How Does Yannick Ngakoue’s Situation Change How the Jaguars May Have to Address the Offseason?

Following the 2019 season, one of the few positions the Jaguars could consider a strength moving into 2020 was defensive end. Rookie Josh Allen led all NFL rookies with 10.5 sacks and earned a Pro Bowl spot, while veteran Yannick Ngakoue had another strong season with eight sacks and four forced fumbles.

But after a turbulent Monday for the organization, what was once a strength likely has become yet another hole on a roster with already quite a few of them.

Ngakoue, who has averaged over nine sacks and three forced fumbles per season throughout his four years in Jacksonville, tweeted on Monday that he no longer is interested in signing a long-term contract with the team. Minutes later, it was reported by Adam Schefter of ESPN that the Jaguars were planning to use the franchise tag on the impending free agent pass rusher.

Ngakoue has been seeking a big-money contract since last summer, and the Jaguars have seemingly been unable to work out a deal with the 24-year old defensive end despite having a second crack at it. After Ngakoue's announcement on Monday, it now seems likely that a tag and trade scenario is on the horizon.

This was always a possibility for the Jaguars and one they have likely been preparing for. The team was never going to let Ngakoue hit the open market, but it has been hinted by Ngakoue for some time that he has no interest in playing on the tag, so a holdout or a trade are the two most likely scenarios.

With the Jaguars' inability to lock up Ngakoue long-term, what was once an overwhelming positive is now a glaring issue, and the Jaguars once again need help at defensive end. Now, the Jaguars' offseason wishlist needs to include a pass-rusher to join Allen or else the Jaguars are at risk of losing a pass-rush that recorded 47 sacks in 2019, tied for seventh in the NFL.

Allen had a great rookie season but it should be noted that he was never asked to be the Jaguars' No. 1 defensive end. Instead, that duty fell to Ngakoue. Despite Ngakoue missing a Week 2 game with a hamstring injury, and being hampered by the same injury for much of the first half of the season, Ngakoue played 790 snaps (75%), more than the 634 snaps (60%) Allen played in 16 games. Allen is a remarkable talent, but he will be asked to shoulder a much heavier load in 2020 without Ngakoue in the fold.

Joining Allen at defensive end at times will be veteran defensive lineman Calais Campbell. Campbell is one of the Jaguars' best players and makes a monumental impact for the team on and off the field, but it needs to be taken into consideration that he will be 34 in 2020 and he is coming off a season in which he recorded 6.5 sacks, the fewest he has had in a season since he had five in 2015.

Outside of Allen and Campbell, the Jaguars' current roster features only Dawuane Smoot and Leon Jacobs as players who have been utilized as rushers off the edge. But Smoot changed his body type in 2019 and became more of an interior rusher, recording six sacks (first sacks of his three-year career) all from a defensive tackle alignment. Jacobs recorded the first two sacks of his career in 2019, but he is more of an edge-setting linebacker who can blitz off the edge in certain packages.

This leaves the Jaguars' edge-rushing depth relatively barren when you factor in Ngakoue's eventual departure. Now, the Jaguars will have to focus at least one of their 10 draft picks on the position, while they could have avoided adding to it altogether if Ngakoue remained in the fold.

The Jaguars already had a number of holes to fill on the defense, such as cornerback, linebacker, and defensive tackle. They have limited cap space to do so, so the draft was always going to be the path to rebuilding the defense and the roster overall. Now that rebuilding needs to include a defensive end, something that wasn't supposed to hold true a few months ago.

Jacksonville could now realistically target a pass-rusher with the No. 20 pick, with Penn State defensive end Yetur Gross-Matos, Iowa defensive end A.J. Epenesa, and Alabama pass-rusher Terrell Lewis all realistic options. If you said during the 2019 season that Jacksonville would have to consider using a first-round pick on a pass-rusher off the edge, it would have been a controversial take. Now, it is the likely reality.

The Jaguars' offseason was always going to be one of change and churning of the roster, but expect even more change to come once April rolls around. With Ngakoue's announcement, it is now clear Allen will need a new partner off the edge and the Jaguars will have to replace 37.5 sacks and 14 forced fumbles from the last four seasons.