Dee
Winters.
Dee
Winters.
TCU· 5'11"· 227 lb· 4.49s 40
"A sixth-round flier on speed: keep him clean, let him run, and the closing burst that made him the Fiesta Bowl's defensive MVP eventually shows up on Sundays in a chase-and-blitz role."Pre-draft read
Winters plays as a downhill weak-side linebacker who stacks off the ball at depth and triggers the instant he reads a run key. His game starts with straight-line burst: he shoots front-side gaps before linemen can climb to the second level, and he eats the last five yards in a blink, arriving with enough pop to stop a back's feet on contact.
The second trait is the blitz. He was sent from depth and off the edge on passing downs, times the snap well, and converts speed into a flat, direct path at the quarterback instead of drifting around blocks. In coverage he can carry a seam and expand to the flat with real range. The signature is back-side pursuit — he runs down perimeter plays most off-ball linebackers concede.
One-gap attacking front that keeps him clean and asks him to run — a wide-zone-chasing, Cover-3 match defense with big bodies eating blocks in front of him.
Year 1: core special-teams player and sub-package chase linebacker. Ceiling: full-time Will in a four-man front who blitzes on passing downs.
A two-gap 3-4 that leaves him uncovered as a stack linebacker taking on guards head-up in short-yardage.
His value curve rises the more speed the scheme is willing to trade for size.
JJ McCarthy Throws Pick Six to Dee Winters | TCU vs Michigan | 2022 Fiesta Bowl
The signature college snap: the 29-yard interception return for a touchdown in the CFP semifinal, where he was named defensive MVP.
Dee Winters TCU Highlights
Range, back-side pursuit and downhill triggers across his TCU tape.
Dee Winters 🔥 College TCU Best Highlights
Blitz reps and finishing speed from his 2022 senior season.
A one-year full-time producer with rare closing speed for the position, Winters is a run-and-chase weak-side linebacker whose identity is range and violence in space rather than block deconstruction. He is built lean, plays with his hair on fire, and does his best work when the front keeps him clean and lets him run.
The context matters. He did not start until 2020 and only became a full-time three-down piece as a senior, when TCU's 13-1 run to the national championship game gave him a national stage. That 2022 season is the whole evaluation: 79 tackles, 14.5 for loss and 7.5 sacks across 15 games, most of it generated on movement and pressure rather than stack-and-shed. His signature snap came in the Fiesta Bowl semifinal against Michigan, where he was named defensive MVP and returned an interception 29 yards for a touchdown.
The flags were the ones that keep this archetype on Day 3. He is undersized for a base linebacker, gets stalled when a guard gets hands on him, and his run fits could get aggressive to the point of overrunning the ball. Boards had him as a late-round linebacker with special-teams value and a path to sub-package snaps, and San Francisco took him at 216 as exactly that: cheap speed for the kicking game behind an established starting duo.
- 01
Closing burst
Elite straight-line speed for an off-ball linebacker; he covers ground on the back side and finishes plays on the perimeter that most players at the position never reach.
- 02
Blitz timing
Times the snap from depth and off the edge, converting speed to a flat path at the quarterback; produced 7.5 sacks and 14.5 tackles for loss as a senior.
- 03
Trigger downhill
Reads run keys quickly and shoots the front-side gap before linemen climb, forcing backs to bounce or cut back into help.
- 04
Contact violence
Plays bigger than 227 pounds as a tackler, striking with his shoulder through the ball carrier's frame rather than grabbing and dragging.
- 05
Big-moment production
Named defensive MVP of the Fiesta Bowl semifinal against Michigan with a 29-yard interception return for a touchdown in TCU's title-game run.
- 01
Block deconstruction
Struggles to disengage once a guard or tight end gets hands inside; can be walled off and erased from a run fit at the point of attack.
- 02
Play strength
Lean 227-pound frame gets moved by down blocks and does not anchor when asked to take on a fullback or a pulling lineman head-up.
- 03
Overrunning fits
Aggressive triggers occasionally carry him past the ball, opening cutback lanes behind him when the front does not hold its gaps.
- 04
Coverage detail
Zone drops can be undisciplined; his eyes stay in the backfield and he loses depth or leaves the hook window against play-action.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.49sp50
- Vertical
- 30.5inp50
- Broad jump
- 117inp50
- Three-cone
- —s
- Shuttle
- —s
- Bench
- —rep
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | TCU | 10 | 65 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 0 |
| 2021 | TCU | 12 | 74 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| 2022 | TCU | 15 | 79 | 7.5 | 1 | 2 | 0 |
| Career | — | 37 | 218 | 10.5 | 3 | 6 | 0 |
Verified against cfbstats.com player pages for 2020, 2021 and 2022 (TCU, player 1105830); season totals sum exactly to the career line shown. Winters has no 2020-era cfbstats page for 2019, which was a no-statistic season, so it is not listed. TCU and NFL team bios cite 48 career games and 246 tackles by including 2019 appearances and stat-provider differences that cfbstats does not carry; only the cfbstats-verified line is published here. Fumble recoveries after 2020 are unverified and left blank rather than zero-filled.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Honors
- 2022 CFP Semifinal (Fiesta Bowl) Defensive MVP
- 2022 CFP National Championship Game participant with TCU (13-1)
Core special-teams value first, defensive snaps earned in waves.
The version where the blitz timing becomes a real designed weapon and he plays every down.
Speed and effort keep him on a roster, but he never wins a full-time defensive job.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Sixth-round pick who converted special-teams value into a starting job by his third season and was then traded for a fifth-round pick — a clear win at 216.
San Francisco used him almost exclusively on special teams as a rookie in 2023, when he appeared in 15 games and recorded 10 tackles behind Fred Warner and Dre Greenlaw. He stayed in that role through 2024 as depth, taking sub-package and situational work while the starting duo held the defense together. The break came in 2025, when he seized the starting weak-side job outright and finally played to his college traits: roughly 993 defensive snaps, 85 tackles, an interception and a defensive touchdown, and a top-20 snap volume among NFL linebackers. That season made him a real asset, and in April 2026 the 49ers traded him to Dallas for a fifth-round pick — the No. 152 selection — where he opened the 2026 season as a starting linebacker wearing No. 53.
In hindsight this is one of the cleanest sixth-round returns in the class. Winters gave two years of core special-teams value on a rookie contract, then a full season as a functional starter, and was eventually worth more in trade than the pick used to acquire him. He never fixed the block deconstruction concern, and he is still best when the front keeps him clean, but the range and blitz timing translated exactly as scouted. For a pick made at 216, converting a special-teams flier into a starter and a fifth-rounder is a decisive win for the process.