DL Brandon Dorlus
Defensive lineman Brandon Dorlus was expected to make a leap in 2021 as a third-year sophomore, but no one could have seen how big of a leap. Dorlus became of the best defensive tackles in the conference and held the defense together when superstar defensive end Kayvon Thibodeaux went down with an ankle injury in the season opener. Dorlus finished the year with 25 tackles and 2.5 sacks. Here are PFF’s comments about the Oregon nose tackle:
Dorlus finished the 2021 season as one of college football’s five most valuable interior defensive linemen, with 0.29 PFF Wins Above Average (WAA) generated. For reference, he accumulated only 0.02 WAA his first two years on campus in 2019 and 2020. The former three-star recruit earned a 65.1 PFF grade across 340 snaps in that two-year span before jumping to a 79.2 mark on 665 snaps in 2021. The latter wasn’t an easy thing to do on such minimal volume in the Power Five.
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