Inside The Huskies

Husky Roster Review: Rainey-Sale Will Go from Idle to Fall Unveiling

The freshman linebacker missed all of spring football while recuperating from a high school knee injury.
Dan Raley|
Zaydrius Rainey-Sale, right, leaves the field with fellow linebacker Deven Bryant.
Zaydrius Rainey-Sale, right, leaves the field with fellow linebacker Deven Bryant. | Dan Raley

Wearing a black rubber sleeve on his right knee, Zaydrius Rainey-Sale punched a blocking dummy, threw it down and put a leg into it.

On another day, he swung a heavy sledgehammer into an oversized truck tire.

He purposely threw hard passes back and forth with fellow linebacker Deven Bryant as if to see who would blink first.

Rainey-Sale did a lot of stuff during the University of Washington's month of spring football practices -- everything except pull on shoulder pads and a helmet and run around and hit people.

The Huskies' purported top freshman coming in skipped nearly everything else as he went through rehabilitation from offseason knee surgery and left people to envision what sort of impact he'll make when given the all clear, which is supposed to be soon.

His new linebackers coach Brian Odom likewise is ready to embrace the 6-foot-3, 220-pound defender with the big reputation from Bethel High School outside of Tacoma.

"I haven't seen him participate in an actual practice yet, but he walks into the room and the room lights up because of him," Odom said during spring drills. "He changes it because he's in it. His smile is contagious. He's intelligent. He's engaging. He's been in every meeting. He's thirsting for knowledge of the scheme."

Looking studious, Zaydrius Rainey-Sale follows quarterback Demond Williams Jr. inside after the Spring Game.
Looking studious, Zaydrius Rainey-Sale follows quarterback Demond Williams Jr. inside after the Spring Game. | Skylar Lin Visuals

This is one in a series of articles -- going from 0 to 99 on the Husky roster -- examining what each scholarship player and leading walk-on did this past spring and what to expect from them going forward.

By some accounts, Rainey-Sale is supposed to be more ready to play than former freshman linebacker Khmori House was, and the latter started five games last season before transferring to North Carolina.

Rainey-Sale presents a much different, far taller physique than most of the major players at linebacker in the compact Buddah Al-Uqdah, Jacob Manu and Bryant, with only the 6-foot-2, 223-pound Xe'ree Alexander coming close to his size.

The freshman should get a chance to put everything on display once fall camp starts up in August.

"This kid, if he plays half as good as he prepares right now when he's not available, he's going to be a really good player," Odom said.

ZAYDRIUS RAINEY-SALE FILE

What he's done: Again, he's advertised as the UW's top freshman in the current class. In three high school seasons, Rainey Sale piled up 216 tackles while collecting nearly every statewide defensive player of the year accolade. Going forward, he should be able to jump in and show what he can do.

Starter or not: Rainey-Sale likely moves into the rotation at some point that brings him freshman game snaps, but a conservative guess is he won't contend for starting time until 2026. If he somehow opens UW games or pulls a lot of snaps this fall, he will be the talk of the defense.

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Dan Raley
DAN RALEY

Dan Raley has worked for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, as well as for MSN.com and Boeing, the latter as a global aerospace writer. His sportswriting career spans four decades and he's covered University of Washington football and basketball during much of that time. In a working capacity, he's been to the Super Bowl, the NBA Finals, the MLB playoffs, the Masters, the U.S. Open, the PGA Championship and countless Final Fours and bowl games.

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