Jeff
Gunter.
Jeff
Gunter.
Coastal Carolina· 6'4"· 258 lb· 4.70s 40
"A Sun Belt power rusher who forced more fumbles than anyone in the country in 2020, then produced exactly one tackle in ten NFL games and moved into coaching by 2026."Pre-draft read
A 6-4 3/8, 258-pound edge defender with 33-inch arms and a 6-7 7/8 wingspan who put up 30 bench reps, a 35.5-inch vertical and a 10-foot-2 broad jump. He is a power rusher first: he bull rushes tackles into the pocket, converts speed to power on contact and wins with strength rather than bend.
His calling card at Coastal Carolina was ball disruption. He forced six fumbles in the 2020 season alone, which led the entire NCAA, because he attacks the football at the point of contact instead of settling for the sack. Against the run he sets a hard edge and squeezes down on pulling linemen. What he lacks is the ankle flexion and first-step burst to threaten an NFL tackle's outside shoulder, and he was already 23 by the time he was drafted.
A four-man front that asks its strongside end to set a hard edge on early downs and collapse the pocket with power on obvious passing downs.
Year 1: fifth defensive lineman and special teams contributor. Ceiling: a run-down rotational end who plays 20 snaps a game.
A wide-9 speed-rush front that asks him to win one-on-one around the corner, which is the exact rep his lack of bend loses.
His forced-fumble production suggests his best NFL use was always as an inside rusher in sub packages.
Jeffrey Gunter senior highlights
His 2021 season at Coastal Carolina, the last of three starting years.
Jeffrey Gunter NFL draft film
The pre-draft evaluation tape: power rush, hard edge, limited bend.
Jeffrey Gunter highlights, welcome to the Cincinnati Bengals
The traits Cincinnati bought with the 252nd pick.
Gunter grew up in Durham, North Carolina and played at Riverside High School before signing with Coastal Carolina. He played all 12 games as a freshman in 2017 with 26 tackles and 3.5 tackles for loss, then became a full-time starter in 2018 and broke out with 49 tackles, 14 tackles for loss and five sacks, earning first-team All-Sun Belt honors.
He transferred to NC State for 2019 but was ineligible to play under NCAA transfer rules and lost the entire season. He returned to Coastal Carolina for the program's undefeated regular season in 2020 and had the best year of his career: 58 tackles, 12.5 tackles for loss, 6.5 sacks, an interception and six forced fumbles, which led the country. He was first-team All-Sun Belt for the second time.
As a senior in 2021 he added 41 tackles, 10 tackles for loss and 6.5 sacks for second-team All-Sun Belt recognition. He finished with 174 tackles, 40 tackles for loss, 18 sacks and nine forced fumbles across 48 games and 37 starts. The profile was a productive, physically strong Group of Five edge who lacked the burst to beat Power Five tackles around the corner, which is why he lasted until the fourth-to-last pick of the draft.
- 01
Ball disruption
nine career forced fumbles, including a national-leading six in 2020, from consistently attacking the ball on contact.
- 02
Play strength
30 bench press repetitions and the functional power to bull rush an offensive tackle straight back into the quarterback.
- 03
Run defense
he sets a firm edge on early downs and does not get displaced by down blocks or reach blocks from tackles.
- 04
Production
40 career tackles for loss and 18 sacks over three full seasons of starting in the Sun Belt Conference.
- 05
Length
33-inch arms and a nearly 6-8 wingspan that let him keep blockers off his frame and disengage late in downs.
- 01
Bend
he cannot flatten around the arc, so NFL tackles with average kick slides can ride him past the quarterback.
- 02
First step
a 1.57 ten-yard split is ordinary for the position, leaving him without the burst to threaten the edge immediately.
- 03
Pass rush plan
he defaults to power and lacks a reliable counter move when the initial bull rush gets anchored.
- 04
Level of competition
his production came in the Sun Belt against tackles who rarely resembled the ones he would face on Sundays.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.70sp50
- Vertical
- 35.5inp50
- Broad jump
- 122inp50
- Three-cone
- 7.21sp50
- Shuttle
- 4.35sp50
- Bench
- —rep
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | Coastal Carolina | 12 | 26 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2018 | Coastal Carolina | 12 | 49 | 5 | 0 | 2 | 1 |
| 2019 | NC State | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2020 | Coastal Carolina | 12 | 58 | 6.5 | 1 | 1 | 6 |
| 2021 | Coastal Carolina | 12 | 41 | 6.5 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| Career | — | 48 | 174 | 18 | 1 | 4 | 9 |
Season totals sum exactly to the published career line of 174 tackles, 40 tackles for loss, 18 sacks and nine forced fumbles. The 2019 NC State season is listed with zero games because he was ineligible, not because he was held without production.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Another late-round Cincinnati end who stuck briefly as a rotational run defender.
A power-over-bend Bengals edge whose bull rush carried him to a real NFL role.
A strong-but-stiff edge whose career became a string of practice squad stops.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Cincinnati took Gunter with the 252nd pick and he made the roster as a rookie, which is not nothing for a seventh-rounder. He appeared in 10 games in 2022, almost entirely on special teams, and recorded exactly one tackle. The Bengals reached the AFC Championship Game that season; Gunter was a rotational body who never carved out a defensive role.
The second year ended the run. Cincinnati waived him on August 29, 2023 and re-signed him to the practice squad the next day, but he never played another NFL regular-season down. His entire professional career is 10 games and one assisted tackle. The swing made sense on paper. A 258-pound edge with 30 bench reps and nine career forced fumbles is worth a late-round look. What did not translate was the pass rush: without the bend to win outside or a secondary move to win inside, the power that overwhelmed Sun Belt tackles simply got absorbed. He is now a defensive graduate assistant at Liberty, having moved into coaching in 2026, which is a coherent second act for a player whose value was always effort, strength and football intelligence.