Kevin Dotson keeps doing the kind of work that usually gets noticed, and still somehow keeps getting treated like a footnote.
That’s the strange part of ESPN’s interior linemen rankings, which were shaped by input from coaches and front-office people around the league. Dotson, the Rams’ right guard, landed only in the “also receiving votes” bucket - not in the Top 10, not among the four honorable mentions, just hanging off the edge of the list.
For a player who has been one of the NFL’s most reliable interior blockers since arriving from the Pittsburgh Steelers in 2023, that feels off.
The interior-linemen group is a crowded one, with guards and centers all thrown together, so the pool is bigger than a normal position ranking. Even so, Dotson’s omission stands out because his production has been impossible to ignore. Pro Football Focus has him as the third-ranked guard, and his 2025 season was his best yet by Approximate Value, the Pro Football Reference metric.
The grades back that up. Dotson posted an 89.3 run-blocking grade from PFF, and while he wasn’t quite as dominant in pass protection, he still landed in the top 30 percent among guards there. Put the two together, and he checked in third overall in PFF’s positional rankings.
That’s why the ESPN result feels so jarring. Dotson wasn’t the only Rams lineman left on the outside looking in, either. Left guard Steve Avila also showed up in the “also receiving votes” group despite a PFF grade of 76.8, which placed him ninth.
Dotson’s case gets stronger when you look at the reliability he’s brought to Los Angeles. Even with an injury late last season, he has started 45 games in three Rams seasons and 62 games since 2022.
And then there’s the part that makes the rankings even harder to square: players who got the nod over him. New Browns center Elgton Jenkins earned an honorable mention despite what the source calls an objectively mediocre season after shifting over from guard. He’s four seasons removed from his last Pro Bowl in 2022 and was limited to nine games by a season-ending leg injury, leaving real questions about how he’ll look in his age-30 season.
Packers fans, who watched Jenkins for his first seven seasons, already know how rough last year was.
Panthers guard Robert Hunt also landed ahead of Dotson as an honorable mention. An NFC scout said of Hunt, “He's not in the elite group, but as a run-game mauler, there aren't many better. He just wasn't healthy last year,”
Hunt made the Pro Bowl in 2024, but in six seasons he has never matched Dotson’s 9 AV in 2025. If strong run blocking is enough to get a player into the conversation, Dotson has a case that’s as strong as anyone’s.
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