The 2024 NFL Draft is here, making it an excellent time to highlight some of the class’ best players with scouting reports. Each report will include strengths, weaknesses and background information.
Here’s our report on Brandon Dorlus.
Brandon Dorlus’ 2024 NFL COMBINE RESULTS
- Height: 6-foot-3
- Weight: 283
- 40-yard dash: 4.85
- 10-yard split: 1.68
- 20-yard shuttle: 4.85
- Vertical jump: 30.5″
- Broad jump: 9’3″
- Arm length: 33 1/4″
Brandon Dorlus 2024 NFL DRAFT SCOUTING REPORT
STRENGTHS
- Extensive experience playing outside at DE and inside at DT. Position versatility is a strength of his game.
- Pass rush snaps at DT, where he showed strength and power. Struck with force, and drove back OL into the pocket.
- Showed a one-arm stab as an edge pass rusher with the strength to OTs drive back. Played with heavy hands.
- Lateral quickness and short-area burst to work across gaps, attacking the weakness of OL.
- Sudden in his movement with some twitch to change direction and re-direct his pass rush. Good athlete.
- Quick, active hands as an inside pass rusher, using combinations to beat interior OL. Effective club-arm over move.
- Strong hands to control and displace OL in the run game. Showed that most effectively when aligned inside at DT.
- Showed the ability to set the edge in the run game with arm extension lockout, squeezing inside to make the play.
WEAKNESSES
- High cut and upright, lacking the kind of flexibility and bend you would ideally want from an edge pass rusher.
- Too often came off the snap too high and upright, losing initial quickness, leverage and confined space strength. While he showed some sudden twitch at times, he does not possess elite explosiveness that puts him at a high level.
- Needs to develop more and better hand usage to give him more tools in the pass rush toolbox. Limited arsenal.
NFL TRANSITION
Dorlus could be seen as a multi-positional defensive lineman with the versatility to line up inside and outside. Depending on personnel and down-and-distance situations, he could play in even and odd fronts.
As an edge pass rusher, Dorlus’ game is built more on power than quickness and suddenness, showing the drive strength to execute speed-to-power effectively. From inside alignments, you saw more of the off-the-ball quickness and burst that made him effective.
Overall, there is a power generation element, with strong, heavy hands, to Dorlus’ game that showed up outside and inside, resulting in his ability to control OL with the initial contact and then play off that contact to make plays.
Dorlus’ tape also showed some concerns that could negatively impact his ability to transition effectively and consistently to the next level. One main issue was his tendency to play too high and upright off the snap, negating his quickness and strength-power generation.
Dorlus has good quickness and, at times, showed some sudden movement. Overall, he does not possess the kind of elite explosiveness that puts him in the higher-level category of pass rush from outside and inside.
My sense is Dorlus will likely transition as a rotational multi-positional DL who will get snaps in the sub-fronts. His ability to generate a pass rush from outside and inside will determine the number of snaps and impact in the defense.
OTHER NOTES
Dorlus played five seasons at Oregon, starting his final threes seasons. He earnied First-Team All-Pac 12 honors in 2021 and 2023. Dorlus came out of South Florida as a three-star recruit.
Dorlus played multiple positions in Oregon’s defensive fronts, including inside at 3-technique and snaps at 1-technique. There were third-down snaps in which Dorlus lined as a standup Joker in the middle of the defense with room to generate velocity and speed versus interior OL to rush the QB.
Dorlus showed some strong power rushes vs. Washington LT Troy Fautanu, including a one-arm stab that was set up by an initial two-hand strike, and it broke down Fautanu’s technique, getting him off balance.
