The New York Giants are excited to see how big of a jump defensive lineman Dexter Lawrence takes in this second season.
In his rookie season last year, Lawrence started all 16 games for the Giants and made a significant impact.
This year, Lawrence could be poised to become a force in the middle of the Giants’ defense and take his place among the top defensive linemen in football.
Gil Brandt, the architect of the Dallas Cowboys’ dynasty of the 1960s and 70s now an analyst for NFL.com, cites Lawerence as one of his top breakout defensive linemen of 2020.
Brandt lists Lawrence ninth out of nine players behind Tennessee’s Jeffrey Simmons, Chase Winovich of New England, the Raiders’ Clelin Ferrell, Ed Oliver of Buffalo, Washington’s Montez Sweat, Christian Wilkins of Miami, Carolina’s Brian Burns and Jaylon Ferguson of Baltimore.
“Just like Wilkins, Lawrence’s former Clemson teammate, Lawrence wasn’t necessarily spectacular — but he was still underappreciated in 2019, logging 38 tackles and 2.5 sacks in 16 starts,” writes Brandt. “I’m interested to see how new Giants defensive coordinator Patrick Graham deploys Lawrence in his system.”
It’s not a significant honor to be listed last behind several players that were drafted way after you, so we’ll take Brandt’s list with a grain of salt.
Lawrence was clearly more impactful as a rookie than many of the others listed here and with Leonard Williams and Dalvin Tomlinson flanking him and Blake Martinez over his shoulder now, you can expect Lawrence to step up his game in 2020 and perhaps become a game-changing force on the Giants’ defensive front.
