UK's Top Players Ahead of the 2024 Season: No. 1 Deone Walker

If you guessed that Deone Walker would be No. 1 on my list of the top Kentucky football players in advance of the 2024 season, you were correct.

Walker is a projected first round pick in next year's draft and he could go as high as the top five. He's one of the top "freaks" in college football based on size, athleticism, and traits, and he's a matchup nightmare for opposing offensive lines even in the SEC.

Walker would start for any team in college football and Kentucky's ability to keep him in Lexington in the NIL era is a testament to his loyalty to the program and the program's to him.

The 6'6, 345-pound defensive lineman was a first team All-SEC player according to the Associated Press last season and he's one of the players who could push to win national defensive awards in 2024.

Walker had 7.5 sacks, eight quarterback hurries, and 12.5 tackles for loss as a defensive tackle in Kentucky's 3-4 scheme. Players up front in Lexington typically haven't amassed a lot of stats like that so it's a testament to Walker that the numbers have followed him.

PFF gave Walker an overall defensive grade of 80.6, which resulted from 81.7 against the run, 65.2 tackling, and 80.5 pass rush marks. PFF actually credited Walker with a whopping 39 hurries last season. And, of course, we've seen Walker drop back into coverage.

It will be interesting to see if Kentucky gives Walker a chance at an iconic moment on offense, and he revealed that last season they did have a play drawn up for him, though it didn't come to fruition.

Walker is Kentucky's most high profile defensive player of the Mark Stoops era already, other than Josh Allen, and he's got one more year in Lexington before representing the program in the NFL.