When undrafted free company opened after the 2026 draft, the Bucs attracted LSU edge rusher Jack Pyburn with a $15,000 signing bonus and $100,000 in assured wage. That $115,000 is a good chunk of change, however not the max they will supply. They went greater on offensive lineman Ben Scott final spring at $265,000 in ensures.
But it surely’s additionally not throw-a-dart cash. Tampa Bay particularly wished Pyburn over a large discipline of obtainable undrafted edge rusher choices, paid as much as get him, and added him to a room with a half-dozen names already competing for what’s probably 5 – 6 spots.
What did the Bucs see that the league missed for seven rounds? I took a take a look at the tape and the manufacturing profile to see what strains up, what doesn’t and why the Bucs made Pyburn a precedence.
Jack Pyburn’s Construct
Jack Pyburn involves Tampa Bay as a 6-foot-4, 258-pound stand-up edge rusher with one senior season at LSU and three years at Florida earlier than that. He’s a former heavyweight highschool wrestler who moved from inside linebacker to defensive finish in faculty. Pyburn weighed 262 at his LSU professional day on March 23 and declined to run the 40, do the bench press, and the vertical. However he did take a look at on the broad leap, 3-cone and quick shuttle. This was after he declined to check on the NFL Scouting Mix leading to a slender Mockdraftable profile.
Pyburn has 1st-percentile arm size that evokes conversations round Rueben Bain Jr. Possibly the Bucs are accumulating quick arm kings as the brand new aggressive benefit.
Historically, edge rusher is a size place. Lengthy arms maintain an offensive sort out off your chest, allow you to management the rep, permit you to disengage to the ball while you’ve received leverage. Pyburn’s 30 7/8-inch arms put him on the very backside of the trendy NFL edge rusher distribution.
And whereas the Bucs have stated they don’t see it as an issue for Bain, frequently citing Mike Tyson as if it was a speaking level circulated all through the constructing, they do present up as a difficulty for Pyburn on tape – however extra on that later. The 14th-percentile broad leap is an actual lower-body explosion concern. The Thirty first-percentile three-cone confirms that lateral redirect isn’t a power. The portrait is of a built-up, well-conditioned, average-or-below-average mover who has to win with arms, leverage, and processing.
The Manufacturing
In 4 years and 41 video games throughout Florida and LSU, Pyburn gathered 132 tackles, 10.5 TFLs, and three sacks. His senior season at LSU produced 52 tackles, 5.5 TFLs, and two sacks. What jumps off the web page on the defensive aspect is his profession sort out price: a ten.4 % determine that ranks second amongst 280 qualifying FBS edge defenders. The ball finds him.
The pass-rush manufacturing appears to be like extra revealing while you reduce it right down to true go units, stripping out screens, RPOs, and quick-game reps. Throughout two seasons on respectable pass-rush alternatives, Pyburn wins his repetitions at a 59th-percentile price, a hair above the median for an FBS edge rusher. However while you measure how typically these wins translate to precise stress on the quarterback, the quantity drops to the thirty seventh percentile.
He will get there. He typically doesn’t end. That rep-to-finish hole is why a participant with 33 pressures in his senior season ended his faculty profession with three sacks complete.
What The Bucs See On Tape
To get a great really feel of what Jack Pyburn has to supply, and the place he struggles, I watched three video games from his 2025 season. I take advantage of Professional Soccer Focus recreation grades to assist me discover a high-end, medium-tier, and low-end recreation in an effort to attempt to forestall a small pattern measurement bias. The video games chosen for Pyburn had been Week 7 – South Carolina (56.1 go rush grade), Week 11 Alabama (46.2 go rush grade), and Week 12 Arkansas (70.5 go rush grade).
Towards South Carolina, Pyburn produced his season’s largest stress quantity, eight on 35 pass-rush snaps. The movie broke that down into three clear particular person wins, 4 pocket-condense pressures that didn’t translate, and 6 pure one-on-one losses. Probably the most constant constructive was his scheme execution.
LSU used him as a wrecking ball, clearing rush lanes for stunting teammates seven distinct occasions, producing a pressured discipline purpose, an interception, and two teammate sacks. Pyburn was such a nuisance general that South Carolina began to double-chip him late within the recreation.
Bucs EDGE Jack Pyburn – Photograph by: IMAGN Photos – Scott Clause
Towards Alabama, the image darkens. Alabama recognized him early and ran their offense at his aspect of the sector. Pyburn produced one game-changing sort out for loss on a delayed display screen and one clear interior-burst win from a 3-tech alignment. Outdoors these moments, the structural considerations confirmed up persistently. Pyburn’s lengthy arm transfer misplaced three head-to-head leverage battles throughout the three video games. His common effectiveness fell off a cliff when the extent of competitors improved – Alabama’s tackles are miles higher than what South Carolina was trotting out final 12 months.
Towards Arkansas, with the competitors tier dropped, the trait stack he depends on confirmed up cleanly. Pyburn stepped down on a good finish to disrupt the offensive line’s run circulation, threw the tight finish apart, and completed a sort out for loss. He produced one other clear bend rep the place he attacked the excessive aspect with a double swipe, received the nook with a rip transfer, and didn’t end solely as a result of the quarterback stepped up within the pocket.
Bucs OLB Jack Pyburn – Photograph by: IMAGN Photos – Stephen Lew
Pyburn dropped into protection and matched cleanly to a boundary receiver, getting a hand on the route and staying connected. He confirmed lively zone eyes, trying to bracket a route somewhat than sitting in his landmark. The Arkansas tape’s contribution was affirmation that the trait stack is sturdy, the bend trait is healthier than I initially thought-about, and the popularity items maintain up at each comp tier.
The composite is constant. Three of the 4 pass-rush pillars Jon Ledyard taught me once I bought into this discipline: get-off, acceleration up the arc, and alter of route all grade out as beneath common. The fourth, bend, is common and improved on the third look. His base anchor is nice, his energy is inconsistent, and his chip-protection vulnerability ranges from neutralized to stoned. These are actual causes he went undrafted.
The Causes The Bucs Guess On Pyburn
The traits that make Jack Pyburn value a $115,000 UDFA guess cluster round 4 items, and so they present up simply as clearly on tape as the constraints do.
Recognition is a high-end NFL trait, with documented wins on performs designed particularly to govern him. Pyburn persistently processed nicely in opposition to misdirection. A number of reps together with play-action in opposition to South Carolina, the Alabama delayed-screen TFL identified mid-loop on a stunt, and the Arkansas step-down learn all present as proof.
Bucs OLB Jack Pyburn – Photograph by: IMAGN Photos – Stephen Lew
Motor is the second-most sturdy trait, exhibiting up into the fourth quarter of each tape together with his bodily traits failing; it’s the trait the sort out price cited above is basically measuring. Scheme execution is the third. LSU wasn’t afraid to make use of him as a 4i, 5-technique, 7-technique, wide-9, as a standup 3-technique or mugged over the A and B gaps.
Protection usability is the trait the Arkansas tape upgraded most instantly, with him exhibiting lively zone eyes. Todd Bowles ought to love that.
That mixture of traits, plus a stand-and-strike run protection flooring that produced greater than a dozen clear wins throughout three tapes, profiles as a high-floor contributor. It’s not a starter’s trait stock given the structural pass-rush limitations. It’s, nonetheless, precisely what a training workers desires in a UDFA.
The Roster Math
The Bucs’ edge rusher room is ready on the prime with Yaya Diaby, first-round rookie Rueben Bain Jr., free-agent addition Al-Quadin Muhammad, 2025 fourth-round choose David Walker the probably two-deep, and Anthony Nelson and Chris Braswell combating beneath them for ultimate roster spots. Mohamed Kamara, retained on the observe squad, is a seventh. Pyburn enters because the eighth identify.
The combat he’s really in is with Kamara and fellow rookie Yasir Holmes, who impressed as a tryout participant, for a observe squad position. Produce sufficient in camp and preseason to earn and the job is his. And if accidents open a window, climb onto the again finish of the lively roster.
Bucs OLB Yasir Holmes – Photograph by: Cliff Welch/PR
Todd Bowles’ protection rewards an edge rusher who can execute a number of assignments cleanly, performs nicely on early downs to earn third down reps, can arrange teammates by promoting out in stress packages as a stunter, and runs with a sizzling motor. Pyburn checks all of these bins, even when his athleticism is a limiting cap on his ceiling.
It’s sufficient for the Bucs to make a guess on Pyburn. It’s a small one in {dollars} and a wise one in scheme match. The observe squad is the lifelike end result. If the structural limitations grow to be coachable somewhat than mounted, Pyburn has a path to a roster position in 12 months two. Both means, the Bucs paid greater than dart-throw cash. There’s a cause for that.
