10. Logan Stenberg, IOL, Kentucky
Height: 6’6″ Weight: 317
40-Yard Dash: 5.3 seconds
Bench Press: N/A
Vertical Jump: 26 inches
Broad Jump: 8 feet 8 inches
3-Cone Drill: 8.0 seconds
20-Yard Shuttle: 4.83 seconds
60-Yard Shuttle: N/A
Bio: Logan Stenberg was a three-star recruit coming out of Madison, Alabama who chose Kentucky over Troy and Southern Mississippi. He was a two-way player in high school, who totaled 34 pancake blocks his senior year while chipping in a pair of sacks and two forced fumbles as a defensive lineman. Stenberg redshirted his first year on campus, and played sparingly as a redshirt freshman, but he locked down the left guard spot as a redshirt sophomore and never looked back. He allowed four sacks back in 2017, but has not allowed a sack since. For a guard in the extremely competitive SEC, that is a tremendous statistic.
Stat to Know: Building off the previous point, Stenberg allowed just a single quarterback pressure in 2019, on 262 pass-blocking snaps, according to Pro Football Focus. That was the lowest pressure rate of any guard in this entire draft class.
Strengths: Stenberg’s style of play harkens back to an earlier era of professional football. His teammates consider Stenberg to be the most hated offensive lineman in the SEC, and he plays with a nasty streak that he will readily admit to having. He flashes solid lateral movement and footwork on reach blocks when tasked with zone blocking, and also shows good feel and timing on his combination blocks. As you might expect, Stenberg is an offensive lineman who puts that nasty streak to good use, finishing his blocks every chance he gets:
Stenberg does not want to just block you, he wants to finish you. On this play against Florida he gets into the nose tackle and wrestles him to the grounds, falling on top of him for good measure. Plays like this, which highlight his upper body strength, are why he projects to be a tremendous guard in a gap/power scheme.
(As an aside, my son walked in when I was cutting this video, saw what Stenberg did, exclaimed “oh my gosh” and then ran away. He’s eight and plays more Madden than I care to admit, so he knows someone getting pancaked when he sees it).
As a pass blocker, Stenberg shows the ability to anchor against slanting defenders and blitzers, and has the awareness to find twists and stunts coming from either side. While he waits to fire his hands in pass protection, unlike others in this class it plays to his advantage. He has the ability to see a defender commit to a move and immediately counter it, making him a stud in pass protection as the numbers bear out.
Weaknesses: He is going to get flagged in the NFL. Last year he was flagged 14 times, and he is not going to stop who he is once he gets to the league. He also had a supporter behind him in Mark Stoops, who told the media back during the season that “[i]f I though there was a lot of selfish intent, then we would have a bigger problem than we do. A lot of times that’s not the case. He understands that. He does not want to hurt this football team at all, in any way, shape or form. And he’s not selfish, but plays it extremely nasty on every play.”
Beyond the nasty streak, Stenberg is not the most athletic of the guards in this class. That was on display both last season and in Indianapolis during the Combine. That might limit him schematically to a heavy gap/power team rather than an offense that relies heavily on the outside zone game. While the pass blocking was solid, with injuries at quarterback he did not have a ton of pass blocking opportunities this past year, with Lynn Bowden Jr. taking over at quarterback.
Conclusion: A team looking for a tone-setter on the inside will love Stenberg. He is a nasty mauler in the running game, and plays with a mean streak that will endear him to his teammates and infuriate his opponents. He has ideal size to play guard in the next league, and while not the most athletic prospect he moves well enough to handle life in the NFL. He has done enough on film in the pass protection part of the game to make him a solid selection and early contributor in the league.
Comparison: Conrad Dobler. Sure, Dobler is viewed as one of the meanest and dirtiest players of all-time, but with Stenberg’s reputation and nasty streak, is there a better comparison?