Former Pitt defensive lineman James Folston Jr. has another chance at playing football at the highest level.
Folston, a 6-foot-4, 250-pound defensive lineman out of Cocoa High School in Florida, was selected by the New Orleans Breakers with the first pick of the fourth round of the USFL Draft.
Folston played sparingly during his time at Pitt, bulking up from a 230-pound safety to slide all the way down to play with his hand in the dirt on Pitt’s defensive line. He recorded 47 tackles (30 solo), 3.5 tackles for loss and 1.5 sacks in 28 games in Pittsburgh between 2015-18.
In Pitt’s 2017 win over Virginia, Folston racked up four solo tackles, two tackles for loss and a sack — highlighting one of his best collegiate efforts.
Folston played in all 26 games during his junior and senior seasons, making five starts as a defensive end in Pitt’s system.
247Sports rated Folston as the 2,169th-ranked recruit in the 2014 class, slotting in as the 183rd-ranked safety and the 307th-ranked out of Florida. As a four-year player at Pitt, he outearned his two-star high school rating.
The Breakers selected Northern Colorado quarterback Kyle Sloter, Georgia’s Davin Bellamy and Georgia Tech’s Anree Saint-Amour in the first three rounds of the 2022 USFL Draft.
The 2022 USFL season, the first season since the 1985 season, will begin on Saturday, April 16 at 7:30 p.m. with a matchup featuring the New Jersey Generals and the Birmingham Stallions.
