Draft analyst believes Quincy Rhodes Jr. is 'exactly what an NFL defensive end looks like'
Arkansas junior defensive end Quincy Rhodes Jr. came into the 2025 season carrying more pressure than any player on the Razorbacks’ defense.
With massive shoes to fill following the departure of Landon Jackson on the edge, the lengthy 6-foot-6, 275-pound Rhodes confidently stated back in August that he was ready to accept the challenge head on.
“Now, with Landon gone I feel like it’s my time,” the North Little Rock alumnus said during fall camp. “So I’ve just got to live up to expectations and expectations on myself.”
He has backed that up, and then some.
After starting just one game his first two seasons with the Hogs, Rhodes has logged eight starts in nine games this year and is tied for the SEC lead with 14 tackles for loss and tied for second with eight sacks.
“This offseason, the staff didn’t really mention Quincy, he was more like a ‘wait and see’ type of player,” NFL and College Football analyst Ryan Roberts of A to Z Sports told HawgBeat. “They were high on the athlete that he is, but they were just waiting for everything to click mentally, that type of thing, so he actually wasn’t even a player that they mentioned with him being an underclassman and he can go back if he wants, that was kind of the thought process.”
There have been three occasions this season where Rhodes has logged two or more tackles for loss in a game, and he is coming off of a career day in last Saturday’s loss to Mississippi State. His 4.5 tackles for loss were the first for a Razorback in a single game since 2005 and the most by an SEC defender in 2025. He is also the first player in program history to record 4+ tackles for loss in multiple games in a single season, the other against Memphis on Sept. 20.
“He just had a terror of the game in the past week and has been playing really good ball,” Roberts said of Rhodes. “When I popped it on I mean, obviously, like, the unteachable stuff is very easy to see. You can’t teach 6-foot-6, 270, long arms, explosive. He’s got all those traits that people generally flock over and to see the production back it up is obviously a really big thing because we always kind of bank on upside, but seeing it actualizing into production is obviously a big thing.
“When you talk about what an NFL defensive end looks like, a 4-3 hand in the dirt type of guy, that is Quincy.”
Shining bright in a dark season
Rhodes has been a bright spot for an Arkansas squad that is currently riding a seven-game losing streak and is the lone bunch of the 16 teams in the SEC that has not earned a league win.
Though the defense has shown improvement against the run in the past two games, it is still a unit that ranks dead last in nearly every SEC category. Despite the struggles, as well as a lack of depth along the interior, Rhodes has still found ways to put himself in position to make plays.
“First and foremost, it’s like a two-pronged process to a degree,” Roberts explained. “The first part is just simply isolating him and translating him to the next level. So, like, as a 4-3 defensive end, does he do X, Y, and Z well that is going to translate to the next level? Does he understand how to take on blocks? Does he have any sort of pass rush in his arsenal? All that type of stuff. Can he translate well to the role you are asking him to?
“The rest of the stuff, I think, is super interesting because he has a body type where even outside of just getting the production comparable to everybody else on the defense line and on his roster, he also is a guy that does have the potential to maybe do some other things. If you want to reduce him down in pass rush situations, you can also play him from wider alignments.”
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Could Rhodes be the Hogs’ highest defensive lineman drafted in nearly two decades?
If Rhodes does leave the Razorbacks for the 2026 NFL Draft, Roberts does not expect him to be on the board for very long.
“Regardless of how his process goes, if he declares, I think that he’s definitely going to be at least a top 50 player in this class, so a top two round guy for sure, probably earlier than that like a mid-second,” Roberts said. “I would be surprised if that type of athlete isn’t going at least in the early second round range. I think the big thing, though, for him is just going to be the process. I haven’t heard anything negative about him from, like, the personal side. A big thing and the character reports and all that type of stuff, so as long as he checks out there, he should be good sailing to be an early pick.”
If Rhodes were to be selected in the top 50 picks, he would be the highest drafted defensive lineman from Arkansas since Jamaal Anderson went eighth overall to the Atlanta Falcons in 2007.
Rhodes is rated as the eighth-best defensive end for the 2026 NFL Draft per ESPN’s Mel Kiper Jr. and has been projected as a First Round selection in multiple mock drafts.
Even though he was mostly unknown outside of Arkansas’ locker room prior to this season, Rhodes’ physique and skills that you can’t teach jump off of the page.
“He has the explosiveness to be able to put offensive linemen in conflict, which is first and foremost,” Roberts said. “He has that get off and that first step explosiveness to be able to affect offensive linemen early in reps. You’re also seeing his hands develop throughout the year and he has incredibly quick hands which is going to allow him to get off of blocks well.”
Roberts also broke down the areas of opportunity for Rhodes, which presumably will get worked out with more time.
“I think the biggest improvements are mostly with lack of experience. The awareness in the run game is a little bit up and down at times. He has every tool to be a really good run game player, but I do think that there’s sometimes where maybe he just kind of guesses a little bit or maybe he’ll shoot a gap or kind of lose integrity of his alignment, that type of stuff.
The other thing is that he just needs to add moves to his arsenal. Right now, he’s a long arm winner, so he is going to win with his length and his explosiveness. Let’s use a little bit more nuance as a pass rusher at times: let’s add an inside counter, let’s add a rip, let’s add a club rip, let’s add a swim. Just adding tools to his toolbox as a rusher, I think, turns him from a potentially really good starter to maybe an A-plus plus star, who knows? Down the line, he definitely has the athleticism to be that type of player.”
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