Renner's NFL Draft summer position rankings: Best linebackers for 2026, including the next Jalon Walker?
As NFL defenses have evolved over the past decade, so has the linebacker position. Taking on blocks is no longer a necessity. Stacking and shedding is a relic -- 250+ pounders are dinosaurs. I may be getting a little hyperbolic, but the amount of linebackers whose weight start with 22 or 21 has exploded.
Two traits have come to dominate the linebacker landscape: speed and physicality. Can you cover ground quickly and can you stick your shoulder pad into a pulling guard at full speed? Thankfully for the NFL, this class has a lot of players who answer "yes" to both those questions.
Here are my top 10 linebacker prospects (ordered from No. 1 to No. 10) ahead of the college football season.
Positional rankings: EDGE • DT • LB • CB • S • IOL • OT • TE • RB • WR • QB
Note: ⭐️ represents player's 247Sports star rating as a high school recruit
- Player type: Do-it-all LB
- Room for improvement: Mental mistakes
- Early grade: Early Day 2
While there's plenty of holes to poke in Hill's sophomore tape, I'd bet good money on him becoming a high-end player at the next level. Some players just move differently than everyone else and Hill falls into that category for me. It's almost hard to believe he's nearly 240 pounds with how gracefully he glides across a football field.
On his pick six vs. ULM, Hill looked like he could flip to tight end tomorrow and be considered a top prospect. Some players just have that unique caliber of all-around athleticism that's going to have a hard time failing at the next level. Hill is one of them.
Hill started down the stretch as a true freshman in 2023 before racking up 100 tackles in 2024. While there's still far too many reps where he completely turns someone loose in zone coverage or is caught with his eyes where they shouldn't be, if he cleans those up he'll be a first-round linebacker.
- Player type: Tone-setter MLB
- Room for improvement: Zone matching
- Early grade: Early Day 2
I remember watching Jalon Walker's tape last spring and having to glance over at times to remind myself of his No. 11. That's because there was a linebacker next to him wearing No. 3 with a darn near identical build (albeit slightly less filled out) who was as explosive and tenacious when tracking down ball carriers. Nine months from now it could be Allen hearing his name called on Day 1 of the draft the same way Walker did. He's that type of prospect.
If you can start at linebacker as a true freshman for Kirby Smart the way Allen did the final five games of 2023, chances are you've got the goods mentally. Flip on the tape and it won't take more than a play or two to see Allen has the goods physically too. If he makes a jump in terms of his ability to anticipate routes in zone coverage, Allen will likely be a first-rounder.
- Player type: Edge hybrid
- Room for improvement: Reps off-ball
- Early grade: Day 2
This is a pretty substantial projection given Perkins didn't play off-ball linebacker last year, but I see a translatable skill set nonetheless. Somehow, the 6-foot-1, 210-pounder was playing primarily edge for Ole Miss the past two seasons. While it was a bit of a hybrid role that saw him rush the passer 260 snaps and drop into coverage on 113, according to PFF, what earned him a spot on this list is how adept he is at defeating blocks and finding ball carriers. Perkins racked up 10.5 sacks and over 50 tackles in 2024.
I see the same sort of tools that have been crucial for many edge-turned-off-ball linebackers in the past. On tape you see a motor that won't quit, speed to track down quarterbacks outside the pocket, physicality to send offensive tackles backward, and a nose for where the football is going.
- Player type: Uber-athlete
- Room for improvement: Physicality
- Early grade: Day 2
Styles is the best athlete in the linebacker class. Truthfully, it's not close either. The former safety has kept adding muscle without losing any movement skills over the course of his three-year career with the Buckeyes. At times, Styles looks like he's playing at 1.5x while everyone else is at normal speed.
He'll be the biggest physical freak to enter the NFL at the linebacker position since Isaiah Simmons with far less projection than Simmons given Styles' projectable role in Ohio State's defense. The reason he checks in at four for me and not higher is that there's still a timidity to his game on tape. That could very well be a holdover from his days playing in the secondary, but it shows up as a tackler and in his willingness to stick his nose into blockers. If that improves -- which I would expect it to in his second season playing in the box -- he could end up LB1 off the board.
- Player type: Three-down WLB
- Room for improvement: Staying clean vs. run
- Early grade: Late Day 2
When I mentioned in the intro that defenses don't care too much what the scale says, but rather how physical you play, Louis was the type of linebacker I was referring to. Louis plays with the kind of reckless abandon you love at the position without letting it seep into his tackling prowess. He played a difficult coverage role for the Panthers that often saw him kicked out to the slot and he still held his own.
In his very first season as a starter last fall, Louis became a second-team All-American with four picks and 57 defensive stops -- second most among Power 5 linebackers. If he improves on that I'd expect him to go from a late Day 2 grade to early Day 2.
- Player type: Run-and-hit WLB
- Room for improvement: Stacking and shedding
- Early grade: Late Day 2
Weeks was only a sophomore last year, but already showed a mastery of LSU's defense that none on this list can match. His ability to read and react is already at an NFL-level. It's why he finished with 56 defensive stops to trail only Jihaad Campbell in the SEC, according to PFF.
Weeks pairs his quick trigger with quick and agile feet to maneuver around blocks with ease. What he doesn't quite have yet is the size and play strength to bang with NFL-level offensive linemen. He's got a smaller frame than you'd like for a linebacker and could be mistaken for a safety at first glance. Still, I see a little Blake Cashman in Weeks' game where play strength gets less important when offensive linemen can't get their hands on you in the first place.
- Player type: Tampa-2 MLB
- Room for improvement: Playmaking
- Early grade: Early Day 3
From a physical perspective, Barton should be higher on this list. He's a long, smooth athlete who ticks so many of the boxes you want to see at the position. Specifically his ability to change directions and flip his hips at 6-foot-5 makes him ideal to roam the middle of the field in coverage at the next level. While that's good in theory, on Saturdays his playmaking ability was lackluster last fall. He failed to finish so many plays and missed over 1/5 of his tackle attempts last season. While he's got NFL bloodlines with his brother Cody, Lander has some holes in his game to plug before he finds an NFL starting role.
- Player type: Thumper
- Room for Iimprovement: Play in space
- Early grade: Early Day 3
If you want a true throwback linebacker in this class, Barham is your man. He almost looks out of place on tape with a defensive end frame playing at the second level. Unsurprisingly, he sends offensive linemen backward on contact like a defensive end too. If you're drafting Barham, it's for a specific role. He's not going to be kicking out to the slot to go one on one with a wide receiver. You better be a blitz-heavy defense where Barham doesn't have to stray too far outside the tackle box. If that sounds like your defense, Barham can be a difference-maker.
- Player type: Steady WLB
- Room for improvement: Play strength
- Early grade: Early Day 3
Lawson may have gotten overshadowed by his teammate Jihaad Campbell last fall, but he has a long NFL future in front of him in his own right. Unlike Campbell, Lawson doesn't possess high-end physical tools. Whether it's Lawson's frame, speed, explosiveness, or agility, nothing jumps off the tape to get you too excited, but at the same time not much is a liability either.
Lawson wins with football IQ and consistent technique. He knows how to play around blocks and is quick to diagnose concepts between the tackles. It's the reason Lawson outsnapped Campbell in both 2022 and 2023. If his progression continues, Lawson could easily be a starter early on in his NFL career.
- Player type: Athlete without a position
- Room for improvement: Feel for the position
- Early grade: ???
There is no denying that Perkins is a special athlete that the NFL is going to covet someday. I'm just not sure it's going to be at linebacker. It feels like a lifetime ago that Perkins was a true freshman starting in a hybrid edge role that was darn near unblockable on third downs. He took over numerous games that season and seemed destined to be a future top 10 pick.
That never quite materialized as Perkins plateaued in the 220-pound range and never quite took to a role playing him more off the ball. His best trait is still what he can do rushing the passer, but unless he puts on 20 pounds, the NFL isn't going to even give him a chance to do that. An ACL tear only four games into last season makes his draft projection a massive unknown at this point in time.
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