Tommy
Akingbesote.
Tommy
Akingbesote.
Maryland· 6'4"· 306 lb· 5.09s 40
"Maryland's most immovable interior body never turned mass and 33.5-inch arms into disruption, and four career sacks in 44 games is why a four-star homegrown anchor lasted until pick 247."Pre-draft read
Akingbesote is a base-front 3-technique/4i who wins with mass and length before quickness. He plays with a wide, anchored base against down blocks, and his best trait is the long-arm stack: he catches the guard's chest with 33.5-inch arms, locks the elbow, and reads the puller instead of getting washed. Against gap schemes he holds the point without surrendering ground.
The pass rush is built on power, not plan. He carries a real bull rush and can walk a single guard back on the first push, but the counter menu is thin and his get-off is average, so pressure arrives late. Testing at 306 pounds with a 5.09 forty frames the ceiling honestly: a heavy-handed two-down anchor whose signature is that nobody moves him off his landmark.
Even-front 4-3 base defense that asks its interior linemen to two-gap on early downs and rotates in dedicated sub-package rushers on passing downs.
Year 1: developmental practice-squad body and short-yardage/goal-line rotational anchor. Ceiling: a 400-snap two-down run-stopping interior starter who never comes on third down.
A one-gap penetrating Vic Fangio or Steve Wilks-style front that asks interior linemen to shoot gaps and generate individual pass-rush wins from a wide-9 tilt — his average get-off and thin counter package would leave him a liability on obvious passing downs.
Best served by a room with a veteran run-down anchor ahead of him so he can be developed slowly rather than exposed.
Tommy Akingbesote 2024 Highlights | NFL 2025 Draft
Senior-season cutups: anchor work against down blocks and double-team absorption.
NFL Draft: DL Tommy Akingbesote | Maryland Football
Conference draft profile reel of his Big Ten snaps.
Tommy Akingbesote Film Breakdown
Play-by-play breakdown of hand usage, bull rush and pass-rush limitations.
A four-star Maryland kid who stayed home, Akingbesote is a homegrown interior defender whose football identity is durability and block absorption rather than splash. He picked up the sport as a high school junior after a basketball childhood, and the late start still reads on tape — the hands and the leverage are ahead of the instincts and the plan.
He grew slowly and honestly: seven games as a freshman, a two-sack sophomore year in rotation, then 28 tackles as a junior with two batted passes and a blocked field goal, and finally a senior season with 12 starts, 32 tackles and five tackles for loss to lead the Terrapins' defensive line. The signature snaps are double-team absorption on third-and-short, where he eats two blockers and lets the linebackers scrape clean. The flags were equally clear: 7.5 career tackles for loss over 44 games and four total sacks say the disruption never matched the frame.
The board treated him as a late Day 3 developmental body — East-West Shrine Bowl invite, priority free agent to seventh-round range. Dallas taking him at 247 was a cheap swing on size, length and a home-state motor, not a bet on immediate snaps.
- 01
Anchor at the point
Sets a wide, low base against down blocks and reaches, rarely getting displaced off his gap on early-down run snaps.
- 02
Length and lockout
33.5-inch arms let him long-arm guards, extend, and keep his chest clean while he reads the backfield.
- 03
Double-team absorption
Holds two blockers on interior gap schemes, which is exactly what kept Maryland's linebackers running free on short yardage.
- 04
Functional power
Carries a legitimate bull rush and can walk a single guard back into the pocket on the initial push.
- 05
Positional versatility
Played 3-technique, 4i and nose in Maryland's fronts, so he fits both even and odd-front rotations without relearning technique.
- 01
Pass-rush plan
The counter menu is thin; when the bull rush stalls he has little to fall back on and pressure arrives late.
- 02
Get-off
Average first-step quickness off the snap gives interior blockers time to set, which caps his one-on-one win rate.
- 03
Production gap
Four career sacks and 7.5 tackles for loss across 44 games is thin disruption for a four-year Power Four starter.
- 04
Late-developing instincts
Started football as a high school junior; his block recognition and screen diagnosis still lag his physical tools.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 5.09sp50
- Vertical
- 28inp50
- Broad jump
- 103inp50
- Three-cone
- —s
- Shuttle
- —s
- Bench
- —rep
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | Maryland | 7 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2022 | Maryland | 12 | 14 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2023 | Maryland | 13 | 28 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| 2024 | Maryland | 12 | 32 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Career | — | 44 | 77 | 4 | 0 | 2 | 0 |
Season totals verified against CFBD; the four seasons sum exactly to 77 tackles, 4.0 sacks and 2 PD. Forced fumbles and recoveries were not verified and are left blank.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Big-bodied interior body who bounces between rooms as the short-yardage anchor without ever becoming a pass-rush answer.
Undersized-athlete profile that turned pure anchor and hand strength into a decade-long rotational run-down career.
Late-round Power Four lineman with the frame but not the disruption, cycling through practice squads.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Dallas took him with its final pick of the 2025 draft and then moved on quickly: he was waived on August 26 as part of final roster cuts without earning a spot in a defensive line room that had already invested elsewhere. Carolina signed him to the practice squad on September 8 and released him on September 23. Buffalo picked him up on October 28, kept him on the practice squad through the season, and signed him to a reserve/futures deal on January 19, 2026. He did not appear in a regular-season game as a rookie.
The retrospective is straightforward and not unkind. This was a pick made on frame, length and a home-state motor rather than on evidence of interior disruption, and the first pro season played out exactly the way the college production suggested it might — a body that teams want in camp, not yet a player who forces snaps. Buffalo's futures contract is the meaningful signal: someone in a good defensive line room saw enough anchor and enough length to keep developing him. Year two is the real test.
Data note: Season totals verified against CFBD; the four seasons sum exactly to 77 tackles, 4.0 sacks and 2 PD. Forced fumbles and recoveries were not verified and are left blank.