{"id":640449,"date":"2026-04-30T11:21:36","date_gmt":"2026-04-30T11:21:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/640449\/"},"modified":"2026-04-30T11:21:36","modified_gmt":"2026-04-30T11:21:36","slug":"luke-kuechly-gives-his-thoughts-on-panthers-2026-nfl-draft-class","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/640449\/","title":{"rendered":"Luke Kuechly gives his thoughts on Panthers’ 2026 NFL Draft class"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the Carolina Panthers<\/a>‘ top draft picks may be rekindling some fond memories for Luke Kuechly<\/a>.<\/p>\n

On this week’s episode his podcast JJ and Luke, the franchise great\u2014along with co-host and longtime long snapper JJ Jansen\u2014discussed the top of the Panthers’ 2026 NFL Draft Class<\/a>. When breaking down second-round pick<\/a> and defensive lineman Lee Hunter, Kuechly recalled the table-setters Carolina nabbed back in 2013.<\/p>\n

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“The guys on Texas Tech\u2014[David] Bailey the edge rusher and, obviously, Jacob Rodriguez\u2014those guys would not have the success that they did without having a really good inside guy,” he stated<\/a> of Hunter. “And my second year in Carolina, we drafted Star Lotulelei<\/a> in the first round and Kawann Short<\/a> in the second round.<\/p>\n

“And Thomas [Davis] and I . . . Al Holcomb, our linebacker coach, said, ‘Hey you two better walk into [general manager] Dave Gettleman’s office and say thank you.'”<\/p>\n

Kuechly, with the help of Lotulelei and Short, captured the AP Defensive Player of the Year honors that very season. As a unit, the defense allowed the second-fewest yards per game (301.3) and amassed a league-leading 60 sacks while helping push the Panthers to an NFC South title.<\/p>\n

Carolina is probably hoping that Hunter can have a similar effect on his teammates. The 6-foot-3, 318-pounder was named a first-team All-American in 2025, where he registered 26 pressures and 25 stops.<\/p>\n

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So, hopefully for the Panthers, linebackers Devin Lloyd<\/a> and Trevin Wallace<\/a> will eventually go thank general manager Dan Morgan.<\/p>\n

For Kuechly’s full thoughts on Hunter, as well as first-round pick Monroe Freeling, take a listen down below . . .<\/p>\n

Follow @ThePanthersWire<\/a> on Twitter\/X for more Panthers content.<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on Panthers Wire: 2026 NFL Draft: Luke Kuechly gives thoughts on Panthers’ class<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One of the Carolina Panthers‘ top draft picks may be rekindling some fond memories for Luke Kuechly. On…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":640450,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[559],"tags":[64,63,1257,310144,232543,75223,310147,310146,253163,153304,593,85,310145,257620,150077],"class_list":["post-640449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-carolina-panthers","tag-dave-gettleman","tag-defensive-lineman","tag-devin-lloyd","tag-fond-memories","tag-kawann-short","tag-lee-hunter","tag-luke-kuechly","tag-nfl","tag-sports","tag-star-lotulelei","tag-top-draft-picks","tag-trevin-wallace"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=640449"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640449\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/640450"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=640449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=640449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=640449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}