Sam
Roberts.
Sam
Roberts.
NW Missouri St.
Roberts arrived at Northwest Missouri State as a 175-pound defensive end and left at 292, a body transformation that is the whole story of the player. At 6-foot-4 5/8 with 33 1/2-inch arms he plays as a five-technique who slides inside on passing downs.
His best trait is length used with purpose: he keeps blockers off his frame, stacks and sheds to the ball, and his 47 career tackles for loss came from beating linemen to the spot rather than from pure get-off. He also blocked four kicks in college. The pro day was heavy and stiff — a 5.14 forty and a 30-inch vertical — and the rush plan is a long-arm and a bull. Against MIAA linemen he overwhelmed people; against NFL guards he has to win with technique he was never forced to develop.
A two-gap 3-4 front that asks its ends to hold the point against down blocks and lets length, not quickness, do the work.
Year 1: practice squad body and kick-block specialist. Ceiling: rotational base end who plays 20 snaps a game.
A one-gap attacking front built on get-off, where his first step leaves him behind the play.
The blocked kicks are the fastest route to a helmet on Sunday.
Sam Roberts, DL, NW Missouri State | 2022 NFL Draft Prospect Official Highlight
His pre-draft reel from the Cliff Harris Award senior season.
Bill Belichick Praises Patriots Rookie Sam Roberts, Still Sees Room For Growth
New England's coach on what the small-school rookie still had to learn.
Roberts grew up in Waynesville, Missouri, a two-time all-state pick who also played offensive line as a senior. He redshirted in 2016 weighing 175 pounds and spent the next five years eating his way into a defensive lineman's body, listed at 265 by 2017, 285 by 2019 and 292 as a senior.
The production climbed with the weight. He was an All-MIAA honorable mention in 2017 with 24 tackles, six tackles for loss, a sack, an interception and a blocked kick across twelve games. In 2018 he made first-team All-MIAA with 50 tackles, thirteen tackles for loss and six sacks in thirteen games, plus honorable mention All-America recognition. In 2019 he started twelve games despite missing two with injury, posting 49 tackles, ten tackles for loss, five sacks and three blocked kicks, which tied for sixth in the entire country.
The MIAA canceled its 2020 fall season, so his senior year came in 2021 and it was the best one: eighteen tackles for loss and 6.5 sacks in thirteen games, the eighth-best single-season TFL mark in Bearcat history, with a half tackle for loss in twelve different games. He won the Cliff Harris Award as the nation's small-college defensive player of the year, was MIAA defensive player of the year and made first-team All-America. New England spent pick 200 on the size.
- 01
Length and frame
6-foot-4 5/8 with 33 1/2-inch arms and a 6-foot-9 1/2 wingspan, the kind of build teams project onto a five-technique.
- 02
Disruption volume
47 tackles for loss and 18.5 sacks over four playing seasons, capped by an 18-TFL senior year.
- 03
Stack and shed
he keeps his chest clean against single blocks and works down the line to chase the ball carrier from behind.
- 04
Kick blocking
four blocked kicks in college, including three in 2019 that tied for sixth nationally at any level.
- 05
Development curve
went from a 175-pound redshirt to a 292-pound national small-college defensive player of the year.
- 01
Athletic ceiling
a 5.14 forty, 1.76 ten-yard split and 30-inch vertical at his pro day are ordinary for a defensive lineman.
- 02
Level of competition
his dominance came against Division II offensive linemen who could not match his length or mass.
- 03
Rush plan
he is a long-arm and bull-rush player with almost no counter work available once that first move gets stopped.
- 04
Anchor consistency
the weight is new and double teams move him off the spot more than the tackle-for-loss totals suggest.
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | NW Missouri St. | 12 | 24 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| 2018 | NW Missouri St. | 13 | 50 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2019 | NW Missouri St. | — | 49 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2021 | NW Missouri St. | 13 | 0 | 6.5 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Career | — | 38 | 0 | 18.5 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Northwest Missouri State does not publish box-score tables for these years, so everything comes from the official Bearcats biography. He redshirted in 2016 and the MIAA canceled the 2020 fall season, so neither year gets a row. The 2019 entry lists twelve starts and two games missed to injury but no games-played total, and the 2021 entry never gives a tackle number, so both are left blank rather than guessed. Tackles for loss and sacks sum exactly to the 47 and 18.5 the four listed seasons produce.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Late-round Patriots defensive lineman who bounces between rosters and practice squads.
Heavy interior body who carves out a long rotational career on base downs.
Small-school defensive lineman who never gets past the back of the roster.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
The Patriots kept him around for two full seasons without ever really playing him. New England released him on August 26, 2024, and Chicago signed him to the practice squad three days later, only to let him go on October 1 with an injury settlement.
Carolina picked him up for its practice squad in November 2024 and promoted him to the active roster on December 10. The Panthers waived him at cutdown in August 2025 and re-signed him to the practice squad, and Atlanta signed him off that squad a week later. He got his most meaningful run with the Falcons before a knee injury in Week 10 against Indianapolis put him on injured reserve in November. The Giants signed him in March 2026 and waived him that August. Twenty-six tackles and one sack across four organizations is the ordinary outcome for a Division II lineman taken at 200: a real NFL career, but a fringe one, and the 2021 award tape never translated to Sundays.