Drive Time: Sorting the Defensive Tackle Quandary, Kenneth Grant Deep Dive

a d line heavy episode today. I was going to do some mail bag questions as well, but I got too long in my argument for the defensive tackle position. So that's what we're going to do. From the Baptist Health Studios inside the Baptist Health Training Complex. This is the Draft Time Podcast. Maybe gaffe right off the top. I've lied to you guys. This is not recording from the Baptist Health Studios. In fact, I just want to

do the full transparency thing here. We'll see if I can get through the elements of this podcast because I've got strep throat. My son's got strep throat along with hand foot mouth. My daughter I'm pretty sure gonna have strep throw as well. So the entire squad is home today trying to get this podcast recorded, and you were probably gonna hear my son at some point, whether he's yelling at me. He's got Blaze and his RC car upstairs,

so he should be good to go. But he does like playing with me, so I suspect you'll either hear his voice, you'll hear him enter the room, or my favorite, you'll hear him throw his toys down the stairs. That's his favorite way to get my attention. So if it's a funny addition to the podcast, we'll keep it in. If it's annoying, I'll just take it out. So there you go off the top. Let's go ahead and get

a into the elephant of the room here. And maybe that's a bad way to intro this segment because you know, being the lurker that I am on social media these days, I see that folks are quite upset about Kalis Campbell. There he is landing back where his career started. What's up, boy? The RC Car's broken? Okay, we'll fix it and that stuff is fixed up right quick. So people are pissed off about kalayis going back to the Cardinals, right, and some of the questions about what it means for the

defensive tackle position for your Miami Dolphins. Let's get a few facts in off the top. The great news here. Great news, right, according to Nick Corte, who does a fantastic job with projected compensatory picks and the formula the NFL uses like, he nailed Robert Hunt in the third round. He even nailed Christian Wilkins flowing to the fourth round because of a snap count disparity and the Deshaun Elliot

seventh round pick this year. He was even befuddled by the fact that we were originally awarded a seventh round pick first Tedrick Wilson, which was of course later corrected by the NFL. So he's very qualified, right, That's the

point of that entire diatribe. He says that with Campbell's signing with the Cardinals, the Dolphins are officially plus one in the compensatory formula for the twenty twenty sixth class, and that player is Javon haw who's fifteen million dollars per year contract would net Miami a fourth round pick provided he plays enough snaps in twenty twenty five and the Dolphins do not. Uh, what's the word I'm looking

for here, Negate. That plus one activity with the free agent signing before the comp window formula closes back up in May. So if you're keeping track, that would be a third and a fourth this year and a seventh a fourth next year. And then if Anthony Weaver gets a head coaching job, which still feels like a matter of time as long as we don't go like five and twelve, I think he'll get that, then you would

get threes in both twenty six and twenty seven. So that's three comp picks in the top one hundred over a three year span, and three more in the one hundred to one hundred and forty range. That's six total picks in the top one forty. And if you bat five hundred on getting contributors in those positions, that's four years of cost control on minimum contract players. And we heard what coach said about draft picks set in the culture, right, I think you're going to have to get used to

this mode of team building. It sounds like that's what Mike McDaniel has learned the first three years of of his tenure, that the draft is a far more fruitful position to select players from than free agency, and we cautioned you guys on that back in February and January not to pat myself in the back too hard here, but the one in two year veteran deals in free agency really re emphasizes the necessity to be great in

the draft. That's not to say it ever went away, but I'm sure you guys remember how free agency kind of was fool's gold for the longest time. Right then, I want to say it was like the twenty thirteen Broncos. It could have been a year later or earlier, but it was in that range when they had Peyton Manning. But they signed DeMarcus where Wes Welker was part of that class, TJ. Ward, Dominique Rodgers, Comarti, who else? As I look it up now, actually Quentin Jammer was in there.

They signed Luis Vasquez to the offensive line. With the point is they essentially built their defense through free agency. Okay, that's right, I looked it up. It was both the twenty thirteen and twenty fourteen seasons. Add a key to leave Emmanuel Sanders to that entire group there. It gave them the number one defense in twenty fifteen with something like eight of the eleven starters on defense were free

agent acquisitions. You pair that around good draft picks and Von Miller, Malik Jackson, and a couple other draft hits like Dane Travathan, Bradley Roby, and you get yourself a Super Bowl winning team that quite literally didn't have a quarterback that year because Peyton Manning was no longer Peyton Manning and brock Ostwiler was the guy they benched Peyton Manning for. And this continued for a few years. We even saw a recent Super Bowl team do the exact

same thing, the twenty twenty one Bengals. They go three to zero in the AFC Playoff, scoring just twenty one points per game, including a second round win where they had eight sacks and three picks off Ryan Tannehill, but won the game by just three points. Right they kicked five field goals in that game. It was a defense

and special teams victory for the Bengals that day. And that defense was constructed through free agency, with seven of the eleven starters being free agent signings, and if you extended to the top fifteen players and snaps played, ten of those fifteen were free agents from the previous year. All of this is to say we had like a ten year period where you could build an entire side of the football and free agency, but we mentioned the countless times before free agency the top players really just

aren't hitting the market anymore. And now it's about being frugal, picking spots, identifying good values. Allow James Daniels, who I think, if he stays healthy all year, probably doubles his cost.

And I had this conversation with Kyle Krabb the other day on the phone, like we might have misconstrued the budget for the offseason for the Dolphins to spend in free agency, but when you add the twenty five percent cap inflation that goes onto these contracts with players who were you know, we talk about cornerstone plus starters and adequate starters, like you're essentially playing paying adequate starters, which are the third tier in your football team, Guys that

you probably should find on Day two of the draft, and you are paying them damn near cornerstone premium contracts. You guys are understand that if we did that, if we did what a lot of the fan base kind of urges this team to do, and spent money on players of that caliber, Jevon Holland, who to me as an adequate starter who got premium money for a safety. That's how you wind up with the Mike Tannebaum twenty

eighteen Dolphins. Do you guys understand that that's what happened that year with TJ McDonald getting that extension early in the year, with you know, even off the eight game suspension, with Rashad Jones's crazy contract, paying you know, Josh Sitton thirty three year old offensive linemen who are past their prime. Like that is not a good mode of team building. And so say what you want about where the roster

is right now. We went over this in a podcast last week, right about the places they improved, the places they have kind of regressed in And I think you can look at the areas of regression and say it like that's kind of severe, especially at defensive tackle right and it's really just kalay As Campbell and DeShawn hand which to me, that's a part time player who was very good in kalay As Campbell that you can find

somewhere in the draft, and then DeShawn Hann. I mean you should be able to find that player on the cheap and free agency or on Day three of the draft, because that's what his production was. So, yeah, there's a regression at a couple of spots, but I think that overall the roster has made a lot of improvements. And I just don't think that you're gonna get what you want in terms of paying out your nose for those

types of players. When you can get that same type of contributing player in the draft for peanuts, for literal league minimum versus like a seventeen million dollars per year contract, that is the best way to put yourself back in position.

And you've seen, you know, the people that worked that Mike McDaniel worked around and under do the exact same thing, whether it was the floor in Green Bay, whether it's McVeigh and the Rams and this crazy pivot they made a couple of years ago, or the Niners right now with Mike shann or with Kyle Shanahan. So I just think you're gonna have to kind of get used to that and we'll see if it all works out in

the grand scheme of things. But I think this is the way forward, and I'm glad to see the Dolphins and Mike McDaniel feel the same way. So to see this core in place again, Yes, this roster has remaining needs. It does. I'm not going to sit here and tell you otherwise. That would be totally foolish. And despite that review, I got on the podcast of the day man who was this guy? If if you are this guy, tell me who you are, because I just can't believe you

said this. We find the review not critical enough from Jersey Finns. I feel like I recognize that name. The problem is he's not critical of the Dolphins at all. Everything is rainbows and sunshine after not winning a playoff game in twenty five years. Hey, I don't really care what the seven team did for twenty twenty five. It has no relevance. He recently said Arti Burns was a good signing. Same Arti Burns, who couldn't crack a practice squad at thirty years old? Well, Burns was on the

Seahawks roster. So that's not true. Stick to listening to Omar and Poopar podcast to get honest opinions. Okay, so on the Ardi Burns podcast, I said that there is a couple of good games of tape where he played some slot and outside cornerback and was aggressive and played press up man coverage, which this defense wants to be. But told you that he hasn't eclipped three hundred snaps in six years, and that's a problem and it's not

gonna probably be something you can count on. So I don't know where you got that from, but we are critical in that area. We're critical about the defensive tackle position needing more pieces. We know that the offensive line

needs a starter right now. I'm not naive to any of that, but the roster when you look at it on the whole, and you know, I got a kick out of this On Twitter the other day, somebody omar posted that quote from an anonymous NFC or an anonymous decision maker coach or something that said, hey, if the Dolphins don't want to, we gladly take him. And it kind of broke the brains of the anti Tua crowd.

Who doesn't. Let's be honest, they don't know what they're watching because to a style of football and the processing of what the way he plays is not something that jumps off the screen at you. But if you appreciate the quarterback position and know what a quarterback's job entails, you know that he's very good. And when the rest of the league recognizes that and the fan base can't reconcile that, to me, it's kind of funny. So we are good at quarterback sands. The injuries obviously too, was

availability as an issue. The receiver room looks really good. I mean to waddlen Hill if they're you know, playing at their highest peak, and then Westbrook A. Kine and Malik Washington. It's a good receiver room. We have our starting tackles and you can you know, mel kiper can say all he wants to. Patrick Paul is not a starter, he's the starter. And we have a really deep edge group. Our top two corners are proven guys. Your entire linebacker

room is set. We are pretty good at most of the premium positions and to round out the rest of the roster, man, if you can find starters and contributors at defensive tackle, at guard, at corner, at safety in this year's draft, then you basically extend this build while simultaneously establishing a certain type of culture through those players, through competition, through never getting complacent, and when you get players that play themselves into big market deals, you can

move on from those guys and collect the pick and restock. We have seen every great team does this. The Patriots did it for years, the Chiefs have done it recently that you saw the Bills execute it last year. I don't know why we are so adverse to going in that direction, although I just kind of sense that the fan base, and maybe that's just the tweets that I see. It's more of like a live in the moment type of situation. So you see a great player come available,

you want that player. You don't get that player, you bemoan the coaching staff and the decision makers. I get that, but I think you should view the offseason as a bigger picture and don't look at where the team is in April and cry wolf because you're gonna be silly. And then also like just because I saw, like, Okay, Barry Jackson tweeted this the other day, and I again love Barry, but he said, like, the chances of the Dolphins getting impact players it picks thirteen forty eight ninety

eight are low. It's like, well, did they cancel the day the third day of the draft, cause like teams get contributors on Day three and u DFAs all the time, like you have to lean on your scouting staff man. You have to get this stuff right, like they did with cater co who, like they did with Nick Needham, like they have done you know in udfas, and on Day three so many times in the past. Now I'll be the first to admit Day three has not been

fruitful the last four or five years. In fact, it's why I think this team is kind of where they are in this position where they're gonna have to have a good draft. But I digress, So again, go back to looking at the Rams in twenty twenty three, they culminate that build with a championship. Right in twenty twenty one, the most aggressive build we've ever seen in football. Matthew Stafford gets hurt. In twenty two, they crater, They bought

them out. Some of those top line producers have injury issues, and they have a dreadful season. But rather than blowing it up, rather than staying with US tas Quo, they pivot and go a different direction. They wind up going back to the draft and selecting starting guard Steve a Vila, edge Brian Young, defensive tackle Kobe Turner, who's a fourth round pick who's like almost a Pro Bowl or maybe

he was a Pro bowler. You can find those guys wide receiver Puka Nakua, who's an freaking All Pro, and they get contributions from from three udfas and they get developmental pieces to take their game to the next level. With twenty twenty two fifth round pick Kyron Williams with defensive tackle Bobby Brown, with twenty twenty UDFA linebacker Christian rose Boom twenty twenty one to third round linebacker Ernest Jones.

This is not me saying this is a guaranteed formula, but rather that it is one way to execute a soft rebuild on the fly. And now here are the Rams really as well positioned as anybody in the NFC. And they did it off back to back playoff appearances, and they were just like fifteen yards away from downing the Eagles in Philadelphia last year and the only down season was one where their quarterback missed a big chunk of the season. Sound familiar. You'll see the Niners do

the exact same thing. They moved on from Deebo, Samuel Javon, Hardgrave, Shavarius Ward, tall Anoahufunga, Aaron Banks and their biggest signing was it might have been Saran Neil, It's debatable, but the point is they removed a lot of high priced talent and focused on guys who play more special teams than anything else. So that's the diatribe about soft resetting and refocusing your model as a draft based one. And I mentioned this to a couple of Beat writers at

the owner's meetings. I said, I thought, you know, I thought the vision for the veteran acquisition mode of trading picks for proven talent was smart in a sense and for a little bit, but I think they kind of went a little bit overboard on it, and it put them in this position where if they had used those picks and again like hey, losing two premium picks of one and the three to the tampering chargers, Like that's

an impact too. So you've found a way to reduce a lot of cheap contributors on your roster, and now you have to kind of overcorrect that and get back to it. So that's what I think you should be hoping for. Get some young players, get some rookies, get development from last year's class, from the twenty twenty three class too, maybe even and let's go at this thing. So let's go ahead and get into the defensive tackle

diet tribe next on the other side. After our first break here, Draft Time Podcast, your host Travis Wingfield, brought to you by Auto Nation. All right, we've been an interruption free here for about twelve minutes on the show. Let's go ahead at defensive tackle now and start with this. Actually, before we start with this, let's start with this first

and foremost. I'm bummed. I thought Koleais was someone you could slot in for five hundred snaps and he played six fifteen last year and just basically let the draft fall to you and not worry about where those snaps might come from. So please don't take this as me accepting a blow and acting like it's okay, because it's not. But the finality of it, that's the part that remains

up in the air. But you start with this. I think we as fans, and obviously I've change my role from fan to a little bit more than just a fan, but still I'm a huge fan of this team. Looking at this whole thing the wrong way because you see the depth chart and think it's missing volume, but you need to think about it more as a share of snap counts. For instance, Kalayas Campbell played six hundred and fifteen snaps last year and guess where they acquired him

June June thirteenth, to be exact. Now, I think last year's rotation was skewed as hell, because well, both Zach and Kalayis gave you more than three hundred snaps as edges.

As defensive ends, you know, five techniques are wider, and that stretched the rest of the defensive tackle room quite a bit, right to the point that we saw five hundred and sixty three snaps from DeShawn Hand, which I think if I told you that going into the year, you'd said, there's no way he plays even half of that, and four hundred and eighty one snaps from Benito Jones. So if you cumulatively remove the edge snaps from Zach and Kalayis kick those inside, you can reduce the number

of snaps you need by almost half. But of course Kalayis is not back, so we'll say by a quarter, give or take. So with those five hundred and sixty and five hundred and eighty snaps, with that's eleven hundred and ten snaps round right something like that. I don't know math No. Eleven hundred and forty snaps. You need about seven hundred and fifty to eight hundred snaps total that you don't currently have on your roster. So if you hit a home run at pick thirteen at defensive tackle,

that's it. That's who would be. He could play seven hundred snaps for you. You're done. But we'll talk about a player that I think fits that mold a little bit. But I think that's far from the only option. Because you don't want to go into the draft saying I have to get an eight hundred snap defensive tackle. That

seems like an issue. But between Kenneth Grant, Derek Harmon from Oregon, and Alfred Collins from Texas, I think all three of those guys could give you the seven hundred snaps you ask for as a rookie one and done type of solutions turn the card in issue fixed. At least that's what you hope for, right because you never know how these guys are gonna play right away or develop. But you kind of when I watch those guys on tape, I see Day one NFL contributors. Now where those guys

slot in. I think Grant requires a thirteenth pick. I think Harmon would come in a possible short trade back. I think think you could get call into the top of round two pick forty eight. I don't know about that, Jim. Now, if you need to create them in the aggregate, there's also a handful of guys I think we'll go on day two. They could give you four hundred to five hundred snaps as rookies. Darius Alexander out of Toledo, TJ. Sanders out of South Carolina, ty Leeku Williams out of

Ohio State, CJ. West from Indiana, Josh Farmer from Florida State, Jordan Phillips out of Maryland. I think all of these guys have a chance through their tape and ability to be impact players right away. This is why we don't just focus on the top fifteen players of a draft. There's a reason they have seven rounds and twenty five man scouting staffs that spend nine ten months out of

the year watching and getting to know these players. And then there's a crop of guys that might be more rotational pieces that can do what Benito Jones did last year and perhaps that comes with a playing time promotion for Benito, who had his best year as a pro. But like Oregon's Jamari Caldwell, who I saw Simon Clancy, who's a really really good draftnick for the Miami you know, covering the Miami Dolphins. He said the Jamry might be a Day two pick, which I could see that, but

I tend to think it's more early Day three. It's splitting hairs. But that's a guy that I think could fit that role. Virginia Tech's Anias Peebles is a guy that I think they're gonna like a heck of a lot on the interior, more of a nose tackle. Utah's Junior Funa. Sorry the polities names, man, they get me. I think there are guys who figure to be there on Day three that could give you two hundred, three hundred STAPs, kind of like what you were hoping for

last year with Jonathan Harris, Neville Gallimore. Of the guys that didn't make the football team, I think you can find that on the third day of the draft, and I I'd rather do that, man. I'd rather have three draft picks and u DFAs than three who the heck were those guy type of signings in free agency, Like, I think that's a better way to build your football team.

So there are options. That's the point to all of this, And if you want to go to the veteran route and maybe feel a little less pressure on draft night, you know, like Raekwon Davis is out there, but you know he had that blood clot issue last year and was released because of some of the health concerns around on that, So I don't know what his availability is. Like, he's a guy that's played four hundred five hundred STAPs his entire career. Marlon Davidson has been the same for

the Titans. He's out there. Linval Joseph is like thirty six years old, could be the new Kalais, I guess. But maybe he's a guy that gives you four hundred five hundred snaps. I think if you signed one and you drafted one, you'd be in a pretty good spot. But I could also see like a later double dip

in the draft class. But I wanted to give you a trump card to all of this of sorts, if you will, that might make you think, hey, maybe they can get away with one decent investment, like pick forty eight or something, and then a couple of UDA fas to battle it out for rotational spots with Matthew Dickerson like, maybe that's something you can do. But I wanted to do this and look at other teams who run variations

of the defensive scheme that we run. And we saw the Ravens defensive staff picked basically clean last year throughout the league, right us Baltimore with the promotion to Zach Orr, Seattle with Mike McDonald, and Tennessee with Ronaldo Wilson, and all deployed to get that right, all deployed defensive coordinators or head coaches somewhere the instituted of this defense with new clubs. So you know, four of the thirty two teams in the NFL, which is what is that one

eighth of the league. So Baltimore they have justin Mattabueke, who played eight hundred and twelve snaps. He is their Zach sealer. Travis Jones was next with six hundred snaps, but he was the twelfth highest volume snap taker on the Ravens defense. Let's go ahead and stop right there and assess what that means. This is really where the comparison track, So it's a it's six defensive backs that played more than him, Matdabuek, They're Mike linebacker, Roquan Smith,

you guys know who he is. And then the rest are multi position guys, whether it's an edge defensive tackle combo or an off ball on ball linebacker combination. A dafay O Way, Kyle van Noy, and Trent and Simpson all are edges who moonlight and secondary roles who played six fifty five six thirty six, six thirty one snaps respectively.

Tavis Robinson played four eighty six, Broderick Washington played four fifty, Malik Harrison three to seventy two, and it just goes on David Ajabu two seventy five, Brent Urban one ninety six, their big nose tackle, Michael Pierce, who retired he played two hundred and thirty snaps having injuries. So if you replicate that model, you can moonlight rolls with Jalen Phillips who's a two hundred and seventy pound edge, Bradley Chub

who's a two hundred and sixty five pound edge. Both those guys can play the three technique, especially in sub packages. Quentin Bell can do it too. You can walk up your linebackers. The Ravens did this a whole bunch with Jordan Brooks, with kJ Britt, with Willie Gay, with Tyrrel Dotson. All of those guys have reps as walked up linebackers. Let's say it's third and medium to long, third and six or third and eight. I don't care. You don't need a defensive tackle in that snap alongside Zach Seeler

out there. You can roll out jp Be Chubb, Chop Gay Brooks. Like, you're not trying to stuff the field with defensive tackles in this position, in this particular sub package. That's my whole point here. The Dolphins have the players to give them snap counts in the front seven. I don't think they're done at defensive tackle. I just don't think we're looking at it the right way because all year last year, it was like, man, they're so fin

a defensive tackle. They don't have forgot the bodies to like run this, And it's like, but they did, and they got through it, you know, and like that's how this system kind of operates. I think you'd you'd be led to believe they need to find fifteen hundred snaps or something at defensive tackle, but it's more like seven hundred. That's the point here, So continuing on in Seattle, Leonard Williams played seven to fifty. There's your Zach seeler, but a lot of those were at five technique as well.

Jaron Reid's a nose tackle, a souped up Benito Jones. A better player than Benito Jones, but at six hundred and eighty snaps obviously a bigger workload. Draymont Jones six hundred snaps. Probably your kalay Is Campbell type split between the inside on the outside. Byron Murphy, a first round pick, was next at four hundred and fifty snaps, and the next guy was Ry Robertson Harris at one eighty eight.

I think they're a different model. They're the most defensive tackle dependent of these four teams, but even still, it's essentially four guys and all but one of them plays off the edge in some capacity. In Tennessee, Justin Simmons played eight hundred snaps. There's your zach sealer. Tavandre Sweat played seven hundred snaps. That's a three hundred and fifty pound nose tackle and something that none of the other teams had SAMs Baltimore with Michael Pierce who was hurt

all year. But I look at Devandre Sweat and like Alfred Collins could be that guy too. Maybe it's Kenneth Grant. Also that at Sebastian Joseph Day at four eighty and our next defensive tackle on this list. That's three guys I gave you Ray is James Lynch, who played two hundred and forty five snaps, a player who finished the season as the nineteenth most snaps on that Tennessee defense nineteen.

He's damn near the bottom of the second string in terms of reps, and he was the number four defensive tackle. So the other three teams with direct offshoots of this defense, two of them looked like what we currently have, you know, saying we need another body for sure. Don't get me wrong there, but we currently have in terms of filling out the front seven with more linebackers and edges than defensive tackles. Again, I'm not telling you this is the

wrecked and sure fire, fool proof approach. I don't know, we have to see, but I think the masses are looking at this the wrong way, and I always try to look to provide the further context for what you're seeing from And again I don't I'm not trying like to crap on people here, but I spend a lot of time doing this and studying this and looking at this, and I think a lot of people to come the team are in a more casual capacity, and so I find it my duty to provide that knowledge and information.

I'm kind of like that doctor on that what are those videos where they have like someone sit down as an expert in their field, and then a bunch of people sit around at tables and then they come to the table and debate the guy, and that one doctor was trying to explain like the efficacy of vaccines and they were like, well, but why are people dying? Is

because it's not one hundred percent. That's like I'm just trying to tell you, like, this is what thirty twenty years of doing this and learning about this has provided me. I can pass it on to you can do with it what you choose. But that's what we're going here. And again not to pile on Simon, because I think he does some of the best work of anybody that does this stuff for the Miami Dolphins. But he did post like, where the hell they're gonna find six hundred

snaps a defensive tackle now? And again I get it, I do, But the draft hasn't happened yet, Simon. And they literally found six hundred snaps last June. And while you probably don't have that free agent like you did last year in kalais out there, you get that fourth round pick for him. What if you moved that pick for a defensive tackle. Remember Jonathan Allen being attached to the Dolphins last year. What if there's a Jonathan Allen

out there? And I can maybe this is another podcast for the other day, but go find a team that maybe has some depth there that might be able to offload a player for you for a fourth round pick for your six hundred snap defensive tackle. Because that's a possibility too. So I don't know. You guys can believe me or not. I don't. It doesn't really matter. I just thought that was worth spending time talking about how

this defense is structured. All Right, they have some work to do, but I'm excited to see which route they take. There's not gonna they're not gonna not have another defensive tackle. They'll find one. We'll see who it is, all right. So with all that in mind, let's take our last break right there and close the show with a deep dive on a player that I think would be a really good pick at number thirteen and answer all the questions we just asked in Kenneth Grant from Michigan. Deep

dive on him. On the other side, Drive Time Podcast, your host Travis Wingfield, brought to you by out donation. Do you guys know that if you don't treat strep throat it can turn to scarlet fever? Like I feel, I kind of feel fine, as you probably can tell a boy my energy, I sound like crap. I'm not sleeping that great, but I feel fine. But I read that if you leave strep throat untreated, it can manifest into scarlet fever. So antibiotics. This episode of Drivetime bought

to you by Antibiotics. Let's talk about Kenneth Grant, number seventy eight from Michigan. The rare traits and build of this guy are what jumps off immediately you start here with Grant, because guys that go six foot four, three hundred and thirty four pounds, which is what he measured at his pro day. And by the way, measurements across Senior Bowl combine pro days are a disaster right now. They're all over the place six four, three thirty four

officially for Kenneth Grant. Guys should not be able to move like he does at that size. I'm sure you've all seen the clip against Penn State where the running back breaks through the line tries to make him move on a safety. In that little move, that little heavy step gives pursuing Kenneth Grant at three hundred and thirty four pounds the extra step that he needs to hawk the ball carrier from behind twenty yards down the field. Christian Wilkins esque at three hundred and thirty four pounds

twenty pounds heavier than Christian Wilkins. That size and that strength allows you to play him on the nose. He has plenty of reps as the one technique what's the one technique? Travis on the outside shoulder of the center and has pass rush wins there pretty much every time he gets isolation reps. Go watch his sack on Pennis

in the twenty twenty three National Championship. He's actually a three technique on that rep, but he rushes the entire man, which typically you want to rush a shoulder of the man. He just powers right through the chest of the left guard, steam rolls him like he literally falls like a sack of potatoes, and Grant just like runs over him. He's not there. It's just sheer power, and a player that moves like he does should not come possessed with that

type of power. Now, he did not work out in Indy, but went thirty one inches on the vertical, good for eighty first percent TILE among all defensive tackles again at three hundred and thirty four pounds, which is in the ninety fifth percent TILE for weight, so that is not a pairing that should happen. It's not natural and eighty third percentile for his ten split the first ten yards of the forty yard dash, freaky freaky trades, freaky first step,

freaky explosiveness at three hundred and thirty four pounds. The shuttle, three cone, forty and broad all came in right around average, between fortieth and sixtieth percent TILE. But those three categories the weight, the ten split, and the vertical that tracks with what you see on tape. To me, this is

the easiest comp in the entire class. He is. To me, he's dexter Lawrence who was ninety seventh percent tile weight, seventy fourth percent tile ten split but did not jump, but he smoothed on his feet like sexy, dexy and strong. Is anybody in the league the usage they had with him at Michigan. He only played one thousand and fifty four college snaps, so not that I'll wear and tear

on them tires. He played five hundred and forty seven this year after a four hundred and three snap campaign as a sophomore, after just one oh four as a freshman. But he just kept getting better. Fifty two pressures on five hundred and fifty pass rush snaps in his career. That's a ten percent pressure rate from a position where pass rushing is kind of a secondary deal. Like Baranito Jones had a good pass rush here last year. He

had a seven percent pass rush or pressure rate. I should say, there just aren't that many nose tackles that will give you that kind of juice and play as a zero or one technique. Also had forty one stops on four hundred snaps against the run. Just a dominant, dominant player on the stat sheet, in a workout and on the field. Another great stat the only defensive tackles with better pass rush win rates from the zero and one technique positions. Member zero technique is head up right

over the center. One technique is off of his shoulder either side. Only Byron Murphy, Jalen Carter, and Elijah Cansei had better pass rush win rates from those positions than Kenneth Grant over the last five years. Let's talk about some of the tape. The first rep I pull up as a te stunt or the tackle, the Kenneth Grant fans out and the edge loops in behind him, or vice versa, and the you know, the end slant in

and picks up the guard. And at three hundred and forty pound Grant loops around and beats the left tackle around the edge. And it's Donovan Jackson Who's going to hear his name called in the top fifty picks come draft night. That first step quickness, the way he can bend the arc at that size, it's fun to watch. Now.

I think he could benefit from some seasoning and NFL coaching because if there's a reason he didn't doesn't go top twenty, it's because sometimes I don't think he processes super well and the feet kind of stop moving, which could lend itself to some taking plays off credence, which is obviously a big concern. Now this is actually a massive concern if it never gets synced up. But to me, that would fall more on a coaching staff, like we

talked about, you know, Charles Davis Graden, the flashes. The flashes are top five worthy, some of the snap to snap consistency, and maybe some of the willingness to just eat a block and survive the rep. Like he's getting double teamed at the point, and he's trying to fight upstream and if you know, if you try to go against the rip current in the ocean, right, that's how

you get yourself buried further and further. But like, even on that rep, the gap that he leaves exposed is an easy pill because he holds the first man on the combo block up long enough that it requires longer attachment from the secondary block, which frees up your linebacker to run in and shut it down. For no game, Like Zach Thomas always said that Tim Bowens was responsible

for so much of his production. Like I think Kenneth Grant could do the same thing for Jordan brook or yeah, for Jordan Brooks because of how he can eat blocks in the middle. I think he can get a little bit narrow. The feet kind of click together. Sometimes his heels clicks together. That can be a sign of lack of reps. But he has to get that stuff sorted out to be the player that I think he can be.

If you've seen a rep of him one gapping and losing, please share it with me, because I haven't seen it yet. One gaping is where you get upfield immediately and you try to get by your man. Two gaping is when you try to kind of play reaction to their move and you have two gap responsibility where you have to be able to get off the right and left side. I think that we could incorporate the way he rushes

with what we do so well. How we have all those electric first step athletes with premiere ten split times gosh, man, like you've got all these options to mug up in the a gaps and show pressure from Brooks to Dodson to Gay to Chop Condensing as an inside nosebacker, And I think about that next to a pairing of Seiler and Grant. Seiler with the best length and hands in the damn game at defensive tackle, and then Grant, who I think can be an elite one gap penetrator the

minute he puts on an NFL helmet. That's a tough, tough ask for sixty snaps a game from an imposing guard center guard combination to deal with all the Dolphins would have with these players. He's plenty good at dropping the anchor as a two gap, stacking up the nose, which he did a ton because he was very frequently doubled at Michigan, and when they cut him loose and told him to rush the outside shoulder of the center or inside of the guard, he just blows by him

every single time. Then he has a pretty good arm over and swim move to free himself too. I think he'll draw a lot of holding calls in the league because guys are bracing for the strength as they kind of sink into their anchor and the momentum of three hundred and forty pounds knocking into them, and he knows how to play it to that size and power. Then

as they're digging their cleats into the ground. He just crossed his face with a quick first step, and now they've got to uproot themselves to try to match his speed, which really nobody can do. So every rep I've seen where he says zero tech and Michigan walks up linebackers to show pressure, it creates one on ones. He just smokes those dudes, and we can do the exact same thing in Miami with this guy. Like it's it's over before it starts, it remains. It reminds me of watching

Chop versus Michigan last year. They just bailed in the passing game the second half because they had like thirteen dropbacks and he had like eight pressures on those thirteen drop backs, and they said, forget this, We're just going to run the football win the game that way. This is every time Michigan was able to generate a one on one, zero or one technique rush, which is something

we get a lot. But Itto Jones last year, right first year in the system, has a seven point six pressure rate, almost two percent higher than his previous career high. You know, in twenty three the lines we had a five point nine pressure rate it's the exact same thing. Last thing with Kenneth Grant. Here the hands. You often see guys impacted by his punch, a physical jolt across the bow. But the best part is when he gets attached. He just controls the rep from start to finish, and

it happens all the time. He subscribes to the belief that you beat the hands, you beat the man, and he's just doing it all the damn time. When you move down in competition at all, Like it's not Ohio State, he just ragged dolls guys. I just finished here. I've seen enough. I just saw him kick out to the five technique against Ohio State and jabstep with an arm over re establish his gap and then closing the ballcarrier. This is my top defensive tackle in the class. I

think he should go in the top ten. Kenneth Grant. In the books, We've now done Grant, Baron and Starks. I also have done Warren. We're going to talk about him on the Monday podcast. But right now, I go Grant, I go Warren, Grant, Baron, Starks my top four my short list for Pick thirteen. So we'll do that on Monday with Derek harmon. I will probably do some more content.

I'm not sure what's going to look like just yet, but hopefully the Wingfield household gets healthy and we can provide you guys with more content on this draft class next week. In the meantime, you all please be sure subscribe, rate review the show, follow me on social at Wingfield NFL and the team at Miami Dolphins. Check out the fish Tank podcast with Seth and Juwe check out the YouTube channel for Dolphins HQ a brand new episode up right now. I did one place scouting, breaking down plays

by six of the free agents. You don't want to miss that. It's some of my best content I do, in my opinion, So get there for that. Draft time, interviews, media availabilities, and so much more. Last, but not least to Miami Dolphins dot com. Until next time, Finza, Alan Cameron Daddy