CFB Zeitgeist Score
34
Below cohort in the position cohort. Carried by tackles for loss at the 39th percentile.
Rex Van Wyhe
Below the discourse floor — the honest stats-only state.
29 TACKLES · 0 SACKS
2026 Outlook
Returning to Kansas State for 2026
2026 Depth chart
Projected starter
Linebacker · Kansas State
Returning around him
2026 Award watch
No preseason watch lists yet (most drop June 15 – July 15)
Kansas State · Last season: 6-6 (AP #17) · Talent rank #47 · 2026 recruiting class #35
LB · KANSAS STATE · BIG 12
CFB Zeitgeist Score
34
Below cohort in the position cohort. Carried by tackles for loss at the 39th percentile.
Heisman Heat
#9859
<1% win probability
Fan Belief
Awaiting
Player-specific FI not yet ingested. Falls back to team mood below.
Respect Gap
Awaiting
Coming online with player-level FI.
Reality Gap
Awaiting
Coming online with player-level FI.
ACCOLADE PROBABILITY
Heisman
<1%
TOP LB AWARD
Butkus
—
CONSENSUS
All-American
—
Player Standing · 17 rungs
Tier 2 · StarterImpact starter. Producing measurable value above replacement.
Career Arc
The durable bio layer: position, size, hometown, and roster role.
How big the prospect was before college, and whether the later career arc beat that expectation.
| Class | Profile | Context |
|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 3-star | 0.8694 | No. 36 recruit | JUCO | Kansas State |
Portal movement changes role, context, and perception. This keeps that path in one place.
| Season | Move | Context |
|---|---|---|
| No transfer portal moves on file for this player. | ||
Where the player landed at the end of the listed season — final nowcast rank, win/finalist/ballot probabilities, and the cleanest official Heisman placement on file.
HIGH CONFIDENCE· through week 16Heisman Futures
Not yet listed on major futures markets.
Selector Grid · 2025
Selector recognition fills in once the major honors lists (AP, FWAA, AFCA, Walter Camp, Sporting News, SI) are scraped and ingested.
NIL · Recruiting · NFL Draft
Market value, pedigree & pro outcome
Recruit stars
★★★☆☆
to Kansas State
Composite
0.8694
#36 national
Today’s Hot-Take
The Hot-Take engine fires when this player’s percentile profile crosses a defensible threshold (top 10% in a cohort, 100+ snap sample). When it’s quiet, the model is honoring its “must be defensible” rule.
Anti-Take
PENDINGThe contrarian read fires when the rules-engine detects a stat that complicates the Hot-Take. Quiet here means the model hasn’t found a defensible counter yet — not that one doesn’t exist.
Fan sentiment · Awaiting signal
The Room reads fan conversation around a player — who’s talking, what they believe, and how that shifts. It publishes once weekly volume rebuilds; for most players that’s in-season, when game-week chatter spikes.
Cohort divergence reads how different fanbases talk about this player. Returns once weekly mentions clear the publish floor.
Rival Radar
No rival-bucket mentions in the current season.
Signature Story
He hasn't written his page yet — we'll start filling it in when there are enough snaps to rank against his peers.
Signature Moment
No signature moment on the ledger yet.
Returns once this player puts together a multi-game body of work — single-game flashes alone don't clear the bar.
Season Pace · Projection
Where the defensive totals stand
To hit 80-tackle season (currently 29): needs 25.5/game over remaining 2.
To hit 100-tackle season (currently 29): needs 35.5/game over remaining 2.
To hit 6-sack season (currently 0): needs 3/game over remaining 2.
To hit 10-sack season (currently 0): needs 5/game over remaining 2.
The fast read on the thing that makes this player more than a generic stat line.
Rex Van Wyhe is trying to climb the steepest award hill in college football: a defensive candidacy. The hook is the disruption profile on Kansas State's defense, with 0.0 sacks, 1.5 tackles for loss, and -- interceptions through the current loaded season. For a defender, the question is never just production; it is whether elite disruption and team context can become nationally undeniable.
Traditional stats first. Advanced context underneath.
Last season
2025 season snapshot | final
30-second read
Defensive contributor against FBS defenders.
2025 season snapshot | final
Tackling & Disruption
Game Log · Week-by-week
2025 season · 11 games
| Wk | Opp | TKL | SOLO | TFL | SACK | INT | PD | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wk 1 | L 21-24vs Iowa State | 2 | 2 | 0.0 | 0.0 | — | 0 | |
| Wk 1 | W 38-35vs North Dakota | 2 | 1 | 0.0 | 0.0 | — | 0 | |
| Wk 2 | L 21-24vs Army | 2 | 1 | 0.0 | 0.0 | — | 0 | |
| Wk 3 | L 17-23@ Arizona | 4 | 1 | 0.0 | 0.0 | — | 0 | Season-high 4 tackles |
| Wk 6 | L 34-35@ Baylor | 1 | 0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | — | 0 | |
| Wk 7 | W 41-28vs TCU | 3 | 3 | 1.0 | 0.0 | — | 0 | |
| Wk 9 | W 42-17@ Kansas | 3 | 2 | 0.0 | 0.0 | — | 0 | |
| Wk 10 | L 20-43vs Texas Tech | 1 | 1 | 0.0 | 0.0 | — | 0 | |
| Wk 12 | W 14-6@ Oklahoma State | 3 | 1 | 0.0 | 0.0 | — | 0 | |
| Wk 13 | L 47-51@ Utah | 4 | 1 | 0.0 | 0.0 | — | 0 | |
| Wk 14 | W 24-14vs Colorado | 4 | 2 | 0.5 | 0.0 | — | 0 | |
| Total | 29 | 15 | 1.5 | 0.0 | — | 0 |
Traditional history
Season rows up top, career context at the bottom.
Season context · Team result + system
| Season | Team | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | Kansas State | 29 | 15 | 1.5 | 0.0 | -- | -- | -- |
| 2023 | Kansas State | 5 | 4 | 1.0 | 0.0 | 1 | -- | -- |
| Career | 2 loaded seasons | 34 | 19 | 2.5 | 0.0 | 1 | -- | -- |
Advanced metrics second
Usage, value, and opponent-adjusted context.
TFL, sacks, and QB hurries are grouped together because defensive Heisman cases are usually built on visible havoc, not on tackle counts alone.
Pass breakups, interceptions, and forced fumbles matter because national awards voters respond to plays that change possessions and highlight reels.
Every percentile is compared against players at the same position and level, so an FBS quarterback is judged against FBS quarterbacks, not the whole sport.
The top tables stick to the stats fans already know from broadcasts and box scores. Advanced context is pushed underneath instead of replacing the basics.
| Group | Metric | Value | Rank | Pct | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Defense | Total tackles | 29 | #1415/4942 | 71st pct | Volumevs FBS DEF |
| Defense | TFL | 1.5 | #1771/4972 | 64th pct | Disruptionvs FBS DEF |
| Defense | Sacks | 0.0 | #1762/4972 | 65th pct | Disruptionvs FBS DEF |
| Defense | Solo tackles | 15 | #1434/4584 | 69th pct | Volumevs FBS DEF |
| Defense | Fumbles recovered | 1 | #103/736 | 86th pct | Takeawaysvs FBS DEF |
| Ball Security | Fumbles lost | 0 | #1/773 | 100th pct | Turnoversvs FBS DEF |
Universal 17-step ladder. Tier pills below; accolade streams nested.
AWAITING CLASSIFICATION
AWAITING CLASSIFICATION · Rung None of 16
Why he’s here
Standing classification populates when honors, Heisman, and roster signals all align.
What moves him up
What moves him down
Accolade streams
The Butkus award tracker integrates per-week probability once a dedicated scraper for this award lands. Confirmed past winners and finalists for this player will surface here.
Splits · Per-game
2025 season · 11 games
Home vs Road
| TKL/g | TFL/g | SACK/g | PD/g | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Home6g | 2.3 | 0.2 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Road5g | 3.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
Win vs Loss
| TKL/g | TFL/g | SACK/g | PD/g | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wins5g | 3.0 | 0.3 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Losses6g | 2.3 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
First half vs Second half
| TKL/g | TFL/g | SACK/g | PD/g | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Weeks 1-76g | 2.3 | 0.2 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| Weeks 8+5g | 3.0 | 0.1 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
Pocket and defense-quality (clean vs. pressure) splits are coming soon.
Savant · Box-rate percentiles
Where this profile ranks vs the LB cohort
Concern: passes defended (17th).
Percentiles versus same-position peers with enough snaps this season, based on box-score rates.
Advanced Savant · LB · 2024
Advanced opponent-adjusted percentile bars are coming soon for this player.
Opponent-adjusted advanced metrics with a cohort filter.
Peer Comparator · Fingerprint match
Three closest profiles by box-rate percentile
Closest peers by overall box-score percentile profile at the same position.
Player DNA
Solid in every phase without a signature dimension.
His 2025 production profile sits closest to Jaren Handy’s 2021 season.
Jaren Handy
Jacob Wahlberg
Kenyon Agurs
Braxten Croteau
VanDarius Cowan
Matches Jaren on
Not enough data yet for this comparison.
As a junior, his production profile tracks closest to Carson Willich's junior season at Iowa State (2025).
Carson Willich
Muelu Iosefa
Gabe Powers
Matthew Fobbs-White
Trip White
Matches Carson on
Supporting Cast · Scheme
Staff and system around the player
Head Coach
Chris Klieman
Pass share
46.4%
342 pass / 395 run
Plays / game
61.4
12 games
OL sack rate (allowed)
4.5%
288 dropbacks · PBP
Scheme: Run-leaning, slow tempo.
Coaching Lineage · 2023–2025
1 coachPlayed his entire career under Chris Klieman.
Off-field context — switch tabs to drill into recruit profile, transfer arc, or roster timeline.
No fields populated yet.
No fields populated yet.
Every honor on the ledger, broken out by stream and selector.
All-America, all-conference, player-of-the-week, watch-list, and postseason awards land here when they're earned. The absence is the signal: most players never collect formal honors, and that's its own kind of context.
Season-end distinction and week-by-week recognition on one timeline.
| Season | Honor | Scope | Team / Selector | Context |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| No formal honors on the ledger yet. All-America, all-conference, weekly awards, watch lists, and postseason trophies land here when they’re earned. | ||||
Modeled rank and official finish by season.
| Season | Team | Role | Latest Model | Forecast | Win | Finalist | Official Finish | Points | Context |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | Kansas State | LB3 | #9859 | #9534 | 0.0% | 0.0% | -- | -- | W16 snapshot | Big 12 |
| 2023 | Kansas State | LB3 | #10267 | #9991 | 0.0% | 0.0% | -- | -- | W19 snapshot | Big 12 |
Team, conference, and class by season.
| Season | Team | Conference | Pos | Class | Bio |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | Kansas State | Big 12 | LB | 3 | No. 28 | 6-5 | 236 lb | Rock Rapids, IA |
| 2024 | Kansas State | Big 12 | LB | 3 | No. 28 | 6-5 | 236 lb | Rock Rapids, IA |
| 2023 | Kansas State | Big 12 | LB | 3 | No. 28 | 6-5 | 236 lb | Rock Rapids, IA |