2017 Jets Sacks Allowed Tally

Yesterday, I concluded my series breaking down every sack allowed by the Jets in 2017 and assigning responsibility for each. You can relive every two-week-each report here:

Previous breakdowns: Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8

Let’s dig into some of the numbers.

First, take a look at the raw list of total culprit (sacks primarily responsible for) and accomplice (sacks partially responsible for) tags for each player.

Culprits:

Brandon Shell - 7

Kelvin Beachum - 7

James Carpenter - 7

Coverage - 6

Brent Qvale - 4

Josh McCown - 4

Brian Winters - 4

Matt Forte - 4

Bryce Petty - 3

Eric Tomlinson - 3

Wesley Johnson - 3

Jonotthan Harrison - 2

Elijah McGuire - 1

Effective Blitz - 1

Robby Anderson - 1

Jermaine Kearse - 1

Austin Seferian-Jenkins - 1

Lawrence Thomas - 1

Accomplices:

Coverage - 5

Josh McCown - 3

Wesley Johnson - 3

Kelvin Beachum - 3

Brandon Shell - 2

Brent Qvale - 2

Effective Blitz - 2

Dakota Dozier - 2

Matt Forte - 2

Ben Ijalana - 1

Jonotthan Harrison - 1

Brian Winters - 1

Let’s combine the two and get a list of total sacks contributed to.

Total Sacks Contributed To:

Coverage - 11

Kelvin Beachum - 10

Brandon Shell - 9

James Carpenter - 7

Josh McCown - 7

Wesley Johnson - 6

Matt Forte - 6

Brent Qvale - 6

Brian Winters - 5

Bryce Petty - 3

Jonotthan Harrison - 3

Eric Tomlinson - 3

Dakota Dozier - 2

Effective blitz - 2

Elijah McGuire - 1

Robby Anderson - 1

Jermaine Kearse - 1

Lawrence Thomas - 1

Austin Seferian-Jenkins - 1

Ben Ijalana - 1

Let’s take those total sack numbers and compare them on a per-game and per-snap rate. Of course, this is highly arbitrary, since I don’t have access to pure pass protection snap totals (Pro Football Focus is great for that), but this is still a fun way to equalize and compare these numbers. Also, don’t forget that comparing the per-snap sack rates of tackles versus guards is apples and oranges; let alone offensive linemen versus running backs. Make of these numbers what you will!

Only those with 2+ sacks allowed are included. The offensive linemen are highlighted in green, the starters are bold/italicized.

(Shell should have 9 sacks below, and a snaps per sack rate of 77.4)

Finally, I went back and tallied officially counted QB hits allowed for each offensive lineman. I excluded roughing the passer penalties and hits generated by blitzes or quarterback escapes. Here are the numbers with QB hits included; as a bonus, I threw in my tally for new Jets center Spencer Long.

Below, take a look at the week-by-week progression for each of these linemen. The totals for each week are a combination of total sacks (primarily and partially responsible for) and hits allowed.

I’m not too shocked at the way things panned out for the starting offensive linemen. You would expect the tackles’ numbers to make them appear worse than interior linemen, since their mistakes are much harder for the quarterback to mitigate just by nature of the position.

After going back and counting hits, two things really stood out to me. Number one, Brandon Shell’s late season improvement was supported further. Shell improved from allowing 5 sacks as the primary culprit in his first 5 games to only 2 in his last 7, but sacks don’t tell the whole story. The hit tally supported his improvement, as he improved from 3 hits in his first 5 games to 0 in his last 7. Shell’s gradual improvement was promising to see.

The second thing that popped out from the QB hit tally was James Carpenter’s gargantuan count. I nabbed Carpenter for a team high 10 hits, coming in six separate games. A whopping 5 of those were in one game, against Tampa Bay in Week 10. No other Jet amassed more than 2 hits (separate from sacks) allowed in one game. In that same game, I didn’t nab Carpenter for a single one of the team’s six sacks. That just goes to show that sacks alone do not tell the whole story.

Kelvin Beachum matched Shell for the team lead in sacks contributed to, but considering he played nearly every offensive snap, his sack total seems average-ish for the left tackle position. I also thought his run blocking was probably some of the best on the team, however low of a bar that might be. He was mostly hailed as “serviceable” and “average,” and I feel like those notions were supported.

To my surprise, Brian Winters held up with very solid numbers in terms of both sacks and hits. He can still stand to do better, though, especially in the run game. He also needs to cut down on penalties. He led guards in total flags with nine, despite missing three games. Winters was dealing with injuries much of 2017. I’m interested to see what he can do if fully healthy.

The Jets relied on zone running plays quite often last year, and James Carpenter didn’t seem very well suited to those. However, when in situations where he could put his head down and maul, he was still producing the most dominant run blocks on the team. I do think he took an overall step back, especially in pass protection. He is certainly better and more proven than the alternatives for now, but let’s see if his 2017 was a blip on the radar or a sign of an oncoming trend.

What are your thoughts on the final numbers?