Third time’s the charm for Jarran Reed? Yes, indeed. Yes, indeed.
You can book it and take it to Vegas. Reed is coming off his first full season of starting every game that he’s played in for the Seahawks and he finished the season with 45 tackles, 1.5 sacks, and one forced fumble. Almost Identical to his rookie season statistics, with the exception of 11 fewer tackles and nine fewer starts. Reed is a stout 2i: two-gapper defensive tackle who clogs up space and does it well.
Reed hardly ever gets moved from his gap responsibility, which was a key reason he was drafted with the 49th pick of the 2016 NFL Draft. He has extremely long arms that helps him create separation for a bigger lineman, which also happens to be rare. Typically bigger bodies have shorter and compact arms. One of the main reasons why defensive lineman are usually the strongest on the team. Reed on the other hand uses his length to his advantage in pivotal match ups very often. His breakdown above has almost 11 plays of him doing so.
In 2017, Reed didn’t have a lot of pressure on him to perform constantly with last years acquisition of Sheldon Richardson, who now plays for the Minnesota Vikings. With Richardson no longer in the mix in Seattle, most if not all offensive line coaches will draw up multiple combo blocking schemes to double team Reed, in hopes of taking him out of the A gap to free up running lanes completely.
I know the Seahawks didn’t require Reed to be much of a pass rush force, but I’m excited to see how Reed has progressed in that area come preseason Week 1. Although I doubt Reed plays much until Week 3 of the preseason, in hindsight it’s still an area Seahawk hopefuls should keep an eye out on.
With almost every team in the NFC West getting better at the quarterback or wide receiver position, Reed will be asked to improve on his consecutive 1.5 sack seasons. Not to beat a dead horse but just to be blunt on how important it is for Reed to improve his sack total here’s a fun fact:
Dwight Freeney, Michael Bennett, and Sheldon Richardson accounted for 12.5 sacks. That’s a third of the 2017 defensive sacks gone in one offseason. Reed was never really much of a sack artist, even dating back to his days at East Mississippi Community College or at Alabama. Hence why I titled the article third time’s the charm: this is his third most recent team and also his third year in the NFL.
To be fair, it’s not like Reed was ever required to do so either because he’s always had phenomenal players around him. This season I’m not so sure that will be the case. So hopefully this is the year things change.
Overall I love the guy. Love is a strong word, but I do.
Enjoy the breakdown and comment below what you like about Reeds game based on his film breakdown above. Until next time. Peace and light #StayDangerous.