Senior Bowl defensive line review … he defensive line in the Senior Bowl game was actually somewhat harder to review than the OL group, in large part because of some questions about level of competition. In particular, the National team defensive linemen, led by Arkansas SE Landon Jackson and Central Arkansas’ David Walker, were blowing past their American OL counterparts pretty much all afternoon on Saturday. The issue for evaluators is going to be that for much of the afternoon, the American OL was manned by as many as 4 FCS players and it really didn’t seem to matter who Alabama A&M OT Carson Vinson was blocking, for example, they were getting to the QB. Still, one could make several observations. LSU’s Sai’vion Jones, who was going against quality O-linemen all game, for example, was outstanding. Indeed, he was the only defensive lineman to make any headway against either Grey Zabel or Caleb Rogers, both of whom otherwise pretty much pitched shutouts all week. Nominally, more a 3-4 DE type who can kick inside on passing downs, Jones lined up at DT throughout the Senior Bowl game where he showed a nice array of spin moves to get into the backfield on a consistent basis. It was also interesting watching DEs Princely Umanmielen of Ole Miss and UCLA’s Olu Oladejo, both of whom we would describe as ‘great circle route pass rushers’ in that they are long, lean guys with a long first stride who are primarily going to try and run around the OT. And while neither is going to be that effective holding the point of attack, both are athletic enough that they can be a handful getting around that edge. On the other hand, we were kind of disappointed in ERs Barryn Sorrell of Texas and Notre Dame’s RJ Oben who did battle at the line of scrimmage but didn’t make much headway rushing the passer. It was also kind of a quite day for the DTs. Aeneas Peebles of Florida State, for example, did show an ability to explode off the snap into gaps; however, when he didn’t win with that first step he tended to get washed out. Same for Alabama’s Tim Smith who was stout enough at the point of attack, but didn’t show much rushing the passer. At the same time, fellow DTs Darius Alexander of Toledo, Nebraska’s Ty Robinson and Utah’s Junior Tafuna did make some plays, but with the proviso that they were going against that somewhat questionable FCS OL mentioned above.
