Wolfe vs. Harris: Analyzing Which Soon-to-Be Free Agent D-Lineman Broncos Should Re-Sign

There is a big question the Denver Broncos need to answer. Do the Broncos re-sign Derek Wolfe, Shelby Harris, both, or neither?

There are a lot of elements that go into evaluating these two defensive linemen. Odds are that the Broncos don’t have the money to keep them both, so let’s go one-by-one through each deciding factor to figure out who would be the best one for Denver to bring back.

Age

Wolfe will turn 30 years old on February 24th, while Harris will turn 29 in August. The year and a half between the two is negligible when working on the defensive line.

Harris seems a lot younger than Wolfe due to entering the NFL in 2014, two years after Wolfe did. There are fewer miles on Harris’ body, but that is a point for later.

Advantage: Push

Money

When it comes to money, all the other factors are going to play a part in deciding how much each player is worth. The Broncos have plenty of available cap space to spend, and plenty of cash to boot. Cash and cap space are not the same thing and teams need both financial assets to be aggressive in free agency.

Harris is likely looking at well more than $10-plus million on an average per year basis. That is a bit rich factoring in his play, which I will get into later.

Meanwhile, Wolfe was playing better and more consistent than Harris was but ended up getting hurt with a quarter of the season left to play. As a result, Wolfe would likely be cheaper than Harris and more worth the money he would get.

Advantage: Wolfe

Health/Durability

Harris got banged up this year, but he started all 16 games for Denver. As for Wolfe, he has only played a full 16-game season three times in his eight-year career. The answer here is simple.

Advantage: Harris.

Leadership

This one seems pretty simple. Harris just doesn’t quite have the respect of the other players on defense and hasn’t seemed to emerge as a leader in the locker room, whereas Wolfe has. Multiple people in and around Dove Valley have spoken to Wolfe stepping up into a leadership role, which the Broncos need on defense.

Advantage: Wolfe

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Run Defense

Now we can get into more statistical analysis by evaluating each guys' run defense. The first step to evaluating their run defense is to look at run stop percentage.

Harris had 20 stops against the run and had a run-stop percentage of 7.1. Wolfe wasn’t far behind with 15 stops and a run-stop percentage of 6.5, though he played in four fewer games. So they are very similar in statistics, but when going over the film, there was a huge difference.

Wolfe was far more consistent in his gap and rarely was pushed far off the line of scrimmage. Harris was a lot more inconsistent and saw himself get bullied by double teams. He did have his bright moments, but they didn’t come all that often.

Harris’ run-stop percentage is decent, but it isn’t in the top half of qualifying defensive linemen. When it comes to run defense, the more consistent guy than the one who gets a big splash plays that don’t come as often as others around the NFL is more valuable.

Advantage: Wolfe

Batting Passes

This is another really simple one. Harris has nine batted passes, while Wolfe has only one. One of those batted passes by Harris preserved a Broncos' victory. There isn’t much debate here.

Advantage: Harris

Pass Rush

Before getting into their play as a pass rusher, there is a great article by Brandon Thorn of the Athletic that you can read here. It goes over the sacks that Harris picked up and the quality of them.

It's a must-read as the quality of the sacks will be factored into today's analysis. That article provided the film to highlight Harris’ sacks.

So after reading over it, I went over all of each player's sacks myself, breaking down the quality of each one. The quality of a sack is based on whether they beat their opponent to get to the QB, it's based on where the quarterback is in the pocket, and how long it takes to get the sack.

To sum it all up quickly, Wolfe had four high-quality sacks, while Harris had only two. That means each had three and four low-quality sacks, respectively.

Wolfe’s low-quality sacks were both of his sacks against the Colts and his second one against the Chargers. Harris’ came against the Titans, sack No. 2 and 3 against the Vikings, and sack No. 2 against the Chiefs.

While sacks aren’t a stat that always reflects the winning team, it should be noted that five of Wolfe’s sacks came in wins while only one of Harris’ cam in a win.

The other aspect of the pass rush is total pressures. Wolfe ended the season with 22 while missing the final four games of the season. When Wolfe went down, Harris was six pressures behind him.

It took Harris two more games than Wolfe to finally surpass Wolfe’s total on the season. Harris ended the year with 27 total pressures.

Harris is renowned as the interior pass rusher, but 2019 showed that to be a false preconception. He was very inconsistent and often struggled to fight off blocks to get any kind of pressure.

There were four games from Harris that resulted in no pressures, and another four with only one pressure. For half the season he picked up four total pressures.

Meanwhile, Wolfe only played 12 games this season and three of them saw him tally zero pressures. Those three games were the first three games of the season where the Broncos struggled to generate pressure of any kind.

For the other 10 games, Wolfe had one or two pressures. Just to throw this out there as well, Wolfe had three games with two pressures and Harris had four.

Advantage: Wolfe

Conclusion

There is a debate to be had here but the only real bone of contention centers around health/durability vs. wear and tear on the body. When it comes to overall play, consistency, leadership, and cost, there is only one option for the Broncos.

That option is Derek Wolfe.

Follow Erick on Twitter @ErickTrickel and @MileHighHuddle.