Before transferring to Texas as a sixth-year senior, linebacker Diamonte Tucker-Dorsey earned FCS All-America status at James Madison.

AUSTIN — Diamonte Tucker-Dorsey knows what the coaches see. The 5-foot-10 linebacker has heard it too many times to count, the only immutable trait laid out in his scouting report: “short.”  

Tucker-Dorsey has spent his entire football life trying to overcome the bias within a world that covets mountain-sized men. He even acknowledged how prejudiced scouts tend to be toward height-challenged defenders when he joined James Madison in 2017 as a two-star linebacker.  

“(JMU was) just a school that believed in me a lot, (even though) I’m undersized,” Tucker-Dorsey said five years ago, pausing and scrunching his face over the notion of being too small. “Some people say that. … I don’t feel like I am.” 

The native Virginian’s size hasn’t stopped him from rising. And it didn’t stop a bevy of Power Five programs from courting Tucker-Dorsey once he entered the transfer portal in mid-May.  

Texas A&M, Florida State, Auburn and others offered scholarships to the sixth-year senior once he hit the open market. Texas coach Steve Sarkisian and defensive coordinator Pete Kwiatkowski, himself a former linebacker, coveted Tucker-Dorsey, too. 

And with the Longhorns in dire need of a talent infusion at the second level, Tucker-Dorsey decided to ink a letter of intent with the Longhorns. So far, he’s had little problem acclimating.  

“I love having Tuck in the program,” Sarkisian said this month. “If you just pulled up his numbers, you can say well, he's 5-10, 215 pounds playing linebacker. Well, is that going to translate? You gotta watch the tape.  

“He's a very productive football player in a lot of different styles of play. He's very good against the run. He's slippery taking on blocks. He's a very good blitzer. He has a natural feel to rush the passer. He does a really good job in coverage. His instincts and football IQ are really high.” 

Tucker-Dorsey came on slow at JMU, a scout-teamer stuck behind talented upperclassmen at one of the nation's most dominant FCS programs. 

He finally broke out as a redshirt junior, earning a spot on the 2020 All-Colonial Athletic Association second team after recording 51 tackles, including 2.5 for loss, during the abbreviated eight-game campaign. And last season, not a single soul expressed concern over how tall JMU’s roving, offense-wrecking linebacker is.  

Tucker-Dorsey became an FCS All-American after amassing a team-high 116 tackles with nine tackles for loss, 2.5 sacks, four interceptions and six quarterback pressures. In the 2021 FCS playoffs, he picked off two passes (with one pick-six) in the Dukes’ win over Southeastern Louisiana and tallied a game-high 10 tackles (1.5 for loss) in their 20-14 semifinal loss to eventual national champion North Dakota State. 

“Sometimes guys that aren't the biggest in stature but are extremely productive on the field, they have to have some other intangibles about them,” Sarkisian said. “And he definitely has all those things. He's serious by nature. He is a football junkie. He loves the game. His instincts, his football IQ are really, really high. And I think ultimately that's why he's had so much success throughout his career. And I foresee him having a lot of success (at Texas). We wouldn't have brought him here if we didn't think he could have an impact on our team this fall.” 

Fifth-year linebacker DeMarvion Overshown has six inches — at least —on his new teammate. In fact, Tucker-Dorsey is the shortest of the Longhorns’ linebackers, who tout a median height of 6-2.  

Overshown doesn’t mind ribbing Tucker-Dorsey about it, either.  

“Oh, yeah. That’s my guy,” Overshown said. “Ol’ Tuck, lil’ man. I call him ‘little’ every time I see him. But I’ve learned so much from him. I saw him do a move the other day on film, and I was like, ‘I ain’t never thought about that.’ Some of the stuff he does, you can tell he’s been playing football for a long time.” 

It’s all love between the new teammates, though, short jokes be damned.  

Overshown knows the linebackers weren’t up to snuff last season, and Tucker-Dorsey’s knowledge has proved invaluable to the entire room. And with Overshown’s role expanding — he’ll come off the edge more in 2021 — Texas needs all the depth it can get. 

Coaches expect a big leap from rising juniors Jaylan Ford and David Gbenda. Returning starter Luke Brockermeyer is progressing from last November’s season-ending ACL tear. Former walk-on Jett Bush and senior Devin Richardson are solid enough backups to Ford.  

But the short guy has been pretty impressive, too. 

“He's definitely got an edge to him, and I love it,” Overshown said of Tucker-Dorsey. “We compete every day. He’s one of the guys that's gonna tell me when I’m wrong, and I'm gonna tell him when he's wrong. Having that kind of relationship with him is going to help our defense even more.” 

Nick Moyle is a New Jersey native and an alum of Rutgers University and Indiana University's National Sports Journalism Center. He joined the Express-News in 2015.