The stat that shows Boye Mafe could be an elite pass rusher

Do Seahawks face dilemma with Boye Mafe?: Seaside Joe 1711

The Seattle Seahawks face a dilemma with second-year linebacker Boye Mafe in that he’s been rushing the passer like Myles Garrett but stopping the run like Eddie Lacy.

In ESPN’s pass rush win rate statistic, Mafe is tied with Carolina’s Brian Burns and Houston’s Will Anderson (more on that later) for the third-best pass rush win rate (27%) in the NFL behind only Micah Parsons (33%) and Garrett (32%). The good news is that Mafe has 31 pass rush wins on 113 opportunities, but the “hol’ up wait a minute” is that he has the second-lowest double-team rate of anybody in the top-20 at only 13%.

There is no question that Mafe is coming up as one of the most-talented 25-and-under defensive players in the NFL as a pass rusher. His six sacks is tied for 16th-most in the NFL and only two players ranked above him are the same age or younger (Kayvon Thibodeaux, Parsons).

However, Jets head coach and former Pete Carroll defensive assistant Robert Saleh made a point to the media on Wednesday that sacks are “very overrated” in reference to New York’s Quinnen Williams only have 0.5 at the midpoint of the season. In fact, Saleh, who coached for the Seahawks from 2011-2013, said he saw first hand that players can get accumulate sacks by getting lucky.

Notably, Seattle’s all-time great defense in 2013 didn’t have a single player with 9+ sacks: Michael Bennett had 8.5, Cliff Avril had 8, and Clinton McDonald was next with 5.5. And that was the 2013 Seattle Seahawks defense.

So while Boye Mafe having six sacks is nice, it’s encouraging that he’s also getting credit for winning his one-on-one battles at a high rate, at least according to ESPN. If Mafe finishes the season with 12 sacks, those are 12 plays we get to cheer about as fans. Even better, Mafe stripped Lamar Jackson of the ball and caused a turnover on Sunday, and that’s the play that K.J. Wright has called the best in football: The strip sack.

The more sacks for Mafe, the more opportunities for Seattle’s defense to get off the field, something they’ve been the worst at in the entire NFL over the past three years.

Unfortunately, there are other stats and other aspects to Mafe’s profile as an outside linebacker that are very concerning and could cause him to lose opportunities for game-changing plays: If you are a liability on run defense, you won’t see the field as often. Just ask Darrell Tayor.

As far as being a pass rusher, Saleh’s point above is that even if Quinnen Williams doesn’t have any single sacks, he’s one of the best in the NFL at creating pressures and drawing double teams and playing run defense. (Saleh says that Williams is “top-5” in all these categories, but he’s actually pretty low in pressures from what I can tell and this is nitpicking, but sixth in pass rush win rate for DTs.)

(Jarran Reed is 14th in pass rush win rate for DTs and his 70% double-team rate is among league-leaders; Leonard Williams also has a 13% win rate, same as Reed.)

It has to be addressed that Boye Mafe is only double-teamed 13% of the time. He might still win his one-on-ones, that’s great, but are offenses just not that concerned about Mafe getting one sack per game? Even if we throw out the elite edge rushers Parsons and Garrett (29% and 31% double-team rates, respectively), most of the top-ranked players at the position are at least double-teamed 18% or more. Rookie Will Anderson is at 23%, former Seahawk Jadeveon Clowney is at 27%, the underrated Jonathan Greenard is at 22%, and even guys like Samson Ebukam (18%) and Bryce Huff (16%) are above Mafe.

The only player on the top-20 with a lower double-team rate is Chase Young (11%) and he was just traded for a late third round pick.

Someone might argue that Mafe draws fewer double-teams because he’s playing opposite of an elite edge rusher, but we know that’s not the case. Even when Uchenna Nwosu was healthy, he wasn’t “that guy” and he doesn’t show up near the top of any leaderboards. Nwosu had just eight pressures prior to going on IR, which ranks 94th in the NFL.

Another notable when it comes to pass rushers and double teams is that Clint Hurtt ranks 32nd in calling 6+ man pressures, meaning that the Seahawks defense is basically the least aggressive in the NFL. To me that would imply that offensive lines and extra protection would have even more reason to double-team Mafe, but they don’t take advantage.

Maybe they don’t have to because in spite of six sacks, Mafe’s 12 pressures on the season is the same as his number: 53rd.

Pressures can be a wonky stat, different depending on who you ask, but I don’t know of anyone with Mafe as being among the league leaders in pressures. According to Pro-Football-Reference, Aidan Hutchinson, the number two pick in Mafe’s draft class, leads the NFL with 28 pressures. There are 13 players with at least 20.

Hutchinson’s 4.5 sacks ranks below Mafe. Would it be better to have the player with 1.5 more sacks or the one with 16 more pressures?

According to PFR, Mafe’s 2 QB hurries ranks 120th (to be fair, Myles Garrett is also listed with two QB hurries) and that is even lower than teammates Dre’Mont Jones and Jarran Reed, who each have three.

That’s all about Boye Mafe as a pass rusher, but nothing about Mafe helping in coverage or stopping the run.

On the Week 9 episode of The Athletic Football Show, Nate Tice points out that the Ravens were “really targeting Mafe” in the QB run game (at 22:45). “Oh my God, they ran it at him every single time.”

“(Mafe) was crashing so hard, that they weren’t scrape exchanging. It felt like the Colin Kaepernick game against the Packers in the playoffs.”

There are definitely moments from Boye Mafe that you want to see in his key plays from the game, but also some of the moments that Tice is mentioning against Lamar. I don’t think it means Mafe is bad against the run, we’re talking about a very unique quarterback here, but maybe there are opportunities for teams to run at him, as is the case with quite a few Seahawks defensive players.

Everybody here is happy with Boye Mafe, including me. The Seahawks needed a pass rusher like Mafe and if you can land him anywhere outside of the first round, even at the top of the second, that’s a huge steal. It only becomes a serious debate of what he’s worth when Mafe gets to the 2025 offseason and the topic of his next contract comes up. Until then, we can enjoy the show.

That can be true at the same time that it is true that the Seahawks face a dilemma of whether or not Mafe is being exploited by smart offensive coordinators and the most-talented offensive weapons (for example, Jalen Hurts is still on the schedule), as well as if Hurtt can either increase his actual production of pressures and wins AND/OR force defenses to double-team him so that Mafe isn’t the only player on the team among the league leaders.

In other words, how the Seahawks are the ones to exploit his talents, not teams like the Ravens exploiting a hole in Seattle’s lack of defensive aggression or Mafe’s passion for getting to the quarterback.

By the way, we talked a lot about Will Anderson leading up to the draft and as it turned out, the Seahawks never had a legitimate chance to pick him anyway because the Houston Texans traded up with the Arizona Cardinals to select him two spots ahead of (never a consolation, always a prize) Devon Witherspoon. Would the Cardinals have even entertained Seattle’s offer if they made one?

Well, Anderson leads ALL NFL players, not just rookies, in run stop win rate. He has a high pass rush win rate, high double team rate, 13 pressures and nine QB hits. He’s not perfect (PFR says he has already missed eight tackles) and we don’t know how well he would have fit with the Seahawks, but he’s another example of Saleh’s point that it’s not all about the sacks; Anderson has two in his first eight games.

Boye Mafe does have the sacks, does have the ability to be an all-around great outside linebacker, but the Seahawks must continue to help him turn the corner.

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