Just over two months removed from his last game with the Michigan Panthers, the USFL conference championship, the United Football League’s 2024 Defensive Player of the Year, Breeland Speaks, is wreaking havoc on quarterbacks in the NFL.
Despite signing with Jacksonville two days before its preseason opener on Aug. 8, Speaks ranks second on the team in sacks and quarterback pressures with 1.5 and four through two games, respectively.
All while being the Jaguars’ 12th-least frequently deployed defender, of 41, with 21 snaps logged.
Speaks’ first big play, a sack split with defensive tackle Esezi Otomewo, was a special moment: Not only was it his first sack against NFL competition since the 2019 preseason; it came against the team that cut him two seasons into his rookie contract, Kansas City.
“It meant everything to me,” Speaks told Jaguars Wire after the Jaguars’ 26-13 victory over the Chiefs.
“Obviously, being drafted by Kansas City, got a Super Bowl with them, I just wanted to show everybody and them as well that, ‘Hey, I can still play this game at a high level.’ ”
Any wear and tear from Speaks’ 10-game, 9.5-sack season with the UFL’s Michigan Panthers between April and June have not yet been apparent in his short Jaguars stint, one Jacksonville initiated following a training camp ACL injury to defensive end De’Shaan Dixon.
“The opportunity in itself was saying a lot for me,” Speaks said about signing with Jacksonville. “So I just take that and I’m just gonna run with it.”
Jaguars head coach Doug Pederson admitted Monday that Speaks’ path toward the club’s 53-player, regular-season roster is narrow given his late Jacksonville arrival.
Namely, D.J. Coleman and seventh-round rookie Myles Cole, who were with the team for training camp, have stood out to Pederson throughout the preseason at the same position as Speaks, rotating in behind starting edge rushers Joshua Hines-Allen and Travon Walker and top backup Trevis Gipson.
But Pederson acknowledged the opportunity Speaks will have Friday against Atlanta in Jacksonville’s preseason finale, not ruling out his potential of making the team but also suggesting he is a candidate for a spot on the Jaguars’ practice squad.
“It’s tough when guys come in the middle of camp. But he’s done a nice job just picking up the terminology, picking up the defense,” Pederson said. “He’s getting meaningful game reps that are good for him. We’ve just got to continue to evaluate how he does in individual drills, any team reps that he gets during the week.
“Then again, with this last game, probably looking like the second half potentially playing, and making the most of those reps.”It’s probably a challenge with a guy like that, probably 53, as you go. But practice squad is not out of the question. That’s what a lot of these guys are competing for. They’re still competing for those spots.”
Regardless of whether Speaks secures a spot on Jacksonville’s active roster or practice squad, sticking with the Jaguars for Week 1 would mark a career comeback for the edge rusher. He has not aligned with an NFL team outside of the offseason since 2021, with the New York Giants, Dallas and Buffalo.
The Chiefs’ 2018 second-round draft pick, who spent his second season on injured reserve and simultaneously serving a four-game suspension for violating the NFL’s substance abuse policy, has not appeared in a regular season game since he was a rookie.
But one UFL front office executive whose team faced Speaks and the Panthers in 2024, who otherwise spoke with Jaguars Wire on the condition of anonymity, views it as a miracle Speaks slipped through the NFL’s cracks to the developmental league the last two years.
“Very disruptive player. You had to know where he was on every snap.” the executive said. “With his age and past NFL pedigree, he leaves you a little in shock with how high of a motor he plays with. His best plays are at the [point of attack] — but the reason he was named DPOY was all his effort plays from the backside making chase-down plays.
“He’s a rare player for the UFL.”
The NFL’s upcoming roster cut-down day is not one Speaks likely has circled on his calendar.
Kansas City and San Francisco had bad news to share with him around this time of year in the past: The former in 2020 upon the release from his rookie deal and the latter last year following his first preseason pro re-emergence, when he had three tackles in three games.
But as it approaches Aug. 27, Speaks is keeping his head up, motivated to keep making plays in black and teal.
“Make the team,” Speaks expressed, “that’s my only goal.”
