Tennessee Vols defensive lineman goes viral at NFL combine thanks to tweet from 6 years ago
Tennessee Vols defensive lineman Elijah Simmons is in Indianapolis this week taking part in the 2025 NFL scouting combine. Simmons, who played at Tennessee from 2019 to 2024, is hoping to be selected in the 2025 NFL Draft later this spring. The Memphis native was on the field for workouts/testing on Thursday, running an unofficial […]
Tennessee Vols defensive lineman Elijah Simmons is in Indianapolis this week taking part in the 2025 NFL scouting combine.
Simmons, who played at Tennessee from 2019 to 2024, is hoping to be selected in the 2025 NFL Draft later this spring.
The Memphis native was on the field for workouts/testing on Thursday, running an unofficial 5.38 in the 40-yard dash.
Simmons weighed in at 334 lbs this week.
Six year old tweet from former NFL star JJ Watt about Elijah Simmons goes viral
Six years ago, Simmons was briefly in the NFL draft spotlight when he was on the stage when the Tennessee Titans made their first round selection.
After seeing Simmons and his imposing presence on stage, three-time NFL defensive player of the year JJ Watt, who was playing for the Houston Texans at the time, tweeted "Can we draft #72 from the Tennessee metro high school team? Kid looks like a beast."
The official NFL Twitter/X.com account highlighted Watt's tweet on Thursday with Simmons taking part in the combine.
Simmons, who was a key interior defensive lineman for the Vols during his time on Rocky Top, finished his Tennessee career with 59 tackles, eight tackles for loss, a half sack, and three passes defensed.
This isn't the first time that Simmons, by the way, has gone viral.
Simmons, who is 6-foot-1, went viral six years ago after posting a video of himself dunking.
Simmons tweeted that video in response to a challenge from Jeremy Pruitt, the head coach at Tennessee at the time.
“I asked him the other day, ‘how much do you weight?’ and he said 352,” said Pruitt after Simmons signed with the Vols in late 2018. “I told him, ‘when we offered you a scholarship, our agreement was that you had to be 325,’ and he said, ‘well coach, I can dunk a basketball right now,’ and I said, ‘well I want you to video and send it to me’.
"Well, he did dunk it, but it was an alley-oop, so I told him that he had to get to 325 so he could get off the ground with a ball in his hand to do it. So that tells you a little bit about how he can move.”
Six years later and that video of Simmons still shows up in Instagram feeds from time to time.
Vols edge rusher James Pearce says a huge ‘revenge game’ was his favorite moment during his time at Tennessee
That was definitely a fun one for Vols fans
