Scouting Report: DT Bryan Bresee
Taking a look at a former five-star recruit who has flashed plenty of good stuff, but been a bit inconsistent over his Clemson tenure, and how that projects to Detroit.
Background
Bresee was a highly-touted recruit coming out of Damascus High School (Maryland). He ranked as the #1 overall recruit in the class of 2020 according to 247Sports Composite. A very lofting billing to live up to.
He ascended into Clemson’s lineup quite quickly, starting 10 games as a true freshman in 2020, racking up 4.0 sacks and 6.5 tackles for loss from the interior defensive line. He earned Freshman All-American honors from several publications, such as ESPN and The Athletic.
However, his sophomore season was not the next step forward many hoped it could be, largely because Bresee tore his ACL early in the season and was out for the remainder of the season.
Some of the lack of on-field production certainly should be given a slight asterisk from 2022, noting the immense family challenges that the Bresee family went through, losing Bryan’s 15-year old sister, Ella, to an aggressive form of brain cancer. The link provided above is an ESPN Gameday production talking about Bryan and Ella’s relationship, and the difficulties of that loss.
Bryan left the team for a short period, just after a win over Furman and was out for a few games spending time with his family. He then had his own scare in October, a diagnosis of a kidney infection. Between the two incidents, Bresee was either absent or battling infection for the first half of the 2022 season.
However, Bresee rebounded quite well in the offseason process, having a stellar Combine performance that reminded everyone once again why he has been such an intriguing commodity, which is his quick twitch ability at defensive tackle.
Bresee’s Strengths
The first thing that pops out on film is how naturally disruptive Bresee tends to be. At 6’5, 300 pounds, and moving very quickly, Bresee is very tough to stone at the line of scrimmage, and an excellent first step allows him to explode into offensive linemen quite regularly.
His athleticism is also easily seen in his ability to navigating the line of scrimmage laterally as a run stopper. An underrated trait these days, but Bresee has excellent awareness against the run and plays with a passion to make run stops just as much as he wants to sack the QB.
He is also very powerful in his upper body. Plenty of clips with Bresee tossing linemen aside, throwing clubs and rips with force, and showing good ability to torque. Very violent player with his play strength.
Bresee also has quality length, and is able to use it well as the initiator of contact. He’s not timid in the slightest and uses each of his physical gifts quite well.
Areas Bresee Can Improve
Probably the biggest one for sure is developing a better pass rush attack plan with his hands. Bresee is more traits and upside than he is finished product, and that’s most easily seen with some of his lackluster attack plans as an interior rusher. His physical gifts allow him to make plays nonetheless, but he’ll need to round out his game to take a big step forward at the NFL level. The clip below is a good example of when Bresee just simply doesn’t have a good plan of attack if his physical traits don’t come through:
As with most disruptive interior players, Bresee can be somewhat inconsistent with his pad level. He sometimes will go to press blockers off of him without setting a good base. He gets away with it at times because he’s stronger than others, but needs to be more consistent with his bend and base to become a top end NFL player.
While he is violent with his hands, he needs to be more accurate in landing his blows. Sometimes he’ll club wildly and miss a few more than you would like. Plays a lot like a bull in a china shop, which while overall is good, still can be problematic if you can’t fine tune and harness it a bit.
Bresee’s Fit with the Detroit Lions
I have to admit, I think my stock on Bresee is up following this. Looking into his background, Bresee really only got:
A shortened and chaotic 2020 season with COVID complications throwing everyone off.
Three and a half games in 2021 due to an ACL tear.
Eight or so games in 2022 due to bereavement and other injuries.
Thus, the experience here is actually quite low, and thus the lack of polish to his game is a bit less detrimental in my opinion. Now, the checkered injury history does raise concern, especially given the Lions are in such need at defensive tackle due to injuries effectively keeping Levi Onwuzurike from contributing. However, medical details are beyond my scouting purview, and it’s one aspect I tend to leave exclusive determination to the team on. Which is short to say, if the Lions feel comfortable with their medical evaluations on Bresee, I’m quite content to go along with it.
Now, as to the fit, I think it is actually really good. Bresee’s best attributes right now are his power and explosiveness, two things Holmes has tended to covet in defensive linemen. He demonstrates them best when disrupting opposing rushing attacks, but as mentioned, the tools are there to become a quality interior pass rusher at the next level. He’s agile and mobile, he can chase down the line, and he can anchor against double teams. That’s an ideal duo for a run stopper.
As to the Holmes mold, the emphasis for defensive tackles did tend to fall more on “disruptive pass rusher” than it did on “disruptive run stopper”, but again, Bresee certainly has the tools to be developed into a quality interior rusher with some experience. That’s his biggest weakness is that he simply was unable to stay on the field enough to really take a step forward after an excellent 2020 season at Clemson. If he can stay healthy in the NFL, I have a lot of belief he will become a very good football player, and he fits a lot of the boxes Detroit would likely want checked off.
Right now, I think Bresee is an excellent fit for what the Lions want in a 3-technique paired next to Alim McNeill (who realistically can start at either 3T or 1T depending on who Detroit brings in alongside him).
Overall, the question is when would the Lions add him, and that becomes the tougher part. Personally, I think the Lions probably have to take him at 18th overall if they want him. I myself would love that, though I imagine many are not thrilled with that idea. The issue is with teams like the Saints (29th and 40th), Eagles (30th), Steelers (32nd), Cardinals (34th), Seahawks (20th and 37th), and maybe even Browns (42nd) all sitting in between the Lions second first-round pick and their first second-round pick, the odds of Bresee sliding to them at 48 seems quite low. Ideally, Detroit would be able to manage a trade back from 18 into the mid-to-low 20’s and take Bresee there.
And so this is probably the best way to put it: I am very confident in Bresee reaching his ceiling, especially in Detroit. I think the majority of the issues are easily solvable with time and consistency and experience. But that becomes the biggest drawback. Can you trust the medical evaluation on Bresee that he would stay healthy? Again, we just saw that explosive defensive tackles with elite tools do not workout when they are chronically injured and doing rehab. If the Lions feel comfortable with their medical evaluations on Bresee, I would love to see him end up in Detroit, but ultimately, I would totally understand passing, as the checkered injury history is a concern, though that clearly has not stopped Holmes before.
Thanks Bo, now I finally know my opinion on Bryan Bresee