Commanders Pass Rush: Top 5 With Healthy Chase Young?
Rankings are like tax brackets in a way only they measure the production of units like the Washington Commanders defensive line instead of financial gains.
If it was simply financial the Commanders would be near the top having four first-round NFL Draft picks starting up front.
Instead of being at the top of pass rush production, however, Washington sits just outside the top tier looking to make the leap this season.
In a simple way, they’re on the outside looking up because of the loss of defensive end Chase Young for most of the past year and a half.
When you get more in depth with it though, you find out Young doesn’t have to be great to help his group become just that.
In 2022, the Commanders defensive line had three top 25 pass rush grades among those in the NFL with at least 440 pass rush snaps.
The only other NFL team to join Washington with this distinction was the Miami Dolphins.
Defensive tackles Jonathan Allen and Daron Payne and defensive end Montez Sweat all registered highly in Pro Football Focus’ algorithms while combining for 168 pressures on opposing quarterbacks.
That’s more pressures counted by PFF for that trio than the entire Chicago Bears defense had last season.
In fact, they were the seventh-best trio in the NFL in both pressures and sacks.
But Washington doesn’t run three defensive linemen, it mostly runs four in defensive coordinator Jack Del Rio’s scheme.
Looking at the teams ahead of the Commanders in pass rush trios, if we add Young to the mix based on last year’s production he’d need to come through with 44 pressures and 10 sacks to make this quartet the best in the league.
Both would be career highs.
Geoff Burke, USA Today
But to get into the Top 5, if Washington can get similar or better production from the trio of Allen, Payne, and Sweat then it needs just 24 pressures and four sacks from Young.
Those are numbers Young exceeded with ease in his rookie season, which is also his last fully healthy one.
With James Smith-Williams filling in mostly for Young last season during his extended recover from dual knee surgeries, the Commanders pushed for a top five ranking in pressure and sack production from the defensive line alone.
There are some questions about whether or not Young will actually start the season healthy after suffering a stinger in Week 1 of the preseason that has taken an abnormally long time to heal.
But if he is, and Washington gets Young on the field in Week 1 against the Arizona Cardinals, it could be the final push needed for the defensive line to enter the top level of unit prestige.
And that would go a long way toward helping the Commanders achieve their goal of rising up the rankings as an NFL franchise this season.
