By Jacob Robinson and Dianna Russini
Jun 7, 2024
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Many say the salary cap isn’t real. Today, David Lombardi’s article on the 49ers shows the cap exists — it justtakes some accounting magic.
Today’s NFL update:
- 📊 Will2023 numbersrepeat?
- 📚 Kellen Moore’sPhilly impact
- 🔬 NFL officiating,examined
- 🏋️♀️ Justin Tuckerbulking up!
2023 NFL stats: Surprising, Sad and Superhuman
There are few things I enjoy more than a review of NFL stats. Let’s start today with a look at seven from 2023 — some good, some awful and others just impressive (Derrick Henry) — and whether they could repeat themselves in 2024.
1/7: Bryce Young was sacked 62 times, joining Sam Howell (65) as the only pair of quarterbacks to be sacked 60-plus times in one season in the past 20 years. The only rookie QB to ever be sacked more than Young was 2002 David Carr (an NFL-record76 times in 16 games). Still,Young kept fighting.
Repeatable?The Panthers guaranteed $90 million to new starting guards Robert Hunt and Damien Lewis to ensure it doesn’t happen again.
2/7: Christian McCaffrey led the NFL with 417 touches — 339 in the regular season and another 78 in the playoffs — in his age 27 season. The last player to record 400-plus touches at a similar age was LaDainian Tomlinson in 2007, at age 28.
Repeatable?In 2008, LT saw 350-plus touches. Arecently paidMcCaffrey could again shoulder a massive load.
3/7: For the ninth-straight year,a team drafting in the top eight won its division. Houston! See the graphic below by the Fantasy Footballers for the others.
Repeatable?The Falcons would be my 2024 guess, given the Bears (Lions, Packers) and Chargers (Chiefs) face tougher competition.
4/7:C.J.Stroudled the NFL with an interception percentage of 1.0, throwing just five on 499 attempts. If you were to incorporate playoff stats, his rate would tie Dak Prescott’s overall mark from 2016, when Dak’s regular-season INT rate was a rookie-record 0.87. But as Adam Harstad of FootballGuys wrote, interception rates regress. In Dak’s second season, his interception percentage climbed to 2.7.
Repeatable?Even if Stroud matches Aaron Rodgers’ all-time career record of 1.4 percent, his numbers will slip at some point. Expect more INTs in year two.
5/7: Only three quarterbacks threw for over 30 touchdowns in 2023, the smallest group since the league switched to a 17-game regular season in 2021, when nine QBs hit 30-plus.
Repeatable?Expect more touchdowns from top signal-callers after injuries (and/or Brandon Staley) ravaged former 30-plus-TD passers Joe Burrow, Aaron Rodgers, Kirk Cousins, Deshaun Watson and Justin Herbert.
6/7: Derrick Henry, who turned 30 in January, led the NFL in rushing attempts in 2023 (280), 2022 (349), 2020 (378) and 2019 (303). In the one year he didn’t, he was on pace for 465 before a foot injury cost him nine games.
Repeatable? You tell me. Henry signed with the Ravens, who led the NFL in rushing attempts last season.
7/7: Bobby Wagner, who turns 34 in June, led the league in tackles (183) for a third time. He joined Clay Matthews Jr., Kyle Clifton, Jessie Tuggle and Ray Lewis as the only players to accomplish that feat.
Repeatable?Expected to be an every-down linebacker in DC, the former Seahawk could replicate LB Foyesade Oluokun, who led the league in tackles two straight years for two different teams, Atlanta and Jacksonville.Wagner could even make his 11th-straight All-Pro team.
What Dianna’s Hearing: Kellen Moore takes control in Philly
Remember “Big Dom”? Dom DiSandro, the Philadelphia Eagles’ chief security officer who gained popularity afterDecember’s sideline scufflewith 49ers linebacker Dre Greenlaw, was recently promoted to senior advisor to the general manager and gameday coaching operations.
However,the man with all the juice in Philly right now is new offensive coordinator Kellen Moore.The former Dallas Cowboys play caller has full control over the Eagles offense, one that quarterback Jalen Hurts said is “95 percent new” to the team. The Eagles’ epic collapse last season, including the season-ending 32-9 playoff loss in Tampa Bay, came with head coach Nick Sirianni orchestrating the offense — though it was offensive coordinator Brian Johnson fired in the aftermath.
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I was told Johnson did not have a significant role in game planning or play calling last season — Sirianni controlled the offense. GM Howie Roseman has made changes for 2024: Moore will call the offense with assistance from offensive line coach Jeff Stoutland, who is responsible for the run game.
Back to you, Jacob.
Officiating Improvement Plan: NFL’s ‘underfunded and understaffed’
Forget questions about whetherDez Bryant caught it or how the Saints would have fared in the Super Bowl if pass interference was called, the NFL’s officiating problems extend far beyond the field.
Today,The Athletic’s Kalyn Kahler sharedan insightful story on the NFL’s officials. After she spoke to 10 former zebras, Kalyn’s article taught me plenty about the league’s most infamous part-time employees. Here are a few nuggets:
- Last month, the NFL seemed to acknowledge the officiating issue when announcing changes to the department as part of an “Officiating Improvement Plan.”
- League officials have a union, the NFL Referee Association (NFLRA), which has existed in some formsince 1966. In 1994, they signed their first Collective Bargaining Agreement with the NFL, with the current CBA preventing current officials from talking with reporters.
- Officials are reviewed after each game by a team of graders at the league office. The micromanaging of recent department leader Walt Anderson had crews going from receiving “around four to five downgrades per game before Anderson to 15-20 downgrades per game with him.” One former official said, “After about Week 4 or 5, I stopped reading them because they just made morale really bad.”
- Kalyn notes that “Anderson also implemented the biggest change in officiating mechanics — the way officials move on the field, where they stand to get the best view and how they work in concert to cover multiple angles — since Art McNally developed them in the 1970s.” Former officials said it made sense in theory, but in practice made them worse at their roles. (That explains it!)
NFL officials (and fans, coaches, players) could be in for a difficult season, as “an abnormally high number of inexperienced officials will take the field.” Great.
The NBA, MLB and NHL all employee full-time referees, which is easier for their suits to justify, given the length of their respective seasons. But with the NFL setting a revenue goal that would make them almost as much as the three leagues combined(!), you have to wonder when they will stop considering their officials merely “a necessary evil,” as one put it.
Around the NFL
Giants WR Malik Nabers, the No. 6 pick in this year’s draft, “has gamebreaking talent but has room to grow,” according to beat reporter Dan Duggan’s latestrookie scouting report.
Only 16 of the 64 rookies who’ve played for HC Sean McDermott inBuffalohave started at least seven games, noted Tim Graham in hisreview of Bills OTAs. Safeties coach Joe Danna is “doing everything he can” to get rookie safety Cole Bishopup to speed (and on the field).
QB Russell Wilsonis the “unquestioned QB1 in Pittsburgh,” writes Mark Kaboly in his12 observations from Steelers OTAs. One potential player to watch: fourth-year tight end Pat Freiermuth, who “was not only targeted often, but looked like a legitimate playmaker in this offense.”
Ravens K Justin Tuckeris ready for the physical contact that might accompany the NFL’s new kickoff rules, claiming thathe’s spent more time in the weight room. Prime Video analytics expert Sam Schwartzstein, a major part of the kickoff changes that debuted in the XFL,doesn’t anticipatekickers to be as involved as most expect.
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(Photo: Justin Ford/Getty Images)
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