2023 NFL Breakouts: Second and third-year defensive players ready to explode ft. ft. Drake Jackson, Daxton Hill and more
This is the second half of our series on the biggest breakout candidates across the NFL this upcoming season, where we focus on players heading into year two or three.
Once again, I’ll start by giving a quick introduction to each player with his collegiate background and time spent in the NFL so far, discuss the strengths of those players and some areas in which they flash certain skills, list a few things they should focus on improving upon and then explain my reasoning for them becoming impact players this year.
In order to bring some fresh names to the table, I didn’t include players who have already recorded double-digit sacks or tackles for loss, recorded three or more interceptions, earned a Pro Bowl or an All-Pro nomination so far.
Furthermore, I didn’t list a few other names that are largely already considered to be young stars, such as Jaelan Phillips or Jaycee Horn, and there will be no repeats from last year, which included names like Dayo Odeyingbo, Isaiah Simmons and Richie Grant.
We already started with the offensive guys last week and now we transition to eight more names over on the defensive side of the ball:
#1, Drake Jackson, San Francisco 49ers (EDGE)
Just outside the top-50 overall recruits in 2019, Drake Jackson immediately jumped onto the national scene with a Freshman All-American season (46 tackles, 11.5 for loss, 5.5 sacks, three PBUs and a forced fumble), before his numbers fell off a little bit the next two years.
He still ended up going at the back end of the second round last year (61st overall) to a team that has been rotating through athletic pass-rushers for several years now. Jackson appeared in 15 games as a rookie, but never managed to knock Samson Ebukam out of the starting lineup.
Ultimately, he recorded three sacks and tackles for loss each, but also had an interception off a batted pass in Week 17 against the Raiders (down by three at the start of the fourth quarter) and a crazy eight passes broken up, despite only spending one snap in coverage all year, according to Pro Football Focus.
This guy’s movement skills at 6-foot-4, 250+ pounds are pretty special and I believe we could see his underlying numbers ascend soon, after putting up 16 total pressures across 228 pass-rush snaps as a rookie.
Just watching the 49ers' D-line come off the ball in passing situations, the two guys that stand out looking at the juice in their get-off are Nick Bosa and Jackson. Obviously, there’s a long way to go, before the young buck becomes anywhere as effective at getting home as the reigning Defensive Player of the Year.
However, he’s a pretty unique mover and something that he actually has over a more tightly-wound Bosa is his looseness and the way he can bend his rushes. We didn’t get a chance to see it as consistently as what he’s capable of, because he’s still learning how to counter more technically sound tackles in the way they utilize hand combats, but the flashes were there of him dipping underneath guys and turning the corner at challenging angles.
Along with that, he features a strong combo of the stab with a more direct path toward the middle of the tackle’s chest in order to create a softer corner for himself as he transitions into the club-rip move.
Due to the wide-nine alignments San Francisco likes to put their D-ends in, once he’s established the outside rush, the way he can crash across the face of tackles with the rip-through can create real issues. I thought the shake he displayed as a rusher in college really caught your eye and as he learns how to defeat the blocker’s hands earlier, that should shine more in the pros as well.
Even if Jackson does find himself in semi-stalemates with blockers, because of his length and slipperiness, he can free himself by swatting away their hands and/or ripping through their shoulder, to create an angle towards the passer for himself. He will also hit a nice spin move a few times once he’s pushed guys up the field.
San Francisco ran the second-highest rate of games up front (33%) to only the Cowboys in 2022 and Jackson was immediately involved as a pretty versatile piece on those. You see him jump a couple of gaps over as he sticks the outside foot into the ground on T-E twists while keeping his shoulders pretty much parallel to the line of scrimmage, in order to not widen his path. Yet, he can also free up his teammate off the edge on those when pushing up the B-gap.
The Niners coaching staff deployed Jackson to some degree in the role they had for Arden Key in 2021, where he would basically be a nose tackle on passing downs or some two-minute drills/end-of-half situations. From that spot, he was assigned spy duties and hanging over the center, to bat down passes over the middle and pursue scrambling quarterbacks, or looped out wide all the way to the opposite side edge at times.
Run defense was certainly the weak area of Jackson’s profile coming out of USC. But where he does get the job done already is pressing off tight ends near the point of attack and gaining vision on the ball carrier or condensing the edge when the play is designed the other way by riding those guys closer toward the action.
What really stands out in that regard is the flexibility in his ankles to change directions, where he can attack a couple of steps up the field and then angle by 90 degrees to flatten down the line as he sees the ball handed off.
I expect that part of his game to improve in year two, as D-line coach Kris Kocurek teaches him how to use those tilted wide-nine alignments to his advantage, building up force via that runway towards the blocker and squeezing down that way – along with helping him build up a more comprehensive pass-rush.
The big reason why this is certainly still a projection, expecting Jackson to become a true difference-maker in year two, is how little he saw the field as a rookie. He finished only seventh in snaps among the defensive linemen (29.4%), in part due to a run-defense grade by PFF of just 62.8.
His ability to establish first meaningful contact with his hands, work that half-man relationship and lock out blockers, in order to set a hard edge is clearly not a strong suit at this point (which isn’t overly surprising, going off his evaluation coming out of USC).
Generally, rushing the passer, I believe he has room to upgrade his ability to not allow blockers to land their hands inside his frame first and dictate reps to some degree. Because of that, his arc gets widened and he regularly has to try re-gaining his balance, being caught in odd positions. Jackson also allows chips by the tight end or a back walking up on him, to throw him off significantly.
It was surprising to see how often he got extra attention for being an unproven player along that fearsome Gold Rush, but I guess it had more to do with his alignment in accordance with the offensive play design, which benefitted teammates.
Looking at how different the Niners' defense might look in 2023, I believe we will see more of an impact on the back-end with the change at defensive coordinator from DeMeco Ryans to Steve Wilks, to where they may rely on more single-high structures and a heavier blitz rate.
For the D-line, that might mean fewer stunts and twists, in favor of just letting guys attack up the field. San Francisco did let Samson Ebukam and Charles Omenihu walk in free agency, but brought in former Raiders top-five pick Clelin Ferrell.
The biggest personnel addition however is defensive tackle Javon Hargrave, who not only should firm up the interior run defense, but also create softer angles for those outside rushers thanks to the way he creates push up the middle of the pocket.
Jackson only just turned 22 years old mid-way through April and his ability to win hand-combats earlier improves, the wiggle and flexibility to put stress on the guys across from him should make him tough to stay in front of.