Pittsburgh Steelers rookie OLB Nick Herbig has put on a show so far in 40 snaps this preseason, silencing pre-draft concerns on if he could stick on the edge in the NFL so far. Today I wanted to look at how his performance has stacked up across the league. With Pro Football Focus (PFF) being one of the only advanced stats services that track the preseason, let’s begin with grades for the edge rusher position in run defense, pass rush, and overall defense as their dot sizes (minimum of 20 defensive snaps):
</aHere we get nice comparative context across the league to the impact Herbig has provided. He has been strong as a pass rusher which was more expected coming out of college, with four pressures, 2.5 sacks, and a forced fumble (21st in pass rush grade). The main props this visual highlights (and should not go unnoticed) is the encouraging display he’s put on in run defense.
Herbig comes out of week two of the preseason with the second ranked 82.3 run defense grade out of 177 qualifying players! Yes, it’s preseason and a small sample size, but the start of his rookie year has exceeded expectations across the board for sure, and especially his run defense so far in particular. His overall defense grade also comes out strong at seventh overall (90.6), highlighted by his large dot size. Herbig is one of only eight qualifying edge rushers with a 90+ defensive grade currently and is the only player to have an 80+ run defense grade and 75+ pass rush grade, very impressive feats indeed.
Next, I wanted to provide a deeper look on some things Herbig has excelled at. One thing is stops, which uses the successful play rates formula (less than 40% on first down, 50% or less on second down, and third or fourth down plays kept from a first down or touchdown) and constitutes a failure for the offense:
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Here we see Herbig is one of only seven players to provide at least five stops at edge rusher. More specifically, this came on the three sacks he’s been a part of, which sits atop the preseason ranks, along with two stops in run defense. Every play he’s brought down has been a stop, and has also not missed a tackle, very impactful. He was able to achieve all of this on the least amount of snaps of this group, which tied for 102nd from the first visual. It will be interesting to see this moving forward, considering his rotational role he is instilling confidence in and carving out, aligning perfectly to the high quality we’re seeing as opposed to volume.
To close, I wanted to circle back to Herbig as a pass rusher, using PFF’s Pass Rush Productivity (PRP), which is defined as the amount of pressure accumulated per pass rush snap, also giving weight towards sacks along with pass snaps, along with pass rush win rates:
Recalling Herbig’s 21st overall pass rushing grade, this chart gives further context to the impact he’s provided. His 15.9 PRP ranks fourth best (one of only five players above 15) along with a 22.7% pass rush win rate, both excellent marks that land him on the top right, albeit the small sample size. The dot sizes highlight the latter point further, with his 25 pass rush snaps tying for 91st out of the 125 qualifying players, making his production and ranks all the more impressive.
What Herbig has been able to do so far for Pittsburgh is exhilarating, and here’s to hoping this continues in the preseason finale on Thursday night, instilling even more confidence in the depth at edge rusher as we head into the regular season.
Thanks for reading and let me know your thoughts in the comments.
