The Pass Rushers Of The NFC West
After the J.J. Watt signing that landed him in Arizona, the NFC West easily has the best pass rushers in the league.
After J.J. Watt signed with the Cardinals yesterday, life gets a whole lot tougher for NFC West quarterbacks. In Arizona, they are able to put J.J. Watt on the opposite side of elite edge rusher, Chandler Jones. Between the two, they have racked up 198 sacks in their career and have made 8 Pro Bowls.
Outside of these two monsters, the Cardinals also have outside linebacker Haason Reddick who was near the top of the sack leader board this past season with 12.5.
If you look north to Los Angeles, you’ll find the Rams. They are anchored by three time Defensive Player of the Year, Aaron Donald who has recorded 85.5 sacks in his career as an interior d-lineman. He is not only the top defensive lineman in the NFC, he is the top defensive player and most dominant player in the whole league.
One of Donalds teammates who landed in L.A last season was Leonard Floyd. He made his name known in the NFC West and in the whole league when he had 10.5 sacks, the most of his career in one season.
In San Francisco, they have four guys that can really rush the passer. On the interior, they drafted Javon Kinlaw. He may not have had great numbers last season but, in the coming years I believe he can be an elite pass rusher. Next to him in the interior is Arik Armstead. Armstead is 6’7 and is able to create one on one matchups for his defensive ends. He recorded 3.5 sacks last season and faced double teams on the majority of his snaps.
On the outside for the 49ers, they have Nick Bosa, who tore his ACL last season and Dee Ford. The tricky part of this San Fran pass rush is that they weren’t healthy last year. This next season, we could see four guys that are able to pin their ears back and make life difficult for offensive coordinators.
For the last team in this division, the Seattle Seahawks, their top pass rusher was safety Jamal Adams. He recorded 9.5 sacks this past season while the next best was Jarran Reed who had 6.5. Seattle needs to focus on taking an edge rusher in the draft like a Zaven Collins from Tulsa or Jaelan Phillips from Miami.
I would hate to be an offensive lineman in this conference or a coordinator that has to game plan against these guys because each of these teams has more than one guy that is going to get after the quarterback.