The Cleveland Browns officially signed former San Francisco 49ers DT Kalia Davis to a 1-year, $3M deal yesterday in an effort to effectively replace Shelby Harris on the interior of new DC Mike Rutenberg’s defense in 2026.
Davis, a 6th-round draft pick in 2022, has been an important piece to the 49ers’ run defense over the past two seasons. His ability to be a brick wall at the point of contact, while at the same time using excellent pad level and core strength to throw blockers off of him, has been his most attractive trait as of late.
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Very few interior offensive linemen in the league have the athleticism and upper-body strength to successfully negate the things that Davis is trying to do against the run. He has a top-notch motor, and his incredibly active hands make it hard for blockers to get their hands on him in an effective manner as well.
At 6’2”, 310 lbs., he’s “small” enough to maintain a consistent wiggle and block-shedding ability at the point of attack. On the other hand, he appears to play much bigger than that, as he’s consistently able to stack offensive linemen and effectively take on double teams inside the “A” gaps.
He should be able to effectively replace Shelby Harris in 2026, and he could end up seeing the field quite a bit on early downs depending on the offensive tendencies of Cleveland’s opponents each week.
He’s not going to provide as many splash plays when rushing the passer, but he’s more than capable of being an effective rotational piece alongside Mason Graham, Maliek Collins, Mike Hall Jr., and Adin Huntington in 2026.
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One of the biggest topics on social media yesterday, following his signing with Cleveland, was how his performance grades are so vastly different on various evaluation platforms such as TruMedia and PFF. Some sites have him as a bad run defender, and some places have him as a top 20 run defender in the league amongst all defensive linemen.
One thing’s for sure: the tape will give you the correct answer, and he looks pretty darn good there.
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