The Bengals knew exactly what they were buying when they sent the No. 10 overall pick in the 2026 NFL Draft to the Giants for Dexter Lawrence. It was a bold price, and it sparked plenty of debate right away.
Some saw the move as too rich for a veteran who is nearing 30. Others saw Cincinnati finally acting like a team determined to fix a defense that had fallen short for two straight seasons.
ESPN’s newest positional survey only sharpens that picture. Lawrence may have slipped from the top spot he held entering the 2025 season, but he still landed squarely in the league’s elite tier, checking in at No. 7 among defensive tackles. The highest vote he received was No. 3 overall.
That’s the kind of respect that doesn’t come from the stat sheet alone. ESPN’s rankings are built from the views of executives, coaches, and scouts - the people who spend their weeks trying to deal with these players.
They’re not just chasing sack totals. They’re weighing disruption, double teams, run defense, and the kind of pocket collapse that changes how an offense operates.
That’s why Lawrence still carries so much weight around the league even after what looked like a down year on paper. His 2025 sack total dropped to 0.5, a career low, and he missed the Pro Bowl for the first time since 2021.
But the attention he draws never really went away. Fowler wrote:
“Lawrence fell six spots, but the drop in his play isn’t that steep. The voting between the third and seventh spots was close. That said, Lawrence’s 0.5 sacks in 2025 were a career low, and he failed to make the Pro Bowl for the first time since 2021,” Fowler writes.
“But no defensive tackle gets more attention from offensive lines. Lawrence faced a double-team 71.3% of the time in 2025, a league high for players with at least 300 pass-rush opportunities.”
That last number tells the real story. Even in a season where the box score didn’t pop, offenses still treated Lawrence like a problem they had to solve every snap.
For Cincinnati, that matters. The Bengals spent too much of 2025 getting pushed around at the line of scrimmage, and that weakness showed up over and over again.
Lawrence gives them a different kind of presence immediately. He’s the sort of interior force who can force protection changes before the ball is even snapped, which opens things up for everyone else around him.
That’s part of why the Bengals also brought in Jonathan Allen and T.J. Slaton while continuing to develop Kris Jenkins Jr. and McKinnley Jackson. The front looks a lot different now than it did a year ago, and that was the point.
Rankings won’t decide anything once the games start, but they do reveal how the league sees a player. And in Lawrence’s case, the message is clear: Cincinnati didn’t just trade for a starter. It traded for one of the most feared interior defenders in football.
As one scout told Fowler: “I think he’ll be rejuvenated there,” a scout told Fowler. “He wasn’t happy in New York. He’s got to keep his conditioning in check, but when he’s at his best, he’s next to impossible to block.”
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For a team always searching for reliable depth behind its top targets, Meyers is the kind of name worth watching once camp opens. His background suggests resilience and a willingness to keep pushing through setbacks, and that can matter as much as raw talent when a roster spot and a role are on the line. The question now is how quickly he can turn that kind of resume into something real in a crowded Bengals receiver room. [Read more 🡒]
National Analyst Just Put Bengals New Safety Duo In Elite Company
The Bengals spent part of the offseason trying to stabilize a defense that has too often carried too much of the load, and the addition of Bryan Cook was one of the more direct moves in that effort. Cook arrived from Kansas City on a three-year deal after finishing his rookie contract, giving Cincinnati a proven veteran to pair with Jordan Battle as the secondary tries to take a real step forward in 2026.
Sports Illustrateds Matt Verderame took notice, slotting Cook and Battle among the leagues best safety tandems and putting Cincinnati in the same conversation as some of the NFLs most established back-end groups. Battles heavy workload and production last season already gave the Bengals a foundation, and Cooks championship background adds another layer of credibility, but the bigger question is whether the pairing can turn that recognition into the kind of defensive consistency that helps push Cincinnati back into the playoffs. [Read more 🡒]