Russell Wilson is wasting an elite defense, the Jets (!) are fun, and goodnight to the 2022 Panthers
This week’s Four Verts column features a goodbye to the 2022 Carolina Panthers, an ode to one of the upstart New York football teams and a look at the horrifying malpractice that’s happening with the Denver Broncos.
Russell Wilson is wasting an elite defense
The Denver Broncos are 2-4 this year, and this is one of the rare situations where all of the blame belongs on one side of the ball. The Broncos' defense has held together its end of the bargain, allowing just six touchdowns through the Broncos' first six games of the season. Rookie defensive coordinator Ejiro Evero has the defense humming, Patrick Surtain II has established himself as a dominant cornerback and Bradley Chubb is leading a physical front seven.
This is, unquestionably, one of the best defenses in the NFL. According to Ben Baldwin of The Athletic, the Broncos rank second in expected points added per play on defense (-0.117) behind only the San Francisco 49ers. They’re giving up 4.5 yards per play, also second in the league. They’re seventh in sack percentage (7.7%). Moving the ball against the Broncos is really, really hard — this has been a championship-caliber defense this season.
The Broncos moving the ball themselves has been a completely different story. The combination of head coach Nathaniel Hackett and quarterback Russell Wilson has been a complete disaster for Denver. The reason teams go out and get a franchise quarterback is because they feel like the acquisition will immediately send them to the ranks of the Super Bowl contenders. Bold take, but that’s why the Broncos signed Wilson to a five-year, $242.6 million contract. The defense is doing all of the heavy lifting right now.
Due to his contract, Wilson won’t be going anywhere for a few years. According to Spotrac, the first year Denver can realistically expect to be able to move on from Wilson is 2026. That seems like an eternity from now based on how Wilson has looked over the first portion of the season. It’s nuts that Wilson’s contract status has become a talking point just six games into his Broncos tenure, but it’s somewhat reasonable to ponder where he’ll be in four seasons if this is what it looks like now.
Only the Houston Texans have scored fewer points than Denver, and that’s due to the fact that they’ve played one fewer game. The Broncos currently rank 29th in EPA per play on offense (-0.089) and 30th in success rate (38.3%). They somehow rank 19th in yards per play (5.3), which means that their acquired talent makes something happen a couple times a game before they fail to actually get the ball in the end zone.
The only viable solution at the moment to salvage things might be to fire Hackett. Wilson is locked in as the Broncos quarterback unless he retires in the next two or three seasons. Hackett has made himself expendable by failing to produce any offense with one of the best quarterbacks in this era of football. The franchise's new ownership has money to blow if that’s the avenue it takes.
Just about all of the Broncos’ misfortunes can be attributed to an offense that’s stuck in the mud. Free the Broncos’ defense, it doesn’t deserve this.
Goodnight, 2022 Panthers
It was the worst of times, it was the worst of times. This season is over for the Panthers. Matt Rhule is gone after his three-year reign of doing nothing besides giving pep talks to David Tepper. The Panthers definitely do not have a franchise quarterback on the roster. Star running back Christian McCaffrey was reportedly traded to the 49ers for a package of four draft picks. Robbie Anderson was basically kicked off the team during their loss to the Los Angeles Rams, in which backup quarterback P.J. Walker completed precisely one pass that traveled at least one yard downfield.
This season is over. It stinks to say that so early in the season, but this team is just lifeless. There’s a little bit of solace in knowing that the failures of this season might bring a franchise quarterback next year, but this absolutely was not the plan coming into the season. They traded for Baker Mayfield in an attempt to bring some stability to an offense that has had no stability whatsoever. The efforts of the Rhule era coming to a close resulted in the departure of McCaffrey, signifying the start of a new era in Charlotte.
With McCaffrey headed to San Francisco, the last vestiges of the 2010s Panthers are gone. That’s a little bittersweet. Cam Newton, Luke Kuechly, Thomas Davis and Greg Olsen are off to their post-football careers. McCaffrey will be wearing a new uniform soon. This is the first time in awhile the Panthers will really be flipping the page and starting over from scratch. That’s a bittersweet moment for a franchise that has played a lot of good football over the past decade.
David Tepper has fumbled the start of his ownership reign with the Panthers, that is undeniable. However, the core of this roster is not totally talentless. They seem destined to hold onto star edge rusher Brian Burns, which will be a valuable piece for whoever the new head coach is. Derrick Brown is finally growing into the defensive tackle that the Panthers drafted him to be, Jaycee Horn is a stud at cornerback and safety Jeremy Chinn is an effective player when he’s on the field. Offense is a bit of a different story, but rookie left tackle Ikem Ekonwu and wide receiver D.J. Moore are talented players to keep around as well.
It’s a new era for the Panthers. Tepper hasn’t inspired much confidence to believe that his next coaching search will be better than his first one, but hey, sometimes you just need something different to get onto the right track. C.J. Stroud and Bryce Young might want to look at properties in Charlotte — it never hurts to get a head start.
The New York Jets are a real deal football team
Hey, this is a new feeling. The New York Jets are pretty good! They’re currently 4-2, own one of the better defenses in football and have a new shiny toy in the backfield in rookie running back Breece Hall. After years of stockpiling picks with high talent, the Jets finally appear to have a core worth building around. Young players like Sauce Gardner, Garrett Wilson, Michael Carter, Alijah Vera-Tucker and Hall have all played a huge role in the Jets having a winning record at this point in the season.
That’s a big deal for a team that hasn’t had much hope over the past decade. Not only are the Jets winning games, but they’ve really flipped the script on defense and are starting to look like the defense Robert Saleh envisioned when he was hired to be their head coach prior to last season. Quinnen Williams has been a monster, Carl Lawson is providing steady pressure and the rest of the defense is playing fast. That’s the mantra of what Saleh called in San Francisco — go let the defensive line make plays. They have a lot of juice up front and it's perfectly tailored to the one-gap, upfield style of play that Saleh likes.
The Jets have a young nucleus that’s already showing up and they’ve emerged as legitimate playoff contenders in the AFC. The Buffalo Bills are still the top dog in the AFC East, but this Jets team is a threat to everyone else in the division.
The only thing that the Jets are missing to make this a complete team is a bit more consistency on offense. They currently ranked 21st in EPA per play (-0.029) and 27th in success rate (41%). The offense has made big plays at key times, but as a whole they still have a lot of room for improvement. That’s exciting. They’re winning games, and still leaving a lot of offensive production on the field.
I, personally, was not a huge fan of the job that Saleh did last year, but he’s making me eat my own receipts that I threw out there. Saleh has started to put his imprint on the defense and the culture of the organization. If the offense can catch up to the rest of the team, the Jets just might be back. That’s getting ahead of ourselves a little bit, so for now, it’s fun to enjoy one of the young, upstart teams in the league.
The Cleveland Browns defense is absolutely horrid
The Browns need a team effort to stay relevant while Deshaun Watson serves his 11-game suspension, and they haven’t gotten that at all. Jacoby Brissett performed well at the start of the season, but he’s reverted to the guy that just looks like a competent backup instead of a bonafide long-term starter. That’s just the Brissett experience. The Browns should’ve been ready for a few games to not go smoothly, but their defense hasn’t helped much this season.
To be fair, they’ve had to fight through injuries to some key players. All-World defensive end Myles Garrett missed time after suffering injuries from a car accident and his running mate, Jadeveon Clowney, also missed time with an injury. Still, this unit has really underperformed, especially in relation to the investment on that side of the ball. According to Spotrac, the Browns rank ninth this year in total money spent on defense, but they’re 31st in EPA per play (0.137). That’s not good.
Defensive coordinator Joe Woods is getting a ton of blame, and deservedly so. There’s no reason for the Bailey Zappe-led Patriots to score 38 points in a blowout at home. No disrespect to Zappe, who has played reasonably well for a mid-round rookie quarterback, but the expectations should be a lot higher for this Browns team. Nick Chubb is a superhero, but asking him to compensate for Brissett and a floundering defense is too much for any running back to handle.
The Browns might be too far removed from the playoff race when Watson gets back to make a late-season push. Right now, they’re slated to fork over the sixth overall pick to the Texans as a part of their trade for him. That’s a pick that the current iteration of the Brown could really use, like, on a premier defensive player that can make that side of the ball more productive.
The 2022 Browns were always going to struggle to make the playoffs with Watson out for 11 games, but they aren’t even really putting up a fight right now. Luckily, they’re still in the hunt for the AFC North with the Baltimore Ravens and Cincinnati Bengals floundering around, but suggesting they’ll play well enough to win the division by the time Watson comes back is a difficult thing to project.
Just five more games of Brissett to go before the quarterback that hasn’t played since the 2020 season gets back on the field. Have fun with that!
