Derick Hall wasn’t supposed to make it to the NFL… but through resilience, tenacity and grit, he’s made it somehow – an incredible accomplishment considering that the linebacker was only given a one percent chance to live at birth.
Hall, 22, was drafted as a second round pick (37th overall) by the Seattle Seahawks after impressing at Auburn, where he was named first-team All-SEC in 2022. The six-foot-three, 256-pounds trailblazer registered 6.5 sacks and 60 total tackle during the final season of his college career.
But none of that would’ve occurred without his mother believing that her son would turn out to be a fighter. Hall was born 23 weeks premature in Gulfport, Mississippi, in 2001 and was dead at birth – without a heartbeat before being resuscitated.
Weighing just two pounds and one ounce at birth, with brain bleeding, the NFL player spent a week on life support. Believing that he would likely be in a permanent vegetative state, doctors advised Stacey Gooden-Crandle, Hall’s mother, to allow life support to be discontinued, but she refused.
‘The doctors wanted me to just let nature take its course,’ Gooden-Crandle once told AuburnUndocver. ‘We decided we wanted to fight for him.’
Derick Hall’s rise to the NFL is a ‘one-in-a-million’ story full of resilience, tenacity and grit
The Seahawks linebacker was born 23 weeks prematurely and dead (without a heartbeat)
Struggling to survive, doctors advised against Hall’s mother to keep her son on life support
‘We just trusted God wholeheartedly, and look what we’ve got now,’ said Hall’s mother, Stacey
‘They said he’d never be able to walk or be able to talk,’ she added. ‘They said he’d just be a vegetable. He’d be 85 percent mentally retarded. He wouldn’t have any quality of life. They said ”we shouldn’t try to save this baby.”’
Hall was finally able to go home with his family five months after being taken care of at a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) while hooked on a ventilator. But, his mother didn’t necessarily know if that was the end of her newborn son’s health troubles.
‘A young woman being told all this, I was scared,’ Gooden-Crandle recalled. ‘I didn’t know if I could financially support this kid.
‘I didn’t know if I was prepared for the things I was being told. We just trusted God wholeheartedly, and look what we’ve got now.’
In his early years, Hall would be frequently hospitalized and suffered from asthma. He began playing flag football when he was four, but knew he’d be limited both in games and at practice due to being at a health disadvantage, though that gave him a sense of resilience and grit that’s helped him reach the summit of American Football.
‘The earliest thing I remember is being 4 or 5 years old and having an asthma attack,’ Hall told AuburnUndercover. ‘I was in the hospital for three weeks. Going through all that at a young age, going through breathing machines and treatments and stuff like that, getting through all of that every year at a young age really put me in position to learn how to fight, compete and face adversity.’
Hall began playing flag football when he was four but was limited at games and in practice
At Auburn, Hall was named second-team All-SEC in 2021 and first-team All-SEC in 2022
In full disbelief, Hall had his head in his hands when he learned that he was drafted by Seattle
Hall was a standout athlete at football, basketball and track at Gulfport High School. He was among the most highly rated football prospects in Mississippi in 2018 and even had Division I offers to play college basketball, despite often requiring inhalers as a teen.
Hall’s lungs are still not as highly functioning as they normally would be at his age, though that never stopped him from pursuing his passion.
‘It was definitely hard,’ he recalled. ‘Watching everybody run when I was over there coughing up a lung, it was pretty hard.’
‘I have the lungs of a 13- or 14-year-old child,’ Hall added. ‘Trying to overcome those obstacles through hard work and dedication and commitment started at a young age up until now. That’s what propelled me to where I am today.’
Hall doesn’t use an inhaler much these days. He only occasionally needed a breather during his four years at Auburn, where he developed an interest for civil engineering.
The linebacker could’ve plied his trade at Mississippi State or Ole Miss but cited his relationship with Tigers assistant coach Rodney Garner as the main reason for his commitment.
‘I would never have imagined God would have such a great future for him, especially athletically. He was always smart, a straight-A student. It’s so amazing. He was always a hard worker. I knew he had determination and grit,’ said Gooden-Crandle. ‘He had a goal, and with God’s help he got there.’
Seattle’s newest defensive player holds a close bond with his mother, who he calls his ‘queen’
As a freshman and sophomore at Auburn, Hall recorded a total of 34 tackles and 3.5 sacks. He became a starter as junior, where he registered 52 total tackles and nine sacks, earning himself a second-team All-SEC nomination in 2021 before becoming a member of the conference’s first-team honors a year later.
The newest addition to the Seahawks defense said he’s grateful for his mother and step-father, Cedric Crandle, and all of the help and support they’ve provided along the way to his journey to the NFL.
‘My mom is my queen,’ Hall said. ‘She is everything to me, how hard she worked raising two kids by herself at first, working two or three jobs. God blessed me with a great stepdad. I refer to him as my father, not my stepdad.’
Hall is confident in his ability to flourish wherever the Seahawks plug him in, having played all over the field in college. He’s looking forward to brining his leadership to the team’s locker room after being a team captain at Auburn last season, despite knowing he’ll be a rookie.
‘That was definitely a lot more significant for me to have that, knowing that my teammates picked me to help be a leader on that team,’ Hall said of his last year at Auburn.
‘I feel like I’m a guy who could be in that role and flourish, and I feel like I’m the guy to help that team get better. Just continue to grow.’
