predraft visit with the Green Bay Packers, according to Packer Report’s Easton Butler.
With the Packers, Amos could replace Jaire Alexander at cornerback. Alexander, as it turns out, is one of his favorite players.
Amos intercepted one pass at Louisiana as a freshman in 2020, then went without a pick the next three seasons. When Nick Saban stepped down at Alabama, Amos opted to hop back into the transfer portal.
Rebels coach Lane Kiffin had reason to be interested.
“You know what you’re getting from Coach Saban,” Kiffin said. “I think when you can get players (from Alabama) but especially (defensive backs), you know how they’ve been trained and what they’re used to, so I think that also helps in this instance. …
“When you spin that forward to a player, especially a defensive back, you know they’ve been coached really well, but you also know their mindset. That’s a big deal – someone coming in your program that has already been trained with an elite mindset vs. someone coming in from some other places where you have to work them out of some different mindsets.”
At Ole Miss, he intercepted three passes and finished with 16 passes defensed to earn first-team all-SEC.
After a strong week at the Senior Bowl and the Scouting Combine, where he measured 6-foot 3/4 and 195 pounds with a 4.43 in the 40, he’s put himself squarely in the first-round conversation in a jumbled position group.
“I just feel grateful, you know?” he said at the Scouting Combine. “I’m just taking it day by day. Long journey, and the hard work is like paying off. I just want to continue doing that and being consistent and just being happy and having fun with it.”
In five seasons, Pro Football Focus charged Amos with a 43.1 percent completion rate and 66.0 passer rating. With the Rebels, he allowed 32-of-62 passing (51.6 percent) for 280 yards (just 8.8 yards per catch with a long gain of only 24 yards).
“It came with a lot of practice” he said of his ball production in an interview with The Draft Network before the Senior Bowl. “My defensive back coach, Bryan Brown, and our assistant coach, Pete Golding, they harped on ball production. I try to make plays, and they put me in the best position to do so. I locate the ball. All of that came in practice, and it started during spring ball last year. We harped on it. The hard work paid off.”
Importantly, Amos played in every game the past two seasons. That stands in stark contrast to Michigan’s Will Johnson, Kentucky’s Maxwell Hairston, East Carolina’s Shavon Revel and Notre Dame’s Benjamin Morrison, all of whom missed significant chunks of the 2024 season.
Amos said he worked on his strength, which showed up during his final season, whether it was press-man coverage or as a tackler. Amos has one of the lowest missed-tackle rates among this year’s cornerbacks; he missed 13 tackles while playing about 2,450 snaps in five seasons.
Amos likes playing press-man the most, but scouts like how he uses his vision in zone. The Packers played mostly zone under first-year coordinator Jeff Hafley.
“I want to prove I can do it all,” Amos told AL.com at the Senior Bowl. “Man coverage. Zone coverage. Come up and tackle. I want to show that I can fly around and be accountable. I’m just a technician and I want to get better at everything, just like I have every step of my career.”
Amos is the No. 5 corner in the draft and the No. 39 prospect overall, according to The Athletic’s Dane Brugler.
“Amos has an appetite for press, but I liked him best in zone (Cover 2, Cover 3, quarters), where he can trust his athletic instincts from depth to read and rally,” Brugler wrote as part of a much more extensive scouting report.
He is the No. 42 prospect, according to NFL Network’s Daniel Jeremiah.
“He has average twitch and burst, but he plays with excellent instincts and ball skills,” Jeremiah wrote.
