You won’t find many 2023 NFL draft prospects with more New Orleans Saints fans chanting his name than Pitt Panthers defensive tackle Calijah Kancey. The playmaking lineman drew a lot of attention last season with his high level of play, and the mind-boggling numbers he put up in athletic testing at the NFL scouting combine and Pitt’s pro day have only rallied his supporters further.
He would make a lot of sense for New Orleans, which has moved on from four of their top five defensive linemen this offseason. Despite signing Nathan Shepherd and Khalen Saunders while bringing back Malcolm Roach, they could use Kancey in the interior rotation as a pass-rushing defensive tackle. Pro Football Focus charting credited him with 47 pressures last season, more than anyone in New Orleans.
But he’s going to test the Saints’ commitment to their athletic prototypes. The Saints are notoriously strict in their standards — they’ve fielded, drafted, or signed 20 defensive tackles since 2018 at an average height-weight combo of 6-foot-2 and 301 pounds, arms measuring at 32.9 inches. And Kancey doesn’t just fall beneath that average. In many cases he doesn’t meet the minimum.
Kancey has weighed in at 6-foot-1, 281 pounds with arms measuring 30.6 inches. Just three of their defensive tackles have measured shorter than that (Khalen Saunders, Prince Emili, and Christian Ringo), all 6-flat. None of them weighed lighter than that (Margus Hunt and Kentavius Street both weighed under 290 coming out of college but played at or near that weight by the time they came to New Orleans). And only two of them had arms measuring under 32 inches, both undrafted free agents, not first-round picks (Josiah Bronson at 31.5 and Malcolm Roach at 31.8).
Sure, we’ve seen the Saints buck their trends before. But it doesn’t happen often, and never to this degree on draft day. Kancey has drawn comparisons to another undersized former Panther, Aaron Donald, but Donald was a consistently dominant player in college and he was closer to the prototype than Kancey at 5 pounds heavier with arms 2 inches longer coming out of Pitt. He had a stronger case and it isn’t as strong a comparison as it appears at first glance.
And Saints head coach Dennis Allen has continued to hammer home his philosophy on emphasizing size in the trenches. NewOrleans.Football’s Nick Underhill asked him about the preference for oversized players at defensive end at NFL owners meetings this week, to which Allen responded: “I think it’s a big man’s game. And so, we like size and we like length, and it’s been successful for us. Really, honestly, both in the run game and in the pass game. I think since 2017 we’re top-five in run defense and top-five in sacking the quarterback. And top-five is a little generous, we’re closer to two or three in there.”
What the Saints have shown us in acquiring talent along the defensive line suggests that preference for bigger players extends to the tackles, not just the ends, as Allen laid it out. Still, New Orleans should give serious consideration to Kancey despite his shortcomings. But their strict standards and athletic prototypes might hurt his draft grade in-house, and there’s a real possibility they pass on him for someone who better fits what they’re looking for. It’s also possible Kancey doesn’t make it to them at No. 29 anyway. We’ll just have to wait and see.
