Jt
Tuimoloau.
Jt
Tuimoloau.
Ohio State· 6'4"· 265 lb
"A stout, technically refined defensive end, Tuimolau’s four-year collegiate arc culminated in a dominant senior season, solidifying his projection as a powerful, every-down force who dictates the line of scrimmage."Pre-draft read
Tuimoloau is a heavy-handed base end who plays the strong side and wins with power and length rather than pure speed off the edge. He sets up in a three-point stance, strikes first, and works a long-arm and push-pull to walk tackles into the pocket. The hands are violent and deliberate; the counters come from leverage and hip drive, not from bend around the arc.
The run defense is the calling card — he anchors, keeps his outside arm free and squeezes down blocks before shedding. He can slide inside on passing downs and collapse a guard, which is where his best pressures live. The signature is late-game disruption: he plays his heaviest snaps in the biggest moments, and his production spikes when the stakes do.
Four-man front that asks its strong-side end to set a hard edge on early downs and rush with power — a 4-3 base or an even-front defense with a defined SDE role, ideally one that kicks him inside in nickel.
Year 1: two-down strong-side end on 300-400 snaps, plus interior rush reps in obvious passing situations. Ceiling: full-time base end who plays 700+ snaps, controls the run and adds 6-8 sacks through power.
A wide-9 speed-rush system that lines its ends up outside the tackle and asks them to win the corner one-on-one every snap — he has no answer for that assignment without bend.
Value rises in fronts that stunt and use games inside; his power creates displacement that a looping rusher can exploit.
NFL DRAFT HIGHLIGHTS: J.T. Tuimoloau | Ohio State Football
Draft-year reel of the power rush, the edge setting and the senior-season disruption.
J.T. Tuimoloau Highlights vs. Penn State
The 2022 reference tape: two sacks, two interceptions including a pick-six, and a forced fumble in one afternoon.
J. T. Tuimoloau (2025-2026) Highlights | Indianapolis Colts
Rookie-year cutups from his 215-snap first season in the Colts rotation.
Tuimoloau is a big, powerful, technically sound defensive end whose game is built on hands, leverage and length. He is not a bendy speed rusher and never pretended to be; he is a base end who controls a blocker, resets the line of scrimmage and eventually wins with force. The identity is reliability — he is on the field on all three downs from day one.
The résumé took four years to arrive. He was a five-star recruit who produced in flashes for three seasons — the two-interception, two-sack afternoon at Penn State in 2022 is still the reference tape — before finally putting it together as a senior with 12.5 sacks and 21.5 tackles for loss in sixteen games during Ohio State's national title run. Evaluators liked the arc and the postseason tape but had to price the flags: the pass rush wins with power more than plan, the get-off is average, and the first three years of production say his ceiling may be a good starter rather than a difference-maker.
The board saw a late first-round talent with a very high floor and a modest ceiling, and he slid into the second round when teams chased twitchier rushers. Indianapolis, needing a run-setting complement to Laiatu Latu on an edge group short on reliable snaps, took the safest end left at 45 — a floor pick with a real path to starting.
- 01
Hand power
Strikes with heavy, accurate hands and consistently controls the blocker's frame, resetting the line of scrimmage before he decides where to go.
- 02
Run defense
Sets a hard edge, keeps his outside arm clean and squeezes down blocks, making him a genuine early-down asset from the first snap.
- 03
Bull rush and long-arm
Converts a slow build into real push, walking tackles into the pocket and collapsing the throwing lane from the strong side.
- 04
Positional flex
Can kick inside over a guard on passing downs, where his power translates faster and he generated some of his most damaging pressure.
- 05
Big-game production
12.5 sacks and 21.5 tackles for loss as a senior, with his loudest tape coming in the College Football Playoff run to a national title.
- 01
No bend
Cannot flatten the corner or dip under a set tackle, so a stalled bull rush usually means the rep is over rather than a counter opening up.
- 02
Average get-off
Wins after contact, not before it, which limits his effectiveness on obvious passing downs against quick-setting NFL tackles.
- 03
Late-arriving production
Just 11 sacks over his first three seasons at Ohio State; the breakout came in year four and asks how much of the leap is repeatable.
- 04
Narrow ceiling
The profile projects as a dependable starter rather than a double-digit sack producer unless the pass-rush plan expands significantly.
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | Ohio State | 13 | 17 | 2.5 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| 2022 | Ohio State | 13 | 28 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| 2023 | Ohio State | 13 | 38 | 5 | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| 2024 | Ohio State | 16 | 61 | 12.5 | 0 | 3 | 0 |
| Career | — | 55 | 144 | 24 | 2 | 8 | 0 |
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Dependable every-down strong-side end whose value shows up in the run game and steady mid-single-digit sack seasons.
Power-based, technically relentless base end who became a perennial Pro Bowler by controlling blockers rather than beating them with speed.
Athletic, hard-playing end whose pass-rush plan never expanded enough to turn pressure into consistent production.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Indianapolis brought him along slowly. As a rookie in 2025 Tuimoloau appeared in 13 games but logged only 215 defensive snaps, buried behind Laiatu Latu, Kwity Paye and the veteran rotation of Tyquan Lewis and Samson Ebukam in an attacking four-man front. The counting numbers were nearly blank — 13 tackles, no sacks — and he never got the runway to prove the run-setting floor that made him a second-round pick. The Colts finished 8-9 and missed the playoffs, and the edge room stayed a problem area all year.
In hindsight the pick still looks defensible, but the first year was a warning about the ceiling question. What the board flagged — the average get-off, the absence of a counter when the bull rush stalls — is exactly what keeps a young power end off the field in sub packages, and that is where NFL rush snaps live. He is not close to a verdict after 215 snaps, and the run-defense floor should surface once the veterans clear out. But a second-round end who cannot force his way into a thin rotation is a real data point, and year two is the one that matters.