As a New Orleans Saints fan, it takes a lot for me to admit this, but Luke Kuechly is one of my favorite football players of all time. Inside linebacker is one of the most underrated positions in the league. Outside of special teams, running backs are the only position that makes less money than off-ball linebackers, but if you have a great one, he can be a complete game wrecker.

Kuechly was exactly that. Was he the biggest or fastest guy on the field? No (though I still don’t want a 6-foot-3, 238 pound man running full speed at me), but he is arguably the smartest defensive player the NFL has ever seen. That’s why he’s going to be inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in less than two months.

Over the next few weeks, we at EssentiallySports will be honoring the five newest additions to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Last week, we paid homage to one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time, Drew Brees, so now it’s time to give Luke Kuechly his flowers.

How Great Was Luke Kuechly?

I probably made it sound like Luke Kuechly wasn’t a great athlete, which would be false. He ran a 4.58-second 40-yard dash with a 38-inch vertical at the combine. He was a better athlete than most of the linebackers in the league, but he was no Sonny Styles or Patrick Willis. What really set him apart was his understanding of the game.

Kuechly is commonly referred to as one of the smartest defensive players of all time. He was the quarterback of Carolina’s defense for eight years, totaling 100+ tackles and at least one interception in every single season. But what was more impressive than his consistency was the fear he struck into his opponents.

“Luke Kuechly was the best defensive player I’ve ever played against,” legendary NFL quarterback Drew Brees said on the New Heights Podcast. “When I say iron sharpens iron, guys that just make you better, because you have to be. I knew going into that game that I had to be my absolute best against this dude.”

Drew Brees played 20 years in the NFL from 2001 to 2020. He faced off against some of the greatest defensive players the league has ever seen, but he singled out Luke Kuechly as the best one he ever played against. And Brees would know better than anyone, because he had to face Kuechly twice a year for eight years.

The most disappointing thing about Kuechly’s career is that he didn’t play longer. Kuechly played just eight seasons in the NFL from 2012 to 2019 before hanging up his cleats due to a long history of concussions. Kuechly suffered at least three concussions in his career in 2016, 2017 and 2018, so after the 2019 season, he made the difficult decision to hang it up.

Had Kuechly played another eight seasons, which would’ve put him at 16, which is the same amount or less than guys like Ray Lewis, London Fletcher, Bobby Wagner and other elite linebackers, he was on pace to finish his career with 2,200 total tackles and 1,400 solo tackles, which would’ve put him first and second all time, respectively.

Hardly anybody has been able to match Kuechly’s production through the first eight years their career. It’s just a shame we didn’t get to see him play for longer.

So, with all that said, where does Kuechly rank among linebackers since 2000? You’re about to find out.

1. Ray Lewis

I mean, was there even a conversation for this spot? Ray Lewis is the most dominant linebacker we’ve ever seen, so of course he’s the best linebacker since 2000.

Lewis came into the league and dominated immediately, racking up 110 tackles as a rookie before setting an NFL record with 156 solo tackles the following season, which is 20 more than any other player has ever recorded in a single year (Patrick Willis with 136). Lewis has three of the 17 seasons in NFL history with 120+ solo tackles (and two of the top three). Derrick Brooks is the only other player to accomplish that feat more than once. He was an absolute killer on the field (and off?).

In 2012, Lewis retired with 2,059 combined tackles and 1,568 solo tackles, both of which rank first all time. London Fletcher got close with 2,039 combined tackles, but no one is within 180 solo tackles of Lewis’s record. It does seem like Bobby Wagner will surpass Lewis’s combine tackle record this year, though. He currently trails Lewis by 59 tackles.

Even if Lewis’s records get broken, it’s hard to argue that there has ever been a more dominant linebacker in NFL history.

2. Luke Kuechly

Look, maybe I’m a bit biased because I was born in 2002 and I’m a Saints fan, so I got to see more of Luke Kuechly than most of the other players on this list, but when you really dive into it, I don’t think it’s crazy to say Kuechly was the second-best linebacker this century.

We already broke down the stats and figured out he’d be first or second all time in both combined and solo tackles if he played 16 years in the league like the other guys at the top of those lists, but I can’t overstate just how impactful he was as the quarterback of Carolina’s defense. He was in charge of making sure everyone knew the play and were lined up where they were supposed to. And when I say knew the play, I mean knew the opponent’s play, because it felt like he always knew exactly what was going to happen before the other team even snapped the ball.

I don’t know if we’ll ever seen another linebacker like Kuechly. He had an uncanny ability to know what was going to happen and make sure he was there to make the play.

3. Brian Urlacher

Brian Urlacher was the perfect mix of size, athleticism and instincts. At 6-foot-4, 260 pounds, Urlacher ran a 4.59-second 40-yard dash with a 34-inch vertical and 27 reps on the bench press at the combine, which helped him go ninth overall to the Chicago Bears in 2000.

Anytime an off-ball linebacker goes in the top-1o, they have high expectations right away, and Urlacher met them and then some, logging 123 tackles, eight sacks and two interceptions as a rookie.

Urlacher played 10 fully healthy seasons, and he managed to hit the 100-tackle mark in every single one of them. But racking up tackles wasn’t the only thing Urlacher was good at. He’s one of the greatest coverage backers we’ve ever seen.

PFF only has seven years worth of grades for Urlacher, but in those seven years from 2006-2012, he earned a 80.9 or higher coverage grade in six of them. He incredibly allowed just seven touchdowns while picking off 15 passes and breaking up 29 more during that time, which is basically unheard of for a linebacker.

Urlacher is an all-time great linebacker, but I think Kuechly’s prime was just a little bit better.

4. Patrick Willis

Patrick Willis was one of my favorite players to watch growing up. Ray Lewis was always the best linebacker in the NFL during his time in the league, but Willis gave him a run for his money from 2007 up until Lewis retired in 2012.

Willis was a freak athlete at the linebacker position. Weighing in at 6-foot-1, 242 pounds, Willis ran a 4.38-second 40-yard dash with a 39-inch vertical and 9-foot, 11-inch broad jump at the 2007 NFL Combine. Those numbers helped him go 11th overall to the San Francisco 49ers, and just like Urlacher, he met the lofty expectations his team had for him right away.

As a rookie, Willis logged 174 total tackles, 136 solo tackles and four sacks. His 136 solo tackles as a rookie were the second-most of any player in a single season all time, only behind Ray Lewis’s historic season in 1997.  Willis kept a pretty steady pace for his entire career, logging 100+ tackles every season he played 14+ games, while being one of the best coverage backers in the sport.

Unfortunately, much like Kuechly, Willis’s career was cut short. After just eight seasons in the NFL, Willis called it a career in 2014, retiring from the NFL due to nagging foot injuries. Still, his prime was up there with the best of them.

5. Bobby Wagner

While Urlacher and Willis were considered some of the best coverage linebackers of the 2000s, Bobby Wagner is one of the best run defenders the league has seen in a long time.

Wagner has played 14 seasons in the NFL and has earned a 90+ run defense grade from PFF in nine of them. I know PFF isn’t the end-all be-all, but it does give you a good indication of how great he’s been against the run. And to further put it into perspective, Wagner has been credited with over 50 run stops per season, which included 71 in 2023, according to PFF.

Despite playing two less seasons than Lewis, Wagner is on pace to break Lewis’s all time record for combined tackles. He currently has 2,000 to Lewis’s 2,059, so unless he gets hurt this year (he doesn’t have a single season with fewer than 11 games played), he’s going to break that record. Wagner is still 418 solo tackles off Lewis’s record, so he probably won’t catch him there, but still, one of the two is good enough.

Wagner may not be this flashy athlete that some of the guys above him were, but the dude just knows how to play the game of football at an extremely high level.