Links to all of this year's Reading the New Defense Articles
Atl | Chi | Dal | GB | Jac | LAC | Mia | NYG | Phi | Sea | Ten | Was
Footballguy Sigmund Bloom often opines that there is no longer an information advantage in fantasy football. Increased media coverage of the NFL scouting combine, breaking news on social media, and advanced analytics are all equalizers in fantasy football competition.
Coverage of skill-position players is a daily exercise. NFL defenses, however, do not enjoy the same limelight. Offense is to the big city what defense is to the small town. News of defenders travels more slowly and is less sensationalized. Complex data for analysis are harder to come by. IDP fantasy gamers find themselves unaware of important changes to player values hiding in plain sight.
Fantasy gamers drafted Texan Jalen Pitre as the second defensive back nearly by consensus last year. Scoring 8 fantasy points per game, a 5.5-PPG drop from 2022, Pitre was a liability in IDP gamers’ line-ups.
Meanwhile, T.J. Edwards proved valuable, finishing as an LB1 in the tackle-rich middle of Chicago’s zone coverages. Vikings defensive coordinator plugged Harrison Phillips into the interior role that propelled Christian Wilkins to 84 combined tackles in 2021.
Clues foreshadowing these revelations exist. This series offers analysis of new defensive coordinators’ past schemes together with roster changes and player contracts. The goal is to read a new defense to set fantasy expectations for 2024.
RELATED: See Reading the New Dolphins Defense here >>>
The Importance of Scheme and Deployment
This article leads the second season of the series. The first Reading the New Defense of 2023 offers additional background on the importance of changing defensive schemes, including the significance of true-position IDP. The series further assumes true-position line-ups – two interior defenders, two edge rushers, two off-ball linebackers, two safeties, two cornerbacks, and a flex – mirroring nickel personnel, the NFL’s most common defensive grouping.
Pro Football Focus’s Jon Macri reports data analysis indicating a correlation between linebackers’ tackle rates and zone coverages. Linebackers who made tackles at a high rate per snap played on teams that more frequently played zone in 2023 and each of the two preceding seasons.
#FFIDP - Most efficient coverage schemes for LB tackling in 2023:
— Jon Macri (@PFF_Macri) May 9, 2024
Cover-2: 16.1%
Cover-6: 15.6%
Cover-3: 14.7%
Cover-4: 14.6%
AVERAGE LB TKL RATE: 13.4%
Cover-1: 10.2%
Cover-0: 9.0%
2-Man: 7.9%
Reminder: Zone-heavy defenses are a cheat code for IDP while man-heavy ones hurt… https://t.co/8DELTJojhx
Macri also reports tackle rates per snap for safeties. Known as the last line of defense, safeties are likelier to make tackles when they align in “the box” – where linebackers typically line up.
#FFIDP - Safety tackle efficiency by defensive alignment (2021-2023), per @PFF:
— Jon Macri (@PFF_Macri) June 4, 2024
BOX: 11.1% ?
WIDE: 10.4% ???
SLOT: 9.6% ?
-- Average: 9.1% --
DEEP: 8.5% ?
DL: 7.9% ?
Changing Schemes
In Summer 2023, Vic Fangio was the talk of defensive pro football. The long-time coach who began his career with expansion teams of the 1990s returned to the league as Miami’s defensive coordinator. Coaches implementing versions of his scheme proliferated the league.
This summer, the Seattle Seahawks’ new head coach, Mike Macdonald, has succeeded Fangio as the media-proclaimed defensive genius of the NFL. His former assistants now lead defenses in Baltimore, where Macdonald coordinated for just two years, and Miami, Tennessee, and Los Angeles (Chargers).
Macdonald’s defensive system is not unique and resembles Vic Fangio’s. Both use 3-4 bases, 4-man under fronts in nickel subpackages, and frequent pre-snap structures with two high safeties. The Athletic’s Ted Nguyen explains that Macdonald’s strongest traits are his teaching methods and play calling. Matty F. Brown and Cody Alexander discuss Macdonald's defense, how first-time defensive coordinator fits, and what the defense might look like in 2024 on Alexander's podcast.
Under Macdonald’s guidance, Baltimore led the league in several defensive categories, including DVOA. Notably, the strength of Baltimore’s defensive personnel was up the middle: safeties, linebackers, and tackle Justin Madubuike, a revelation of 2023. Macdonald fielded street free agents on the edges and a motley crew of cornerbacks once do-it-all veteran Marlon Humphrey was lost to injury.
In contrast, Fangio had big-name edge rushers and cornerbacks. His unit’s middling performance and his bristly personality earned him a pink slip. Fangio will coordinate Philadelphia’s defense in 2024.
Aden Durde serves as Seattle’s defensive coordinator this season. Mike Macdonald plans to call the plays.
Erecting Defensive Fronts
With Madubuike’s emergence, Baltimore and Miami each had a premier interior disruptor. NFL defenses are increasingly prioritizing interior pressure to interfere with short quarterback drops and timing-based passing games. Independent Seahawks analyst Matty Brown explains Macdonald’s fronts and touches on how Seattle personnel fit.
Seahawks Defensive Tackles
The Seahawks' offseason investments illustrate the importance of interior pressure to Macdonald. They re-signed Leonard Williams, for whom they traded in mid-2023, to a huge contract and made Byron Murphy II their first pick of the 2024 draft. These two will team with Jarran Reed to apply interior pressure. Williams brings versatility to split wide, making him the best bet to lead the platoon in snaps and fantasy points.
Seattle brought in journeyman Johnathan Hankins to rotate with Cameron Young at nose tackle. Neither are fantasy assets.
Leonard Williams with a couple of nice snaps against the run pic.twitter.com/MXEZBIujRg
— Nate Tice (@Nate_Tice) November 8, 2023
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Seahawks Edge Rushers
Uchenna Nwosu enjoyed a breakout season in 2022, his first in Seattle. Despite his statistical pace falling off early in 2023, the team sorely missed him. He’ll pair with third-year edge Boye Mafe, who shined when pressed into service in relief of Nwosu last season.
The Seahawks moved Dre'Mont Jones from interior defender to the edge after their trade for Leonard Williams. Their investments in Williams and Murphy along with the scheme’s need for size to set the edge in subpackages may keep Jones at edge for 2024.
Two former second-round picks, Derick Hall in 2023 and Darrell Taylor in 2020, round out the unit. Taylor’s track record is that of a pass specialist. At his size, Hall fits best as a pass-rush specialist in the 2024 Seahawks’ defense.
The platoon of edge rushers will be as deep as it appears on paper. No Baltimore edge rusher played even 60% of the Ravens’ defensive snaps in 2023. Justin Madubuike led all members of the team’s defensive front with 757 snaps (65.4%).
Lamar staying out of Boye Mafe's grip until the very end pic.twitter.com/P99ZaWNh1Y
— Nate Tice (@Nate_Tice) November 8, 2023
Building Out Coverages
The Ravens frequently played zone defense from middle-of-the-field-open (MOFO) structure in 2023. Macdonald had one of the league’s best centerfielders in Baltimore last year – safety Marcus Williams; nevertheless, his Ravens were among league leaders aligning with two high safeties, according to Sports Info Solutions. That tendency is likely to carry over to 2024 in Seattle.
Macdonald called man coverage at a middling rate relative to the rest of the league. This equates to less than 30 percent of snaps in the modern NFL. Two data sources for coverage by type, Sports Info Solutions and Pro Football Focus, typically differ by a couple of percentage points. Nevertheless, the decline in the use of man coverage league-wide is striking. Some teams used man coverage more than half the time in the previous decade.
As a rookie in 2022, Seahawks Riq Woolen looked like he could take on opposing X-receivers in press-man coverage at the line of scrimmage, but he regressed in 2023. His team became one of the most reliant on zone coverage. The 2024 Seahawks will likely play man coverage closer to the league-average rate. Woolen and Devon Witherspoon could emerge as a formidable tandem in the league’s budding urge to implement more press-man coverage. Such a tendency would pair well with the team’s investments in interior disruptors.
Seahawks Cornerbacks
Seattle’s first pick of the 2023 draft, at number-5 overall, cornerback Devon Witherspoon finished as the third-best fantasy cornerback of the season with 10.9 points per game in Footballguys scoring. Witherspoon showed inside-outside flexibility and could emerge as the team’s full-time nickel. He’ll start opposite Riq Woolen in base and move inside for at least a portion of Seattle’s subpackage reps.
The 2023 Ravens’ first option at nickelback in subpackages was 6’4 safety Kyle Hamilton. At 6’ tall and 185 pounds, Witherspoon lacks Hamilton’s size for run fits required of a nickel in two-high-safety sets. Witherspoon nevertheless displays the aggressiveness needed as a striker from the defensive backfield. Should Macdonald find a secondary option at nickel, Witherspoon would lose just a bit of his fantasy sheen.
Woolen would need to revive his rookie form to return to fantasy relevance. Guarding X-receivers with his length, he can break up passes.
3:20 of Devon Witherspoon rookie highlights pic.twitter.com/lWXcVhylas
— James Foster (@NoFlagsFilm) May 6, 2024
Seahawks Safeties
Julian Love remains in Seattle after signing on in free agency two springs ago. He looks to three-peat as a DB1 for fantasy gamers alongside newly signed Rayshawn Jenkins. Love, not Jenkins, is an alternative as a secondary nickel, which could boost his three-peat potential.
Jenkins played a box-safety role in Jacksonville but operated deep regularly with the Chargers on his rookie contract. The latter role is more likely since no other Seahawk is experienced in it. Love and Jenkins could split box snaps roughly evenly in one-high coverages as left and right safeties.
Seahawks Linebackers
As Jon Macri reports in the embedded tweet above, linebackers profit as tacklers in zone defenses in MOFO structures. Macdonald’s scheme aligns with this league-wide trend, which should position his linebackers for fantasy utility in 2024. The players themselves cause hesitation.
Seattle signed long-time Dolphin Jerome Baker as an unrestricted free agent. He perennially disappoints as his tackle efficiency falls short of statistical expectations. He has ample experience in man-heavy coverages and produced as a pass-rusher in simulated pressures. Baker played under Fangio last year and relayed the Dolphins’ defensive signals for several years.
Former Bill Tyrel Dodson, also signed in free agency, looks set to play alongside Baker in nickel subpackages. Dodson started ten games in Buffalo but never full-time and only in place of injured players ahead of him on the depth chart.
Under Macdonald in 2023, Roquan Smith and Patrick Queen played nearly full-time and were reliable weekly starters for fantasy gamers. Baker and Dodson will have to earn these roles in Seattle in 2024. Dodson must show he can cover, or Macdonald will be forced to substitute him with dime personnel.
Baker is undersized and not historically strong in run defense. With their depth along the defensive line and light edge rushers, the Seahawks could turn to penny personnel. A subpackage with five on the line and one linebacker could jeopardize reps for either Baker or Dodson.
2 minutes and 46 seconds of highlights of #Seahawks new LB, Jerome Baker!
— Dr. Ball Knower (@seeeeaaaahawks) March 17, 2024
Baker + Dodson will be fun to watch ?? pic.twitter.com/7SH9KKdHGL
2024 Seahawks Outlook
The two biggest names on Seattle’s defensive depth chart, interior lineman Leonard Williams and edge rusher Uchenna Nwosu, earned recognition as fantasy assets with good, not great, seasons playing high volumes. Neither will likely approach the 80-percent snap share they need to recapture 2022 magic. Nwosu has more downside risk than upside at his current ADP of edge rusher #28. (The IDP Show is collecting ADP data via dozens of best-ball drafts.)
ADP suggests that drafters expect less from Williams, who finished as a DT1 in 2023. His ADP is a more reasonable 18 at his position.
Boye Mafe was a late bloomer. He arrived on campus at the University of Minnesota weighing 218 pounds with unremarkable athletic testing numbers on his resume. He grew into a premium athlete but was deemed a raw prospect with high upside ahead of the 2022 NFL Draft. The second-rounder is developing as quickly as Seattle could have hoped. He has upside as a fantasy starter at his current ADP of 30 among edge rushers. He must merely replicate his 2023 production in which he finished 21st in fantasy points at the position.
Devon Witherspoon is a solid bet to post a CB1 season in 2024. Such a statement is significant, given the flat fantasy scoring of the position and the fluidity of roles in the defensive backfield during the season. The ball skills he demonstrated as a rookie and opportunities to attack the line of scrimmage are precisely what fantasy gamers should seek in a cornerback.
With an ADP outside of the top 15 among safeties, Julian Love is a value. His versatility to attack from the slot offers big-play opportunities to supplement tackle numbers that could clear 100 for the third consecutive year. The uninspiring linebackers in front of him could afford him opportunities not otherwise projected.
According to early ADP, Jerome Baker’s track record and Tyrel Dodson’s lack thereof are scaring off fantasy gamers. Each has upside as a fantasy team’s fifth linebacker. As the signal caller, Baker has the safer floor and an LB3 ceiling. Dodson, the relatively unknown quantity, might have LB2 upside, yet he’s as likely to land on waiver wires by October.
Julian Love with a tip-top toe tap. pic.twitter.com/3xKGDDTRlv
— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) December 19, 2023
Summer Plans
Reading the New Defense will drop each week throughout the summer with a fresh look at expectations for defenses under the tutelage of a new defensive coordinator. Analysis at Footballguys aims to equip fantasy gamers with the knowledge and confidence to draft players for their rosters for deployment on Sundays this coming fall. Readers are welcome to contact and follow this writer @DynastyTripp on the app formerly known as Twitter.
