DeForest Buckner looks like the best d-line prospect
November 14, 2015; Stanford, CA, USA; Oregon Ducks defensive back Reggie Daniels (8) passes the football against Oregon Ducks defensive lineman DeForest Buckner (44) during the fourth quarter at Stanford Stadium. The Ducks defeated the Cardinal 38-36. Mandatory Credit: Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports
With all the hype on Joey Bosa and Robert Nkemdiche Oregon’s DeForest Buckner is quietly the d-line prospect in the nation. He’s 6’7″ with long arms, 290 pounds, powerful and athletic as all get out. School difference aside, actually looks a lot like Leonard Williams in terms of his being disruptive.
Going into Saturday’s Oregon-Stanford showdown, Buckner had seven sacks and 12 tackles for a loss. He was the highest-graded interior defender in the nation according to Pro Football Focus. His match-up was against Joshua Garnett, the highest-graded guard in the nation.
Garnett had surrendered just two sacks, two hits and three hurries for a total of seven pressures on the season going in. But when the two went head-to-head, Buckner dominated, beating him for a sack and three quarterback hits. And the bull-rush he hit him with was something horrible as guards don’t generally get beat with bull-rushes.
At 6’5″, 321 pounds with a lot of power himself, Garrett isn’t one to get beat by bull-rushes. According Pro Football Focus, Buckner is the only player with a positive pass-rush against Garnett while using a bull-rush this season. What Buckner was able to do just goes to show how physically dominant he is.
But that’s not the only way Buckner was able to beat Garnett—he used speed and quickness too. Garnett had never been abused like that, especially not this season, but Garnette simply wasn’t a problem for him. According to Pro Football Focus, this was Garnett’s first negatively-graded game of the season and only the fourth over the last two years.
The scouting world tends to sleep on Pac-12 players that aren’t from USC, which is how Stanford’s Henry Anderson slid to the Indianapolis Colts in the third round last May. The grade he posted last year in college the best of all interior defender in the nation. And there wasn’t a rookie interior defender including Williams out-playing him before he tore his ACL.
Buckner has a sack in his past five consecutive games and has been a man amongst boys in most of them. He has been dominant as a pass-rusher and s a run defender to complete his NFL skill-set. And he showed this past Saturday that he’s the best d-lineman prospect in the draft and may be the best player.