4-Down Territory: Debating the NFL’s 50 most dominant players
Recently, the writers and editors for all the team sites around the NFL Wire network voted for the 50 most dominant players in the NFL today. It’s a great list full of the best talent in the league today, but you know how these things go — there’s always someone ready to poke holes in these things.
In this case, those “somebodies” are Touchdown Wire’s Doug Farrar and Kyle Madson of Niners Wire, in this week’s episode of “4-Down Territory.” Both Doug and Kyle were eager to present their cases for the offensive and defensive players who should have made the list, and the ones who did… and perhaps shouldn’t have.
You can read both parts of the list here:
And you can watch “4-Down Territory” right here:
You can also listen and subscribe to the “4-Down Territory” podcast on Spotify…
…and on Apple Podcasts.
1. Who's one (or more) offensive player(s) who should have made the Top 50, but didn't?
Doug: Browns guard Joel Bitonio. While it’s nice that three guards — Zack Martin of the Cowboys, Quenton Nelson of the Colts and Chris Lindstrom of the Falcons — made the Top 50 (I’m always in favor of the big dudes getting some love), it could easily be argued that none of those fine gentlemen had a better 2022 season than did Bitonio, and Bitonio has been one of the NFL’s best guards for a good long time now. The nine-year veteran, who has played for the Browns throughout his NFL career, allowed one sack, six quarterback hits, and 13 quarterback hurries in 667 pass-blocking snaps, and he did so with a quarterback situation that was — to put it kindly — unstable.
Add in his run-blocking expertise and his athleticism in all things, and I would have liked to see Bitonio over at least Nelson and Lindstrom based on their 2022 seasons, and he’s right up there with Martin, if not ahead of him.
Kyle: Buccaneers receiver Mike Evans’ absence is the one that really sticks out to me. He’s been in the NFL for nine years and has 1,000 yards in every season – INCLUDING the year he only played 13 games. It’s so hard to be as consistently productive as Evans has been, and his inevitability should’ve landed him in the top 50.
I also feel like I’d be a bad Niners Wire editor if I didn’t add a sprinkle of Deebo Samuel love here. Samuel had a down year in 2022, but still showed flashes of being nigh impossible to bring down in the open field. Ultimately dominance has to be sustained, so I get why he didn’t get into the top 50, but a big year in 2023 should get him into the same iteration of this list in 2024.
2. Which offensive player made the Top 50, and really shouldn't have?
Doug: I’ll go with two guys at the same position on the same team. Eagles cornerbacks James Bradberry and Darius Slay. Bradberry ended up as the 52nd player on the list based on total voting, and the only reason I can think that he didn’t make the cut is that he’s coming off by far his best season to date. There’s also the matter of 2021, his final season with the Giants. That may have been his worst. Then, he allowed 60 catches on 92 targets for 729 yards, 262 yards after the catch, eight touchdowns, four interceptions, 13 pass breakups, and an opponent passer rating of 100.3.
Then, the Giants decided that he wasn’t a priority in free agency, which allowed the Eagles to swoop in with a one-year, $7.25 million deal that may have been the NFL’s biggest bargain in 2022. All Bradberry did for the NFC champs was to allow 46 catches on 98 targets for 489 yards, 159 yards after the catch, two touchdowns, four interceptions, 12 pass breakups, and an opponent passer rating of 51.8.
Slay came in 59th overall, which seems like a snub for a guy who allowed 47 catches on 83 targets for 559 yards, 162 yards after the catch, five touchdowns, three interceptions, nine pass breakups, and an opponent passer rating of 82.3.
That touchdown total seems high, but it’s mitigated by the fact that Slay spent so much time last season defending the No. 1 receiver for the opposing offense, and he did so much in press-man coverage. Few players at his position were on a higher tightrope last season.
Kyle: Yeah, Darius Slay is a good answer. I’m gonna put Saints linebacker Demario Davis in here, though. He’s been an All-Pro in each of the last four seasons and has 100 tackles in eight out of 10 years since 2013. He’s also become an improved player in coverage over the last four years while also stuffing the stat sheet with 21 sacks over those four seasons. Controlling the middle of the field is vital for modern defenses, and there aren’t many LBs doing it better than Davis right now.
3. Same questions for the defense; Which player(s) should have made the list, and didn't?
Doug: Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson. This was a tough one. If this Top 50 was more about the guys due for career-best seasons in 2023, Jackson might be Top 10. But it wasn’t — it was about the most dominant players coming into the 2023 season, and based on his last two campaigns, I have a tough time putting Jackson anywhere neat No. 19, which is where he finished. Jackson has perhaps his best receiver corps to date, and new offensive coordinator Todd Monken has the tools to de-compress a passing game that has been less than stellar overall under Greg Roman of late.
Beyond that, there’s the fact that Jackson has missed a total of nine games in the last two seasons due to injury (five in 2022), and when he was on the field, he ranked 19th in DYAR among starting quarterbacks, and 14th in DVOA. That’s okay, but is it dominant? I have trouble ascribing that particular adjective to Jackson’s last two seasons, no matter how bullish I am on his near future.
Kyle: I have a couple here. I think we put Jaguars quarterback Trevor Lawrence on this list way too early. He was really good last year and improved dramatically under Doug Pederson, but he was still at just 7.0 yards per attempt with 25 touchdowns and eight interceptions. It was a nice year, but calling him one of the 50 most dominant players in the NFL feels premature.
The other player that stuck out to me was Ravens tight end Mark Andrews. Again, he’s been really good for the last four years, but he has only two seasons with more than 850 receiving yards and a lot of his touchdown production comes from a lack of options in the Ravens offense. Again, I’m not trying to disparage what Andrews has done offensively, but he’s a good receiver and an average-ish run blocker. I’d quibble with calling him one of the most dominant players in football.
4. Finally, which defensive player that made the list shouldn't be on here?
Doug: Dolphins cornerback Jalen Ramsey. Ramsey finished 21st on our list, and while that’s deserved to a point when he’s at his best, there are also too many instances these days when that’s not quite good enough. Last season — his final season for the Rams before the trade that sent him to the Dolphins — Ramsey allowed 56 catches on 86 targets for 712 yards, 234 yards after the catch, seven touchdowns, four interceptions, 11 pass breakups, and an opponent passer rating of 98.6.
Not ideal, but maybe you can slough that off and go to the tape and balance it out. Here’s the problem there — Ramsey’s performance in man coverage last season aligned in metrics and tape, and it was highly problematic, to say the least. When in man coverage last season, Ramsey allowed nine catches on 11 targets for 145 yards, two touchdowns, no interceptions, two pass breakups, and an opponent passer rating of 149.1.
Yes, Ramsey has been a great player for the most part throughout his career. But as important as man coverage is in today’s NFL, calling a cornerback “dominant” when he nearly allows a perfect passer rating when he’s playing it seems a bit much.
Kyle: I feel about Broncos cornerback Patrick Surtain II the way I feel about Lawrence. I’m certain he’s trending toward being prominently on this list for a long time, but putting him there now over a handful of other defenders who have been doing it for longer feels premature. Surtain was good as a rookie and even better in his second season, but with guys like Davis, Slay and Von Miller all sitting outside the top 50, putting Surtain in there is tough for me.
