2023 Round 1 Pick #13:Lukas Van Ness Edge

[Poppa San]

So his numbers are comparable to Miles Garrett and more efficient in getting home in the pass rush than TJ Watt. I'll take that for a start.

 

[Pokerbrat2000]

So his numbers are comparable to Miles Garrett and more efficient in getting home in the pass rush than TJ Watt. I'll take that for a start.

I kind of lost track of LVN during the season. I do remember early in the season shaking my head on a few plays where he was burned on a running play, because the OL let him just take himself out of the play. Rookie mistake and Gary is still doing that.

Let's hope LVN keeps developing and turns into a Pro Bowl player, we could use it on Saturday and for years to come.

 

[Poppa San]

Rookie mistake and Gary is still doing that.

Gary has turned into: SEE BALL - GET BALL. Easy to misdirect. LVN is becoming: I've seen this before and the ball will be over there in a second.

 

[tynimiller]

So his numbers are comparable to Miles Garrett and more efficient in getting home in the pass rush than TJ Watt. I'll take that for a start.

TJ got home 13.4% of his pass rush snaps - LVN is 9% not better. From a rookie year vs rookie year perspective.

 

[Poppa San]

TJ got home 13.4% of his pass rush snaps - LVN is 9% not better. From a rookie year vs rookie year perspective.

13.4% is total pressures not sacks. I was looking at just sacks as getting home. A sack is definite. A pressure is a judgement call. And yes I understand that a pressure leads to someone else getting the sack sometimes. So does sticky downfield coverage.

 

[tynimiller]

13.4% is total pressures not sacks. I was looking at just sacks as getting home. A sack is definite. A pressure is a judgement call. And yes I understand that a pressure leads to someone else getting the sack sometimes. So does sticky downfield coverage.

Gotcha.

 

[Pokerbrat2000]

Gary has turned into: SEE BALL - GET BALL. Easy to misdirect. LVN is becoming: I've seen this before and the ball will be over there in a second.

Agreed.

I wonder if this is why Gary seems to have gotten fewer snaps per game this season? When the season started, I knew they would start him out slower, due to his recovery from his knee injury. However, it seems that he is in there for fewer plays each series. Now that could be because of guys like Enagbare and LVN playing better and it could be they feel its best to save Gary for obvious passing downs? Having a rotation of 4 pretty good OLB's is a nice luxury, which is why Enagbare's injury might be costly to the defense this Saturday.

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[tynimiller]

If McDuffie is healthy I'd like to see us bounce Quay outside on some looks too...we've done it some this year with him have nearly 50 OLB snaps but love to see a few more

 

[Pokerbrat2000]

If McDuffie is healthy I'd like to see us bounce Quay outside on some looks too...we've done it some this year with him have nearly 50 OLB snaps but love to see a few more

Totally agree. I know some aren't that high on Quay, but his speed and range is impressive to me. He seems to have gotten a lot better at sniffing out plays and knowing where the ball is going to be.

 

[Sanguine camper]

PFF Source

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PFF has it wrong. Van Ness had 4 sacks this year, not 6. What are pressures and how much do they really matter? Frequently you see a qb run for a first down or step up and complete passes under pressure. Compared to his peers in the top half of round 1, Van Ness doesn't look so good to date. If he were a 3rd round pick, I'd be fine with his performance. Unfortunately, you should expect more from a top half of round 1 pass rusher. Failure to draft and develop on defense has been a long-term problem.

 

[tynimiller]

PFF has it wrong. Van Ness had 4 sacks this year, not 6. What are pressures and how much do they really matter? Frequently you see a qb run for a first down or step up and complete passes under pressure. Compared to his peers in the top half of round 1, Van Ness doesn't look so good to date. If he were a 3rd round pick, I'd be fine with his performance. Unfortunately, you should expect more from a top half of round 1 pass rusher. Failure to draft and develop on defense has been a long-term problem.

You can state 4 is his figure - however PFF disagreed and awarded him 6 on the year, but the most comprehensive data set I have access to is PFF, if you have another data source that tracks items beyond just whether or not they tackled the QB on a play please share. I believe there are a few other advanced analytical companies that track pressures, hits and such.

 

[Sanguine camper]

You can state 4 is his figure - however PFF disagreed and awarded him 6 on the year, but the most comprehensive data set I have access to is PFF, if you have another data source that tracks items beyond just whether or not they tackled the QB on a play please share. I believe there are a few other advanced analytical companies that track pressures, hits and such.

Hits and pressures are misleading. Hard to know what impact they have. It would much more accurate to track forced incompletions just like they do for DB's. Any given incomplete pass can have 4 reasons:
1-dropped pass or wrong route by the WR; 2- pass broken up by a defender; 3 inaccurate pass by the qb; 4. Forced incomplete by a pass rusher.
It's no less subjective than a pressure. Another better measure would be to track forced interceptions. Since forced fumbles are tracked it makes sense to also track forced fumbles.
As for LVN, the Packers defense has underperformed for a very long time. I think it's due to a deficiency in both drafting and devopment. Van Ness's trajectory so far is similar to a lot of other high draft picks to failed to live up to their draft position. I hope I'm wrong and his career looks more like Trey Hendrickson than Rashon Gary, but I'm not betting on it.

 

[tynimiller]

PFF has it wrong. Van Ness had 4 sacks this year, not 6. What are pressures and how much do they really matter? Frequently you see a qb run for a first down or step up and complete passes under pressure. Compared to his peers in the top half of round 1, Van Ness doesn't look so good to date. If he were a 3rd round pick, I'd be fine with his performance. Unfortunately, you should expect more from a top half of round 1 pass rusher. Failure to draft and develop on defense has been a long-term problem.

Here added Pro Football Reference - You'll note Sack counts for them are not the same...they're higher and lower for some - and unfortunately a few of them don't have advance stats like hurries and pressures for their rookie years:

Red cells are ones where the player is equal or lower than LVN on the metric of the column. One thing of note Pro Football Reference does not track at all pass rush snap chances like PFF...so the sacks and pressures per snap are overall all defensive snaps...kinda hard to see how well a guy is rushing the passer on a run play but it is an even playing field of comparison amongst all of them.

LVN according to PFF has more sacks than 18 of the 30 listed, he had more pressures than 9, higher pressures per pas rush than 6, BUT he only had more pass rush snaps than 8 of them and of those he had more sacks than all 8 and he had more pressures than all 8 and higher % of pressures than 4 of the 8.

LVN according to Pro Football Reference had more or equal number of sacks than 15 of the 30, 10 of the 25 with pressures available, higher % of pressures per snap than 10 of those 25 and higher sacks per snap than 20 of the 30. He saw more snaps total than 8 others, and outperformed most of them in a similar fashion here as he did per PFF.

Matter of fact LVN has had a higher rate or efficiency in every metric than Rashan Gary his rookie year other than % of pressures per PFF on pass rush chances.

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[OldSchool101]

If McDuffie is healthy I'd like to see us bounce Quay outside on some looks too...we've done it some this year with him have nearly 50 OLB snaps but love to see a few more

I was thinking the same thing, also I’d send him in on some designed Blitz packages as it clogs lanes.

 

[OldSchool101]

As far as Lukas. I’d like to unleash him a little bit. Lukas is doing good with his workload, but it’s time to test him a little bit. I’d keep him in that 50-55% snap count.
He’s also effective against the Run with 26% TFL grade. As I’ve said before 25%-30% consistent in Tackle for Loss is generally where you see a Probowl level player float. It’s a key component in evaluating how a player is winning at LOS combined with their level of finishing a play. 26% is at that “probowl alternate level.

 

[tynimiller]

One more thing, those people that made the list above….I recommend folks to research the ages of each of those at the time of their rookie seasons.

How many of them literally turned old enough to drink while they were learning the NFL like LVN has?

 

[Sanguine camper]

Here added Pro Football Reference - You'll note Sack counts for them are not the same...they're higher and lower for some - and unfortunately a few of them don't have advance stats like hurries and pressures for their rookie years:

Red cells are ones where the player is equal or lower than LVN on the metric of the column. One thing of note Pro Football Reference does not track at all pass rush snap chances like PFF...so the sacks and pressures per snap are overall all defensive snaps...kinda hard to see how well a guy is rushing the passer on a run play but it is an even playing field of comparison amongst all of them.

LVN according to PFF has more sacks than 18 of the 30 listed, he had more pressures than 9, higher pressures per pas rush than 6, BUT he only had more pass rush snaps than 8 of them and of those he had more sacks than all 8 and he had more pressures than all 8 and higher % of pressures than 4 of the 8.

LVN according to Pro Football Reference had more or equal number of sacks than 15 of the 30, 10 of the 25 with pressures available, higher % of pressures per snap than 10 of those 25 and higher sacks per snap than 20 of the 30. He saw more snaps total than 8 others, and outperformed most of them in a similar fashion here as he did per PFF.

Matter of fact LVN has had a higher rate or efficiency in every metric than Rashan Gary his rookie year other than % of pressures per PFF on pass rush chances.

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Again I would argue "pressures" are a pseudo stat. What are they exactly? Forcing the qb to move in the pocket? Sacks are objective and more frequently stop a drive. NFL reference as well as ESPN and Fox Sports list LVN with just 4 sacks. Perhaps PFF awards sacks to players who are closest to a qb who runs out of bounds behind the LOS. Hard to know where those phantom sacks come from. Maybe LVN will develop but the team is hurt by a draft philosophy based too much on potential for high draft picks. There's a big opportunity cost waiting for top draft picks to finally pan out after several low production seasons. Gute is making a habit of it with his defensive picks and it's hurting the team.

 

[tynimiller]

Again I would argue "pressures" are a pseudo stat. What are they exactly? Forcing the qb to move in the pocket? Sacks are objective and more frequently stop a drive. NFL reference as well as ESPN and Fox Sports list LVN with just 4 sacks. Perhaps PFF awards sacks to players who are closest to a qb who runs out of bounds behind the LOS. Hard to know where those phantom sacks come from. Maybe LVN will develop but the team is hurt by a draft philosophy based too much on potential for high draft picks. There's a big opportunity cost waiting for top draft picks to finally pan out after several low production seasons. Gute is making a habit of it with his defensive picks and it's hurting the team.

It’s clear you’re not even looking at the stats I’ve provided, pro football reference tracks more items than just sacks and I listed them. They also had LVN at 4.

Sorry I just see only looking at sacks as borderline ignorant way of grading someone. It’s like telling a CB sorry you suck because you never had a INT or even worse ignoring the fact they had five PBUs in the game. Pressures are a crucial part of what we need LVN to produce.

And as I said look at his sacks per snaps if caught solely on sacks, he is no slouch in percentage of rush snaps he is getting home.

 

[Sanguine camper]

It’s clear you’re not even looking at the stats I’ve provided, pro football reference tracks more items than just sacks and I listed them. They also had LVN at 4.

Sorry I just see only looking at sacks as borderline ignorant way of grading someone. It’s like telling a CB sorry you suck because you never had a INT or even worse ignoring the fact they had five PBUs in the game. Pressures are a crucial part of what we need LVN to produce.

And as I said look at his sacks per snaps if caught solely on sacks, he is no slouch in percentage of rush snaps he is getting home.

Sacks per snap is also a misleading stat. There's no production sitting on the Pines. With competent coaches, the higher the production the more snaps a player gets. It ultimately boils down to making plays that stop drives. Other than a turnover, a sack is the next best play to make the opposition punt. There are loads of pseudo stats to inflate the value of pass rushers. To paraphrase AL Davis' "just win baby" I would say, "just get those sacks baby" They stop drives while pressures and hits don't as often. With a mobile qb, a pressure can actually be counterproductive which often flushes the qb to run for a first down.

 

[tynimiller]

Isolating thoughts on an edges play solely on one statistic is lunacy IMO. Is what it is not spending any more time on this.

Regardless Go Pack Go we agree on.

 

[Pokerbrat2000]

Sacks per snap is also a misleading stat. There's no production sitting on the Pines. With competent coaches, the higher the production the more snaps a player gets. It ultimately boils down to making plays that stop drives. Other than a turnover, a sack is the next best play to make the opposition punt. There are loads of pseudo stats to inflate the value of pass rushers. To paraphrase AL Davis' "just win baby" I would say, "just get those sacks baby" They stop drives while pressures and hits don't as often. With a mobile qb, a pressure can actually be counterproductive which often flushes the qb to run for a first down.

Yes and No.

While a sack is definitive, ends the play, takes the QB down for a loss, a pressure can be equally as effective. A hurried QB may miss his target, throw an interception or just throw a bad ball in general. I will take an interception over a sack. Of course, a sack can also create a fumble, so there is that stat too.

While I can't tell you specific games in his career, there were many when Rodgers may have only been sacked a few times in the game, but the consistent pressure that the opposing defense put on him, made his day absolutely miserable.

So yeah, sacks are nice, but I will take consistent pressure and a collapsing pocket over a guy finally getting around a blocker and getting his 1 sack for the day.

 

[OldSchool101]

One more thing, those people that made the list above….I recommend folks to research the ages of each of those at the time of their rookie seasons.

How many of them literally turned old enough to drink while they were learning the NFL like LVN has?

I’ll drink to that!

 

[Sanguine camper]

Yes and No.

While a sack is definitive, ends the play, takes the QB down for a loss, a pressure can be equally as effective. A hurried QB may miss his target, throw an interception or just throw a bad ball in general. I will take an interception over a sack. Of course, a sack can also create a fumble, so there is that stat too.

While I can't tell you specific games in his career, there were many when Rodgers may have only been sacked a few times in the game, but the consistent pressure that the opposing defense put on him, made his day absolutely miserable.

So yeah, sacks are nice, but I will take consistent pressure and a collapsing pocket over a guy finally getting around a blocker and getting his 1 sack for the day.

Sacks work against all qb's while pressures help more against less mobile qb's. Young mobile qb's like Steve Young and Russell Wilson feasted on running away from pressure. Even some rather immobile qb's seem to handle pressure well while others don't. Brady could find a last second check down enough to break your back while pressure does get some qb's like Favre and Cousins to heave it into the secondary.

 

[Pokerbrat2000]

Sacks work against all qb's while pressures help more against less mobile qb's. Young mobile qb's like Steve Young and Russell Wilson feasted on running away from pressure. Even some rather immobile qb's seem to handle pressure well while others don't. Brady could find a last second check down enough to break your back while pressure does get some qb's like Favre and Cousins to heave it into the secondary.

If that was the case, are you saying a defense that gets 5 sacks during a game, all on blitzes, is far better than a defense that only got 1 sack, but was collapsing the pocket all day and forced 2 interceptions as a result.

I agree with @tynimiller, there is so much more that goes into it than just 1 stat (sacks) and if all you are going to look at are the sacks that a player or teams gets, you might be missing some important information.

 

[Sanguine camper]

If that was the case, are you saying a defense that gets 5 sacks during a game, all on blitzes, is far better than a defense that only got 1 sack, but was collapsing the pocket all day and forced 2 interceptions as a result.

I agree with @tynimiller, there is so much more that goes into it than just 1 stat (sacks) and if all you are going to look at are the sacks that a player or teams gets, you might be missing some important information.

The discussion is how to rate pass rushers like highly paid OLBers. I agree that teams try to make up for deficiencies in their pass rushers by blitzing more. They may get more sacks but expose themselves to big plays. Great pass rushers prevent that trade off. Remember "no blitz" Fritz. Shermer didn't need to blitz much because he had Reggie, Shaun Jones and Dotson up front.