Why Oklahoma DB Kendel Dolby is 'In a Better Place Now'

Sooners head coach Brent Venables said his senior defender was "one of those guys that drives you crazy" but has shown growth and maturity in his second season.

Oklahoma Sooners defensive back Kendel Dolby (15) / Kevin Jairaj-Imagn Images

NORMAN — He’s only 5-foot-11 and 190 pounds, but there’s apparently a lot to Oklahoma defensive back Kendel Dolby.

“He plays a lot bigger than his stature,” OU coach Brent Venables said.

Yes, but Dolby’s waters run even deeper than that. To the Sooners’ playmaking senior DB, he’s gotten serious about about football and serious about life.

“He cares about this opportunity,” Venables said. “Cares about his teammates. He’s put in a lot of work. He’s become a better student than what he was.” 

Dolby joined OU last year as a junior college transfer from Northeastern Oklahoma A&M. His projected position was cornerback, and he played there some early — five snaps against Arkansas State, 18 against Tulsa, 30 against Cincinnati, according to Pro Football Focus.

But injuries at the Sooners’ cheetah position — a combination linebacker/defensive back — necessitated a transition. With talent and experience already at the corner spot, OU coaches started giving Dolby more reps at cheetah in practice, and eventually he found a home.

“A year ago he got thrown into the proverbial fire from corner,” Venables said.

Now, with Dasan McCullough still on the mend from a preseason foot injury and Sammy Omosigho still early in his college football career, the work load, at least through one game, has fallen to Dolby, who played 32 snaps there last week in a 51-3 wipeout of Temple.

He said there are aspects of cheetah that are inherently more demanding than corner.

“Sometimes you might be in the box,” he said. “Sometimes you might be man on the slot (receiver) or sometimes you might be zoned. So, it's just knowing your responsibility every play.”

Against Temple, Dolby posted a PFF overall defensive grade of 80.7, including a grade of 70.4 on running plays, 78.8 in tackling, 75.7 as a pass rusher and 74.3 in coverage. Those are mostly up from last year, when he graded out at 65.1 overall, with a run defense grade of 64.7, a coverage grade of 63.7, a tackling grade of 69.5, and a pass rush grade of 77.4.

Maybe his pass rush grade has been so high because everyone probably expects a 5-11 corner to drop into coverage. But Dolby’s effort and intensity and eagerness to create collisions defies the science. He finished last year with 49 total tackles, five tackles for loss and two quarterback sacks to go with two interceptions and four passes defensed.

“He’s really physical,” said defensive coordinator Zac Alley. “He might not be the tallest, longest guy, but man, he’s small but mighty. He’s trying to come in and knock your head off. An elite coverage guy out there in the slot and can lock down anybody in the country. We get to face a lot of great competition every day in practice and you just watch him be consistent and he does it. I’m just proud of him and his development and his growth.”

“He plays big,” Venables said. “He’s really skilled, but he’s got great natural instincts for the game. Incredibly competitive, physically and mentally tough. He can cover man-to-man. He chews up a lot of grass quickly. Some guys are really fast maybe on a watch but get from A to B incrementally, slow. He knows most of the time what the right angle is. He’s a physical tackler. He gets guys down. He’s a real speed-to-contact player. And then he’s becoming more detailed.”

“There was definitely a point,” said Dolby, “where I'm like, ‘OK, I kind of grasp it.’ But it was also like, ‘I want to learn more,’ you know what I'm saying? Like, last year … I really didn't have an offseason at cheetah. So, this year it's like, ‘OK, I got a spring. I had summer. I had fall camp. So now, like, I actually grasp it. I'm ready to grow on it.”

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Venables explained that Dolby’s growth at the cheetah spot has been mainly on the academic side. That’s naturally going to happen with repetition and recognition. But Venables has seen something else in Dolby — that seriousness about learning the finer points of a complex position.

“That was a challenge that we identified a year ago,” Venables said. “ ‘Hey man, you need to show up. Everything that comes out of our mouth, you need to write it down. Let me see your (note)book.’ I’ll read the stuff through his book. Sometimes it might embarrass him. But, ‘Hey man, look at yours and look at ‘Johnny’ sitting next to you. Who’s serious about their opportunity?

“I also told you what you should do. I’ve lived a little life, had success. Sat in here with whatever player and there was somebody before him and somebody before him and someone before him. You can name countless players that have had an elite level of success and what their habits look like. And so getting people to buy into that is not always — I do think it’s an art. You can make them do it, write it down. But you really want their motives to be aligned with your motives.

“ ... So you can make the game be slow. So you can play this game a long time. And so I know he's a guy that wants to play, he loves to play the game, he wants to play it a long time. And so I think that you've seen this growth from the moment he got here, to where he is today in this maturation. He would tell you he's a more mature young man than when he got here a year ago. And his level of details is in a different place with still all this growth in front of him.”

If there’s one thing Oklahoma’s head coach has a passion for, it’s players who take to the academic side of the game like a sponge takes to water. Dolby soaks it up now, and Venables loves it.

“He’s one of those guys that just drives you crazy a year ago, because of his lack of details, lack of precision on doing the little things right over and over and over and over, habitually,” Venables said. “And he's in a better place now, with still room to grow.”

That accounts for Dolby’s contribution to cornerback Kani Walker’s first-quarter interception against Temple. Owls quarterback Forrest Brock tried to fit the ball in a tight horizontal window on an underneath crossing route, but Dolby was glued to his receiver. He reached across and deflected the pass, then when he saw the ball bounce into the air, he swatted it again — right into Walker’s hands.

Dolby’s first reaction was disappointment that he hadn’t caught the football. But that quickly turned to jubilation.

“On the pick … I got mad at first because I wanted to make the play. I wanted to make the pick,” Dolby said. “And I didn't even know it was an interception at first. But then I heard the crowd yelling and I seen Kani with the ball in his hands. So it felt really good.”

It was the second time those two teamed up for an interception in the Sooners’ last two games. 

“Me and Kani actually had (one) in the Arizona game,” Dolby said. “I had tipped the ball and he ended up getting his first pick. So it felt good. So we celebrated on the sideline and I told him I'm happy for him and proud of him and it was a good feeling.” 

“Oh, my God,” Walker said. “I think I replayed that probably like 3-4 times after the game. I was laughing hard because he was telling me on the sideline that he didn’t even know I picked the ball. So I was like, ‘Oh yeah, like, I was right behind you, dude.’ He didn’t even know it until he heard everybody screaming.

“That’s why you see on film, he’s pointing, he’s like, ‘Oh!’ So that was a fun moment for me and Dolby, especially since we had one (against) Arizona, too. He tipped the ball and I picked the ball. So we kind of feel like our aura is like, plus like, 20,000 right now. I don’t know.”

Dolby has apparently forged a similar aura with just about everyone on the team. 

“I love Kendel Dolby,” Venables said. “Just, everybody likes him, because he’s super competitive. He’s just always got a positive attitude. Nobody in the building doesn’t like Kendel Dolby. Even offensive guys who he’s over there jaw-jacking with and competing with, I mean, he's competing to win every single rep, and I love that.

“He’s one of those guys that’s like, ‘Squirrel over here. Squirrel over there.’ It’s like, ‘Yo, over here.’ And he's better than what he was. And I think that’s why you've seen him improve and get better, too.”