Top 10 interior defensive linemen in the 2019 NFL Draft

#5 Dexter Lawrence, Clemson

It didn’t take Lawrence long to see the field, as he was named ACC Defensive Freshman of the Year after posting 79 tackles, 9.5 for loss, seven sacks and two blocked kicks

If you are looking for a huge defensive tackle who can move in the draft this is your guy. That Clemson defense has had many highly sought-after recruits these last few years, but none were bigger than the Player of the Year in the state of North Carolina.

It didn’t take Lawrence long to see the field, as he was named ACC Defensive Freshman of the Year after posting 79 tackles, 9.5 for loss, seven sacks and two blocked kicks. His play and production dipped in year two due to a blocked nerve, but he was still named first-team all-conference and received the honor once again in a healthier condition as a junior, although he missed the team’s playoff run after testing positive for PEDs.

At 6’4”, 340+ pounds, Lawrence has the ability to stack, shed and fill the gap better than anybody in the country. He quickly gets off the snap and shows tremendous burst through the line. Big Dex was asked to deal with double-teams constantly and still found a way to get onto the stat sheet quite a bit.

When singled up, he shows he can push blockers around as if they were little kids and you see him make a few TFLs when there’s a center or guard trying to shield him on the backside of run plays. Lawrence does a nice job countering cut-blocks and keeping the opponent off his knees.

Sometimes he is engaged with an offensive lineman and then comes with a sudden dip of the shoulder to create an angle to run down the line. He shows excellent pursuit for a guy his size and makes some tackles all the way at the sideline. The big man puts some ball-carriers in their own grave and missed just one tackle these last two years.

Lawrence is very crafty as a pass-rusher, who doesn’t waste much time dancing around in front of his man. His power is on display as a bull-rusher, while working to pull the blocker away or spin off him. Lawrence displays secondary efforts when trying to get to the quarterback. Back in 2016 as a freshman, he was the guy, who I thought made everybody on this super-talented Clemson front-four.

While he did have a sub-par sophomore season statistically, he displayed his dominance once again in the ACC Championship game versus Miami, when he recorded a sack and a pass deflection that led to an interception and helped the Tigers hold the Canes to a little over 200 yards of total offense.

The monstrous D-tackle does a nice job recognizing screen passes and taking away space. He might have only recorded a couple of sacks last season, but he added ten QB hits and another 21 hurries on 239 pass-rush snaps

Lawrence can play somewhat the role of a “big can of trash” on the interior against the run, but he loses vision on the backfield at times and does unnecessary spins in an attempt to find the ball-carrier.

His dominance in a run defender is restricted by some inconsistency in his hand-placement because there are some absolutely ridiculous snaps when he gets it right. Big Dex was taken off the field on some third downs due to the incredible depth on the Clemson D-line.

He should broaden his horizon as a pass rusher and work in more counter moves or he will be more of a two-down specialist with a primary role of clearing up space in passing situations by pulling cloth to occupy blockers.

The Impact in the middle of that defense for Lawrence went far beyond numbers. He barely saw any snaps with one-on-one blocking and was never really put into position to get any impressive numbers.

I tend to throw away the 2017 film because he even said himself that he was around “45 to 50 percent” due to that blocked nerve, but he didn’t quite reach my high expectations for last year either. He could have put himself into top ten conversations from what I heard before the season.