Dorance Armstrong Jr. Madden Career 2020-2026 - Peak 78 OVR

Dorance Armstrong put up 15.5 sacks on some genuinely bad Kansas teams, a productive pass rusher on a program that gave him nothing around him, and Dallas took him in the fourth round in 2018. He started where fourth-rounders start, at the bottom of the rotation, half a sack as a rookie, a slow apprenticeship behind bigger names on the edge.

The Madden card sat flat in the low 70s through those developmental years, honest for a rotational rusher who had not yet broken through. Then the production came, five sacks, then a career-high 8.5 in 2022, and the grade began to climb, up to a 78 peak in Madden NFL 26 as he became a dependable piece rather than a project. The rating lagged the breakout by a beat, the way it often does with role players, but it eventually caught up to a rusher who had quietly made himself useful.

He cashed the improvement in free agency, signing with Washington in 2024 to reunite with the coordinator who had gotten the most out of him in Dallas. Armstrong is the unglamorous success story, a mid-round pick off losing college teams who ground his way into a real NFL role through patience and reps. The flat 70s and the late climb to a 78 are the fair shape of a player who earned everything slowly.