Dorian
Williams.
Dorian
Williams.
Tulane· 6'1"· 228 lb· 4.49s 40
"A 4.49 linebacker whose value was always going to be measured in range and kick-coverage snaps, not in the pile — Buffalo bought speed at the second level and got exactly that."Pre-draft read
Downhill weakside linebacker who lived in the alley at Tulane, aligned mostly as the Will in a four-man front and asked to run the width of the field. His game starts with speed: a 4.49 forty that shows up as second-level range, chasing perimeter runs from the backside and closing throwing lanes before the ball arrives.
The secondary trait is blitz timing — Tulane sent him on delayed A-gap and edge pressures and he turned them into 10.5 career sacks. Against the run he wins with speed to the spot rather than take-on strength, and stacked blockers can wall him off. In coverage he carries verticals from depth with real hip fluidity. The signature is simple: nobody outruns him to the football.
Speed-based four-man front that plays its linebackers off the ball and asks the Will to run the alley, spill perimeter runs and cover in nickel.
Year 1: core special-teamer and sub-package coverage linebacker. Ceiling: three-down weakside starter in a defense that protects him with two-gapping linemen.
A downhill 3-4 that stacks him over a guard and asks him to take on kick-out blocks and hold the point in short-yardage packages.
His value rises with every snap the front spends keeping bodies off him.
HARD HITTER | Tulane LB Dorian Williams 2020 Highlights
Breakout sophomore season that led the American in tackles: range, downhill triggers and pursuit angles.
American Draft Tape: LB Dorian Williams - Tulane
Conference-cut draft tape showing the blitz timing and coverage carry that defined the senior year.
What Dorian Williams Brings To The Buffalo Bills Defense
Post-draft film session on how his speed profile fits Buffalo's second level.
Four-year Tulane linebacker who arrived as a lightly recruited South Carolina prospect and left as the heartbeat of the best defense in program history. Built lean at 6-1 and 228, he is a modern weakside body: speed, range, and coverage snaps first, thump second. Everything about the projection ran through athleticism, and the testing confirmed what the tape said.
Production was the résumé. He led the American with 98 tackles as a sophomore in 2020 and added 16.5 tackles for loss, then followed with 73 tackles in 2021 before a 131-tackle senior year that ended with a 17-tackle defensive MVP performance in Tulane's Cotton Bowl upset of USC. That game was the audition tape: chase tackles in space, timely pressure, and a defender who never came off the field. The flags were the ones that follow every Group of Five linebacker — take-on strength against downhill power, occasional over-pursuit, and block deconstruction that lived on effort more than technique.
Boards had him as a fringe Day 2 linebacker, roughly a third-to-fourth round grade with special-teams value baked in. Buffalo taking him at 91 was an on-time pick for a defense that valued speed at the second level and needed insurance behind an aging linebacker room.
- 01
Sideline-to-sideline range
4.49 speed that turns backside perimeter runs into tackles for short gain and lets him play wider than most Will linebackers.
- 02
Timed pressure
Tulane trusted him on delayed A-gap and edge blitzes, and he converted that role into 10.5 career sacks without being a designated rusher.
- 03
Coverage carry
Fluid enough in the hips to run with tight ends up the seam and stay attached out of the backfield on wheel and angle routes.
- 04
Senior-year volume
131 tackles in 2022 with a 17-tackle defensive MVP night in the Cotton Bowl, proof the production scaled against the best opponent he faced.
- 05
Special-teams profile
Speed, willingness in space and four years of coverage-unit reps gave him an immediate role before defensive snaps arrived.
- 01
Take-on strength
At 228 pounds he gets displaced by climbing guards and can be walled from the play when he arrives late to the gap.
- 02
Block deconstruction
Wins with quickness rather than hand technique, so once a lineman latches he lacks the punch and grip strength to disengage.
- 03
Over-pursuit
His speed occasionally carries him past the ball on cutback runs, and misdirection has pulled him out of the read.
- 04
Level of competition
The bulk of the production came against American Athletic offenses, leaving projection questions about processing NFL tempo.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.49sp50
- Vertical
- 33.5inp50
- Broad jump
- 120inp50
- Three-cone
- —s
- Shuttle
- —s
- Bench
- —rep
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | Tulane | 4 | 9 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 2020 | Tulane | 12 | 98 | 4.5 | 0 | 3 | 0 |
| 2021 | Tulane | 12 | 73 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 0 |
| 2022 | Tulane | 14 | 131 | 5 | 2 | 7 | 2 |
| Career | — | 42 | 311 | 10.5 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Seasons 2020-2022 verified against cfbstats.com (bowl games included; the 2022 line covers the Cotton Bowl). cfbstats has no 2019 page for Williams, so the freshman line comes from FBS game logs (4 games, 9 tackles) and its pass-breakup, forced-fumble and fumble-recovery splits are left unverified. Career totals are the sum of the four verified season lines (311 tackles, 28.0 TFL, 10.5 sacks); Wikipedia's 316-tackle and 9.5-sack career figures reflect a different 2019 sample and exclude bowl sacks.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Roster-secure speed linebacker whose defensive snaps come and go while the kicking-game value never does.
Undersized run-and-chase linebacker who turned coverage snaps and special-teams equity into a long-term starting job.
Athletic Day 2 linebacker who could not hold a starting role and settled into a rotational teams profile.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Dorian Williams has spent three seasons with Buffalo, starting 22 of 50 games and posting 220 combined tackles, including a 117-tackle 2024 while filling in for an injured Matt Milano.
Buffalo used him exactly how the profile suggested. As a rookie in 2023 he played all 17 games with two starts, logged 40 combined tackles and lived on special teams behind Terrel Bernard and Matt Milano. The 2024 season was the opening: with Milano sidelined for long stretches, Williams started 11 games and posted 117 combined tackles, one forced fumble and three fumble recoveries, functioning as a full-time weakside starter in a defense that asks its linebackers to run. In 2025 the room got healthy and the snaps split back — 16 games, nine starts, 63 combined tackles and a pair of pass breakups, with Williams rotating between starter and heavy sub-package work.
In hindsight this is close to the median outcome for a third-round linebacker, and Buffalo should be fine with it. He is 220 career tackles into a rookie contract, has proven he can start when asked, and has never come off the coverage units. What has not shown up is a takeover trait: no career sacks in three NFL seasons and only three pass deflections, which means the blitz timing that padded his college résumé has not translated. He is a real NFL starter-caliber body in the right scheme and a very good special-teams player in any of them — useful, replaceable, and drafted about where that value belonged.
Data note: Imported from Wikipedia 2023 NFL draft player selections table.