Jay Gruden hired as head coach of the Redskins

[Schneed10]

Originally Posted by diehardskin2982

Not so fast my friend...

Rack is not even the best linebacker on this team. I took a look on the NFL stats Lab and compared him first to the linebackers on our team. Brian only had 10 sacks, 1 Interception, 0 FF and 60 tackles. Kerrigan had 9 sacks, 0 ints, 4 forced fumbles, and 66 tackles in a year where Kerrigan admitted that he was hurt.

Ryan Kerrigan to have minor surgery; talks 4-3 - ESPN

Now let's compare Rack to the best player at his position this year... Robert Quinn had 19 sacks 7 Forced Fumbles and 57 Tackles. The second best ranked free agent at the same position is Jason Worilds. He had 64 tackles, 8 sacks and 2 FF. That is not much of a drop off, also Jason is two years younger.

We could also target Michael Johnson who excelled at OLB in a 3-4 system in 2012.

All this to say that we don't need to overpay Brian Orakpo. I would argue that Perry Riley is a more important sign than Rack. Riley is our leading tackler and averaged 79.8 tackles over his four year span on the team.

Ugh. Educate yourself please. Robert Quinn is a completely invalid comparison, he's a 4-3 DE. Meaning he rushes the passer on every down. Orakpo is a 3-4 LB, meaning sometimes he backs off in coverage. He put up 10 sacks despite not rushing every down.

Worilds is a fine comparison to make, he actually plays the same position as Orakpo. But you have to remember he lines up next to Lawrence Timmons and right behind Brett Keisel, both of those guys are very active and take a lot of pressure off Worilds. In other words, if you put Orakpo on the Steelers in place of Worilds, and put Worilds on the Redskins in place of Orakpo, the spread in sack numbers would be much larger than 8 vs 10.

Orakpo on the Steelers would still be the guy defenses would have to scheme around, and consequently the whole front seven would improve. It wouldn't look too different from when James Harrison was in his prime. Worilds is OK but nobody fears him.