What Can the Team Expect from Chase Young This Year?

August 27, 2020

By Noonefromtampa

When a team takes any player with the second pick in the draft, like the Washington Football Team (WFT) did with Chase Young, there is a high expectation for that player’s rookie year season and his entire career. In this column, I will take a look at what has occurred statistically with all the top 10 picks from the last 15 seasons, 2005 to 2019, who were edge rushers (either defensive ends or outside linebackers).

Twenty-five edge rushers have been selected in the top 10 over that time period:

Year	Pick	Team	Name	School	Position	Years in League
2019	2	SF	Nick Bosa	Ohio St	DE	1
2019	4	OAK	Clelin Ferrell	Clemon	OLB	1
2019	7	JAX	Josh Allen	Kentucky	OLB	1
2018	5	DEN	Bradley Chubb	NC State	OLB	2
2017	3	SF	Solomon Thomas	Stanford	DE	3
2016	3	SD	Joey Bosa	Ohio St	DE	4
2016	7	SF	DeForest Buckner	Oregon	DE	4
2015	3	JAX	Dante Fowler	Florida	OLB	5
2015	8	ATL	Vic Beasley	Clemon	OLB	5
2014	1	HOU	Jadeveon Clowney	South Carolina	DE	6
2014	5	OAK	Khalil Mack	Buffalo	OLB	6
2014	9	MIN	Anthony Barr	UCLA	OLB	6
2013	3	MIA	Dion Jordan	Oregon	DE	7
2013	5	DET	Ezekiel Ansah	BYU	DE	7
2013	6	CLE	Barkevious Mingo	LSU	DE	7
2011	2	DEN	Von Miller	Texas A&M	OLB	9
2011	7	SF	Aldon Smith	Missouri	OLB	5
2009	3	KC	Tyson Jackson	LSU	DE	8
2009	4	SEA	Aaron Curry	Wake Forest	OLB	5
2008	2	STL	Chris Long	Virginia	DE	11
2008	6	NYJ	Vernon Gholston	Ohio St	DE	3
2008	8	JAX	Derrick Harvey	Florida	DE	4
2007	4	TB	Gaines Adams	Clemon	DE	3
2007	8	ATL	Jamaal Anderson	Arkansas	DE	6
2006	1	HOU	Mario Williams	NC State	DE	11

Interestingly, San Francisco had four of the picks in that time span, and Jacksonville had had three of the picks.

One thing I noticed quickly were the picks who did not fulfill their potential: Aldon Smith (substance abuse issues), Aaron Curry, Vernon Gholston, Derrick Harvey and Gaines Adams (death).  I think Vic Beasley and Tyson Jackson also fit into that category when you look at their career sack totals. So, seven out of twenty-five means 28% of the selections were substandard picks.

Let’s look at some key statistics for edge rushers and first year production:

• Average number of games played – 14.7 (high 16, low 4)
• Average number of sacks – 5.3 (high 11.5, low 0)
• Average number of tackles for loss – 8 (high 19, low 0)
• Average number of QB hits – 12 (high 29, low 0)

A player needs to be on the field and make impactful plays when playing. For an edge rusher, the key stats are sacks, tackles for loss and the number of quarterback hits. The gold standard for a first-year edge player is Von Miller, who had 11.5 sacks, 19 tackles for loss and 29 quarterback hits during his 2011 rookie season. I doubt Young will post those level of numbers, since 50% of Denver’s sacks that year came from Miller and Elvis Dumervil. Also, the WFT has a number of players who can supply pass rushing ability, such as Ryan Kerrigan, Montez Sweat, Matt Ioannidis, Daron Payne and Jonathan Allen.

Applying my limited prognosticating skills. I think Young’s rookie season stats end up around 8 sacks, 12 tackles for loss and 16 quarterback hits.

Next, let’s look at career second and third year statistics for the 21 players who have played at least three years.

Category	Year 2	Year 3
Games Played	15	14
Sacks	6.9	5
Tackles for Loss	8.4	7.5
Quarterback Hits	12.5	10.8

As you can see from the table above, the year 1 to year 2 the stats improve, but from year-2 to year-3 the stats decrease. One reason for this is that with the smaller sample size, the seven less productive players have greater impact on the overall numbers. Also, year-2 to year-3 seems to a point where a player continues on an upward trajectory and falls into the less productive category.

Removing some of the substandard performers from the list of 21 players leaves this list of 11 players:

Player	Sacks – Year 1	Sacks – Year 2	Sacks – Year 3
Aldon Smith*	14	19.5	8.5
Chris Long	4	5	8.5
Dante Fowler	4	8	4
DeForest Buckner	6	3	12
Ezekiel Ansah	8	7.5	14.5
Jadeveon Clowney	0	4.5	6
Joey Bosa*	10.5	12.5	5.5
Khalil Mack	4	15	11
Mario Williams	4.5	14	12
Vic Beasley	4	15.5	5
Von Miller*	11.5	18.5	5

On this table, * means that the player missed significant time in year 3 to due injury or suspension. Some players start with strong production from year 1, such as Smith, Bosa and Miller. Some players increase production in year 2 like Williams, Mack or Beasley, while a few pick up production in year 3 like Ansah, Buckner and Long. A lot of players drop some production from year 2 to year 3, most likely because offenses are starting to scheme against those better players with chips and double teams.

If Young’s production increases or remains high in years 2 or 3 of his career, the odds are the WFT found themselves as top tier player for their defensive line.

 

Data source: pro-football-reference.com