Jaquelin
Roy.
Jaquelin
Roy.
LSU· 6'3"· 305 lb
"A strength-first interior anchor whose value lives entirely on early downs — he keeps linebackers clean better than almost anyone in this class, and he rushes the passer worse than almost anyone."Pre-draft read
Roy is a two-gap-capable interior defender who spent most of his LSU snaps between the guards, alternating between nose and 3-technique depending on the front. His game is built on mass and grip: he plays with a wide base, gets his hands inside on the first punch, and holds ground against down blocks instead of getting displaced. When he wins, he squeezes the gap shut and lets the linebackers run free behind him.
As a rusher he pushes the pocket rather than finishing, working a bull rush and a late club with no real counter package. He is far more valuable on early downs than in obvious passing situations, and his ceiling is capped by average change of direction. The signature trait is the anchor — he does not get moved off the spot.
Even-front two-gap or hybrid run-first defense that asks the nose to hold ground and keep linebackers clean
Year 1: early-down rotational nose taking 20-25 snaps a game against the run. Ceiling: a low-end starting 1-technique on a defense that uses a dedicated sub-package pass rusher.
A one-gap penetrating front that asks interior linemen to win as vertical rushers on passing downs — his lack of a counter move makes him a liability once the offense goes pass-first.
Best paired with a rangy MIKE who can benefit from Roy eating blockers.
Jaquelin Roy | #99 | LSU Tigers Defensive Tackle
College reel showing the anchor at nose and hand usage against interior blocks.
Jaquelin Roy brings versatility
Draft-day breakdown of his alignment flexibility across even and odd fronts.
Watch out for Vikings rookie Jaquelin Roy this season
Rookie-year clip package from Minnesota's interior rotation.
Roy arrived in Baton Rouge as one of the top-rated recruits in Louisiana and left as a solid, unspectacular interior piece. He is a compact 6-3, 305-pound defensive tackle whose football identity is control rather than disruption: hold the point, stack the blocker, keep the second level clean. He played nose in even fronts and slid to a shade or 3-technique when LSU wanted more penetration.
Across three seasons and 35 games he produced 98 tackles, 13.5 tackles for loss and 4.0 sacks, with his best volume coming as a junior in 2022 (50 tackles). The trend was the concern: his sack and TFL production actually declined as his snap count rose, which suggested a run-defense specialist rather than a developing pass rusher. He also could not test at the Combine or his pro day because of a hamstring issue, leaving evaluators with a 30-rep bench, an 8.01 three-cone and a 5.00 shuttle as his only athletic markers.
Boards generally slotted him in the fourth-to-fifth-round range: a functional rotational run defender with starter-caliber strength and no obvious pass-rush upside. Minnesota moved up in the fifth to take him at 141, a defensible bet on strength and youth for a defense that needed bodies in the interior rotation.
- 01
Anchor
Sets a wide base and absorbs double teams without giving ground, allowing linebackers to scrape clean over the top on inside runs.
- 02
Hand placement
Consistently gets first contact inside the blocker's frame, which lets him control the rep and shed late instead of catching blocks.
- 03
Play strength
Thirty bench reps showed up on tape; he stacks and squeezes single blocks and can walk a guard backward on a straight bull rush.
- 04
Positional flexibility
Took snaps at nose and 3-technique across even and odd fronts, so he does not need a specific alignment to have a role.
- 05
Age and frame
Declared as a true junior with a thick, well-distributed 305-pound build that still had room for pro strength development.
- 01
Pass-rush plan
Relies almost entirely on the bull rush with no reliable counter; when the initial push stalls the rep is over.
- 02
Production curve
TFLs and sacks dropped in each of his final two seasons even as his role grew, which is the wrong direction for a projection.
- 03
Testing gap
A hamstring issue kept him from running or jumping at the Combine and pro day, leaving his explosiveness essentially unmeasured.
- 04
Change of direction
An 8.01 three-cone and 5.00 shuttle track with tape that shows limited redirect and trouble chasing plays outside his gap.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- —s
- Vertical
- —in
- Broad jump
- —in
- Three-cone
- 8.01sp50
- Shuttle
- 5.00sp50
- Bench
- 30repp50
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | LSU | 9 | 18 | 2 | — | 0 | 0 |
| 2021 | LSU | 13 | 30 | 1.5 | — | 0 | 1 |
| 2022 | LSU | 13 | 50 | 0.5 | — | 0 | 0 |
| Career | — | 35 | 98 | 4 | — | 0 | 1 |
Per-season figures verified against cfbstats.com; season sums match the career line exactly (9+13+13 = 35 G, 18+30+50 = 98 tackles, 13.5 TFL, 4.0 sacks). Interceptions and fumble recoveries are not published for him and are left null rather than zero. Career games started (reported as 13) could not be split by season, so 2022 starts are null.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
A rotational early-down interior run defender who bounces between rosters but keeps finding work.
The version where the anchor and hand strength are good enough to make him a multi-year starting nose despite no pass rush.
The outcome where the run-only profile plus injuries keeps him on practice squads and out of a stable role.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Roy made Minnesota's roster as a rookie in 2023 and worked as a depth interior body, playing behind the established rotation rather than carving out consistent snaps. His combined NFL production through 2024 sits at roughly 25 tackles and 2 sacks, which tells the story of a part-time role. The Vikings did not want him on the initial 53 in 2024 and gave him permission to seek a trade in late August; no deal came together, and New England signed him to its practice squad on September 10, 2024. He was elevated during that season before landing on injured reserve in December. He stayed in New England through 2025 while fighting a foot issue, was on and off the availability report and never logged meaningful regular-season snaps, and hit free agency in March 2026.
In hindsight this was the outcome the tape argued for. The strength and anchor were real and translated, but a Day 3 interior defender who cannot rush the passer needs to be an elite run stopper to hold a roster spot, and Roy was very good rather than elite in that phase. Health then took away his chance to prove otherwise. It was a reasonable pick at 141 with a narrow margin for error, and injuries consumed that margin.