Dominick
Puni.
Dominick
Puni.
Kansas· 6'5"· 313 lb· 5.35s 40
"A Division II left tackle who kept climbing until nobody could argue with the tape, Puni was drafted as a floor bet at guard and immediately played like the best lineman on the field."Pre-draft read
Puni is a five-position offensive lineman who found his home at guard, and the identity is force. He fires off the ball with a wide, heavy base and a short first step that lets him roll his hips into contact before the defender is set, and in the run game he displaces down blocks and covers ground on pulls better than a 313-pounder should.
In pass protection he plays with a shadow-boxer's rhythm, resetting his hands rather than lunging, and his college tape at left tackle proves he can survive on an island against speed. The signature is finish: he does not just fit blocks, he drives feet through the whistle and puts people on the ground.
Gap/power run scheme with wide-zone and pull-heavy marriage concepts
Year 1: immediate starting guard in a downhill run game. Ceiling: long-term Pro Bowl-caliber right guard and emergency swing tackle.
A pure vertical-set, deep drop-back passing offense that leaves a guard isolated in long-yardage one-on-ones every week and rarely lets him fire out downhill.
Best used on combination blocks and short pulls where his hips and hands do the work, rather than as a static anchor in obvious passing situations.
Film Room: Dominick Puni vs Illinois — all pass protection
Full pass-pro cut-up from his 2023 season at left tackle.
Dominick Puni highlights — 49ers No. 86 pick, 2024 NFL Draft
Kansas highlight reel released after San Francisco traded up for him.
Dominick Puni highlights, Combine and Kansas film
Combine testing plus college tape overview of his guard projection.
A Division II left tackle who became a first-team All-Big 12 blocker in two Power Five seasons, Puni is the rare late bloomer whose traits were never in question, only his level of competition. Guard was always the projection: short-area power, quick hands, and enough athletic range to execute the wide-zone and pull-heavy concepts modern offenses ask for.
The Kansas tape settled the argument. He started all 24 games he played for Lance Leipold, moving from left guard in 2022 to left tackle in 2023, and handled Big 12 edge speed without a technical meltdown. The flags were age (he turned 24 during his final college season), the injury-wiped 2021 at Central Missouri, and a pass set that could get tall and lean when rushers worked his edges.
The board had him as a top-100 lineman with a wide range, roughly late second to fourth round depending on how much a team discounted his path. Taking him at 86 as a plug-and-play interior starter was clean value: the floor was a functional Year 1 guard and the ceiling was a decade of starts inside.
- 01
Point-of-attack power
He generates true displacement on down blocks and doubles, rolling his hips through contact and moving defensive tackles off their landmark.
- 02
Hand placement and reset
Inside, accurate strikes that land on the breastplate, and he re-fits calmly instead of panicking when the first punch misses.
- 03
Positional versatility
Real starting reps at right tackle, left tackle and left guard, which gives an offense five-position flexibility on gameday.
- 04
Movement in space
Pulls and climbs to the second level with control, arriving under balance and finding linebackers rather than diving at air.
- 05
Finishing temperament
He plays through the whistle and looks for the burial, and that nastiness shows up in the fourth quarter of run-heavy games.
- 01
Pad level in protection
He can rise out of his stance against long rushers, which softens his anchor and invites a bull rush into his chest.
- 02
Level of competition
Four years of his college resume came at Division II, so the Power Five sample that scouts trusted was only two seasons deep.
- 03
Draft age
He turned 24 during his final college season, which compresses the development runway teams usually bank on with a third-round lineman.
- 04
Recovery against inside counters
Quick spin and swim moves can beat him if his weight is already committed forward on a heavy first punch.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 5.35sp50
- Vertical
- 30inp50
- Broad jump
- 107inp50
- Three-cone
- 7.47sp50
- Shuttle
- 4.40sp50
- Bench
- —rep
| Yr | Team | G |
|---|---|---|
| 2018 | Central Missouri | 7 |
| 2019 | Central Missouri | 13 |
| 2021 | Central Missouri | — |
| 2022 | Kansas | 13 |
| 2023 | Kansas | 11 |
| Career | — | 44 |
Offensive linemen do not accumulate box-score statistics; only games and starts from official sources are listed.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Mauler in the run game with occasional pass-protection wobbles, a top-10 guard when healthy.
Technically sound power guard who turns a mid-round pick into a decade of high-floor starts.
Functional interior starter whose pad level and recovery cap him as an average NFL guard.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
San Francisco traded up for him and never took the job away. Puni started all 17 games at right guard as a rookie in 2024, earned PFWA All-Rookie honors and posted the fifth-highest PFF grade among qualifying guards, an immediate hit for a third-round pick. A PCL injury in the 2025 preseason changed the picture: he played through it, but the tape early that season showed a lineman who could not sink or slide, with blown-block counts spiking through the first seven games before the second half of the year looked like the rookie again. He has started every game the 49ers have played since drafting him, 34 regular-season starts and counting entering 2026.
In hindsight this is one of the best value picks of the round. The Division II discount was real and it was wrong: the traits that showed up against MIAA defenders traveled straight into Kyle Shanahan's run game, and the only thing that has slowed him is a knee, not the level jump. Chris Foerster has said publicly that the rookie year was partly improvisation and that the technique had to catch up, which is exactly the honest read on why year two dipped. Third-round guards who start 34 straight games and land on breakout lists in year three are how teams win drafts.
Data note: Offensive linemen do not accumulate box-score statistics; only games and starts from official sources are listed.