Best position for freak D-Linemen?

[Carman Bulldog]

Just curious what the consensus best position is for a freak defensive linemen (ie. 80-90+ across the board) in the 3-4?

Do you play him at LDE where he can tee off and rush the passer all day or do you play him at Nose/RDE where he can stuff the run and still be hopefully somewhat effective in the pass rush? I'm assuming most go with the nose but I'm interested in others train of though.

[stevew]

LDE because he will have the best opportunity to get a bunch of sacks/hurries from that position.

[aston217]

Why is it that a LDE in the 3-4 rushes the passer?

[MRL17]

In 4-3, both DEs rush the passer. In 3-4, the WLB takes the pass rushing role on the right side, and the LDE rushes from the left side.

[BYU 14]

Why not the RDE, since that would be the blind side of the QB and best pass rush option?

[aston217]

Oh, never mind, that makes sense. The 3-4 in this game is just the 4-3 with the exception that the WLB is the RDE, the RDE is the RDT, the NT is the LDT, and the LDE is still the LDE (a pass-rushing position).

Does that mean in a 4-3, one DT position is more important than the other?

[MRL17]

The blind side rusher is more important on the outside. (RDE in 4-3, WLB in 3-4) I'm not sure if the game distinguishes this way on the inside. But maybe play your better DT at RDT just in case ;)

[Steel]

Switch to a 4-3 and put him at RE.

[QuikSand]

What's even less understood in this conversation (unbelievably, given the thread so far) is what is best for the team, rather than just this player's performance.

If you play a 3-4 front, your stud DE will put up his best numbers slotted as the LDE. but it's much harder to tell whether that is what helps the team the most, overall. The game, after all, clearly engages in some weird variety of dice-rolling and stat-assigning to come up with this stuff... it's possible (for instance) that your DT will post much better pass rushing stats with the stud slotted at RDE than he would with him slotted at LDE. Really tough to tell, and tough to test.

So, slot him at LDE and let him go to the pro bowl. Why not?

[MRL17]

I always wanted to do some testing to find out the effect of good inside D-linemen but never got around to it.

The outside rushers poach the stats, but if you set up a team with scrubs as the inside rushers and ran a bunch of seasons, then replaced them with studs inside and ran a bunch of seasons again, you could quantify in some way the effect of good pass-rushers in the interior line. The total pass rush percentage, or total number of hurries, sacks, knockdowns, and passes blocked for the line as a group.

Probably a good study for someone with more time on their hands than me ;)

[MRL17]

Ok. So I had some free time waiting for the big game tonight and I did some testing. It's my first crack at testing anything publicly, so be gentle. ;)

The Test:

I wanted to quantify the effect of having good outside pass rushers vs having good inside pass rushers. The test was done using the Baltimore Ravens in a dummy multiplayer league with every team being under AI control except the Ravens.

The defense being used is a 3-4 style with the Outside Rushers being the LDE and WLB; and the Inside Rushers being the RDE and NT.

The Inside Rusher Test:

I selected 2 stud inside rushers, RDE Terrell Suggs and NT Haloti Ngata, then I selected 2 players that were very similar to those two guys except their pass rushing bars were much lower.

Ratings:
RDE Suggs: Run: 85, PRT: 81, PRS: 97, PlayDia: 74, Endur: 50
RDE Aaron Smith: Run: 86, PRT: 16, PRS: 48, PlayDia: 60, Endur: 42

NT Ngata: Run: 74, PRT: 100, PRS: 90, PlayDia: 88, Endur: 84
NT Sione Pouha: Run: 60, PRT: 0, PRS: 28, PlayDia: 58, Endur: 49

I tried to find guys that were similar at run defending, endurance, and play diagnosis to eliminate those bars as variables. They're not perfect matches, but I think we should still be able to get useful info here. Also, all players listed were traded so that it's their first year on the team, and they have no affinities or conflicts to eliminate the effect of cohesion and chemistry.

I ran 10 seasons with Suggs and Ngata playing RDE and NT at 100% with injuries off. (When I say 10 seasons, I ran the same season 10 times over) Then I ran 10 seasons with Smith and Pouha playing RDE and NT in the same manner. (In Suggs and Ngata's seasons, Smith and Pouha were deactivated, and vice versa. I just replaced them in the depth chart in all defensive situations)

The Inside Rushing Results:

Suggs/Ngata: PR%: 24.2, Sacks: 43.0, Hurr: 86.8, Blkd: 16.9, QBKD: 51.4

Smith/Pouha: PR%: 21.8, Sacks: 38.6, Hurr: 72.8, Blkd: 16.1, QBKD: 23.0

Differences:

In units: PR%: 2.4, Sacks: 4.4, Hurr: 14, Blkd: .8, QBKD: 28.4

Pecent less: PR%: 10.0, Sacks: 10.2, Hurr: 16.1, Blkd: 4.7, QBKD: 55.3%


The Outside Rusher Test:

I selected 2 stud outside rushers, LDE Terrell Suggs and WLB Tamba Hali, then I selected 2 players that were very similar to those two guys except their pass rushing bars were much lower.

Ratings:
LDE Suggs: Run: 85, PRT: 81, PRS: 97, PlayDia: 74, Endur: 50
LDE Aaron Smith: Run: 86, PRT: 16, PRS: 48, PlayDia: 60, Endur: 42

WLB Tamba Hali: Run: 58, PRT: 100, PRS: 90, PlayDia: 12, Endur: 48
WLB Danny Clark: Run: 39, PRT: 7, PRS: 36, PlayDia:63, Endur: 67

See the Inside Rusher Test for details, I did this test the same way.

The Outside Rushing Results:

Suggs/Hali: PR%: 23.8, Sacks: 42.7, Hurr: 77.5, Blkd: 17.3, QBKD: 36.8

Smith/Clark: PR%: 20.9, Sacks: 33.6, Hurr: 74.3, Blkd: 16.7, QBKD: 18.5

Differences:

In units: PR%: 2.9, Sacks: 9.1, Hurr: 3.2, Blkd: .6, QBKD: 18.3

Pecent less: PR%: 12.2, Sacks: 21.3, Hurr: 4.1, Blkd: 3.5, QBKD: 49.7%

Observations:

When you compare the percentage results of the two tests, you can get some useful data so I'll relist them for easy comparison.

Inside Good Rushers vs Poor Rushers:
Pecent less: PR%: 10.0, Sacks: 10.2, Hurr: 16.1, Blkd: 4.7, QBKD: 55.3%

Outside Good Rushers vs Poor Rushers:
Pecent less: PR%: 12.2, Sacks: 21.3, Hurr: 4.1, Blkd: 3.5, QBKD: 49.7%

It appears that when you have poor rushers on the D-line you can expect a drop in overall pass rushing percentage, Blocked passes, and QB Knockdowns. The drop in those 3 stats seems to be fairly close to the same regardless of what position (Inside or Outside) you put the inferior pass rusher.

The interesting part is that the data seems to suggest that good outside rushers get more sacks, and good inside rushers get more hurries.

So there's your answer. Inside or Outside, the overall benefit of a stud rusher is very similar regardless of position. The main difference is whether you'd rather get more sacks or more hurries.

This has been pretty enlightening for me. I have always ignored the interior line, filling those positions with late rounders or undrafted guys thinking they didn't matter much because they rarely put up big numbers. This has shown me that although they don't have individual stats, they raise the effectiveness of the group pretty significantly.