Jacob
Phillips.
Jacob
Phillips.
LSU· 6'3"· 229 lb· 4.66s 40
"A five-star athlete who led a national-championship defense in tackles, went on every board as a run-and-chase weakside linebacker, and never got enough healthy snaps to settle the processing debate."Pre-draft read
Phillips is a downhill inside linebacker with legitimate size at 6-3 and 229 pounds and the range to cover sideline to sideline. He triggers without hesitation and arrives with force, the hard-hitting element that made him a volume tackler alongside Devin White and then the centerpiece of the national-title defense.
The second layer is athleticism in space. He runs well enough to carry tight ends up the seam and match backs on angle routes. The concerns are processing and block destruction: he takes false steps when the picture is muddy, runs around blocks rather than stacking and shedding, and misses tackles when forced to break down in space.
A one-gap four-man front that keeps interior linemen off him and lets him run to the football, with a nickel package that uses his speed in man coverage on backs.
Year 1 rotational weakside linebacker and core special-teamer, with a ceiling as a three-down starter if the processing catches up to the speed.
A two-gap front that asks the linebacker to take on guards head-up and control a gap by force every snap.
Jacob Phillips 2019 Season Highlights LSU
Full-season cutup from the national-championship year he led LSU with 113 tackles.
Jacob Phillips LSU 2018-2019 Highlights
Two-season reel covering the run fits, the range and the pick-six against Miami.
Cleveland Browns select LSU LB Jacob Phillips with No. 97 pick
Draft-day selection and the team's framing of what they expected from him.
A five-star recruit out of East Nashville who flipped to LSU, Phillips played all twelve games as a true freshman in 2017 in a reserve role, finishing with 18 tackles and half a sack. The breakout came in 2018 next to Devin White: eleven starts, 87 tackles to finish second on the team, 5.5 tackles for loss and a sack, with a 45-yard interception return for a touchdown in his first career start against Miami that earned SEC Defensive Player of the Week.
With White gone to Tampa Bay, 2019 was his defense. He played all fifteen games of LSU's championship run and led the unit in tackles with 113, adding eight tackles for loss, a sack and a forced fumble. His career line read 218 tackles, fifteen for loss, two sacks and an interception across 39 games, production that put him on every board as a starting-caliber SEC linebacker.
The evaluation split on whether the tackle totals reflected instincts or opportunity. He was a clean athlete with size, speed and a national-championship pedigree, but scouts questioned his diagnosis speed and his ability to take on blockers at the second level, projecting him as a run-and-chase weakside linebacker rather than a signal-caller. Cleveland, rebuilding a defense under a new staff, took him at 97 to compete immediately.
- 01
Range and speed
Covers ground from sideline to sideline and chases plays down from the back side, the athletic baseline every modern defense needs.
- 02
Volume production
Led a national-championship defense with 113 tackles as a junior after finishing second on the team with 87 as a sophomore.
- 03
Physical finisher
Hard-hitting through contact, brings his weight into the target and does not let ball carriers fall forward for extra yards.
- 04
Coverage ability
Fluid enough to carry tight ends up the seam and match backs out of the backfield in a defense that asked him to do it.
- 05
Big-game pedigree
Started 26 games in the SEC and played every snap of a title run, with a pick-six against Miami as a first-time starter.
- 01
Slow diagnosis
Takes false steps and hesitates when the run fit is disguised, which erases the athletic advantage he should have.
- 02
Struggles with blocks
Tries to run around linemen at the second level instead of stacking and shedding, so he gets sealed on interior runs.
- 03
Tackling in space
Misses when he has to break down and square up rather than run through a target at full speed.
- 04
Only two sacks in college
Offers almost nothing as a blitzer, which limits how a defense can use him on passing downs.
Relative Athletic Score (Kent Lee Platte) benchmarks combine/pro-day numbers against every measured prospect at the position since 1987. 10.00 is elite; 5.00 is average.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.66sp50
- Vertical
- 39inp50
- Broad jump
- 126inp50
- Three-cone
- 7.38sp50
- Shuttle
- 4.33sp50
- Bench
- —rep
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | LSU | 12 | 18 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| 2018 | LSU | 12 | 87 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 0 |
| 2019 | LSU | 15 | 113 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| Career | — | 39 | 218 | 2 | 1 | 5 | 1 |
Season and career lines from Sports-Reference with bowl games included; the three seasons sum exactly to the 39-game, 218-tackle career total. His 2018 interception was returned 45 yards for a touchdown against Miami. CFBTrack splits the same seasons into regular-season and postseason rows, which is why its career total of 214 tackles differs; the Sports-Reference figures are used throughout.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
A capable two-down starter who produces tackles when healthy but never becomes a difference-maker on passing downs.
The ceiling his LSU pedigree suggested: a fast, physical every-down linebacker who becomes the engine of a playoff defense.
A talented linebacker whose career is defined not by his tape but by the seasons he never got to play.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
He got on the field right away and then could not stay there. Phillips played nine games as a rookie in 2020 with 25 tackles, starting four, and added five tackles in two playoff games in Cleveland's run to the divisional round. A torn biceps in training camp wiped out most of 2021, limiting him to four games. He came back for 2022 and had his best stretch, 46 tackles and two sacks in seven games, before another injury ended it. Then a torn Achilles in 2023 training camp cost him the entire season.
Free agency took him to Indianapolis on one-year deals in 2024 and 2025, and he did not appear in a regular-season game for either, entering 2026 without a team. The career totals are 20 games, 88 tackles, three sacks and five passes defensed across six seasons. In hindsight the scouting questions were never really tested. The pre-draft debate about his processing barely got a hearing, because the body gave out first: a biceps, then an Achilles, at exactly the ages when a third-round linebacker either wins a job or disappears.
Data note: from Houston