Nebraska Football PFF Year in Review: Linebacker

With Nebraska football’s first season under head coach Matt Rhule in the rearview mirror, it’s time to take a look back at the 2023 campaign.

Using advanced metrics from Pro Football Focus, HuskerOnline continues its “Year in Review” positional by looking at the linebackers. The Huskers had the good fortune to return a duo of senior anchors in Nick Henrich and Luke Reimer, but found some other potentially key pieces for the future, too. Here’s a breakdown of how each of the pieces to this season’s linebacking puzzle fell into place.

Related: QB | RB | WR/TE | OL | DL

Snap Counts and Grades

NameSnap CountDefensive GradeRun Defense GradeTackling GradePass Rush GradeCoverage GradeMissed TacklesMissed Tackle PercentageJohn Bullock41366.571.267.267.356.8611.3%Luke Reimer40968.672.269.880.652.0613.0%Javin Wright35376.172.965.761.479.7713.2%Nick Henrich28973.681.861.357.964.9612.5%Mikai Gbayor 24255.452.268.155.660.827.4%Grant Tagge1349.960.1N/A56.850.90N/AKaine Williams833.462.277.158.032.900.0%Garrett Snodgrass529.360.0N/A58.552.00N/A

HOL Take: Nebraska fans are well aware of the value of senior linebackers Reimer and Henrich. For the most part, that held through in PFF’s grading evaluations. Henrich finished with the sixth-highest grade among Husker defenders and Reimer graded out as Nebraska’s 13th best defender while making 48 tackles in 10 games en route to an All-Big Ten Third-Team selection.

Reimer truly stuck out in the pass rush category. More specifics to come in the pass rushing section below, but the Ashland, Kansas, native posted the team’s highest pass rushing grade at 80.6.

The emergence of Javin Wright, John Bullock and Mikai Gbayor was the big picture storyline for the linebackers in 2023. Bullock went from an uncelebrated walk-on to the team’s fourth-leading tackler. Meanwhile, Gbayor came out of nowhere to post 24 tackles, 3.0 tackles for a loss and a 0.5 sack. He missed two tackles and started four of the 12 games in which he appeared.

Wright, a fifth-year junior, had the best breakout season of the three. He closed the year with the team’s third-highest defensive grade and set career highs in every grade category but tackling. Given the obvious increase in playing time compared to years past, Wright overachieved in a big way. He’ll be asked to take things up yet another notch as he returns for a sixth and final season in 2024.

Run Stopping

NameRun Defense Snap CountRun Defense GradeMade/Missed Tackles On Run PlaysMissed Tackle PercentageSTOP TacklesPercentage of run snaps with a STOP tackleJohn Bullock15471.223/513.9%149.3%Luke Reimer16372.220/13.3%148.8%Javin Wright12872.929/13.3%118.7%Nick Henrich11781.811/00%1513.2%Mikai Gbayor10352.214/29.5%1111.0%Grant Tagge360.10/00.0%00.0%Kaine Williams262.20/00.0%00.0%Garrett Snodgrass160.00/00.0%00.0%

HOL Take: Reimer, Bullock and Henrich combined to finish second (24), fourth (20) and fifth (19) in total stop tackles for Nebraska. When the pool is reduced to solely run plays, Henrich led the linebacking core with 15 STOP tackles closely followed by Bullock and Reimer who had 14 each. Only Nash Hutmacher (16) and Isaac Gifford (18) posted more STOP tackles on run plays.

On the grades front, the Huskers’ primary four linebackers all finished above average. Bullock, Reimer and Wright all graded out between a 71-73 and Henrich topped the group with an 81.8 grade. Only defensive back Tamon Lynum finished with a higher grade than Henrich (90.6) on 63 fewer snaps.

Missed tackles were a bit of an issue for Bullock. He totaled five failed attempts in 154 snaps and his missed tackle percentage of 13.2% was the highest in his position group and the fourth-highest on the team. Henrich did not miss a tackle in 117 run defense snaps.

Nebraska’s Pass Rush

NamePass Defense Snap CountTotal PressuresSacksQuarterback HitsQuarterback HurriesTotal Pass Rush Production (PRP) ScorePRP On the Left SidePRP On the Right SideJohn Bullock24813111110.19.85.6Luke Reimer24015321012.514.710.0Javin Wright21912001210.917.35.4Nick Henrich16550146.86.37.7Mikai Gbayor13351224.36.32.6Grant Tagge800000.00.00.0Kaine Williams5100116.70.025.0Garrett Snodgrass300000.00.0N/A

HOL Take: Be it a result of Tony White’s scheme or something else entirely, Reimer had a career year rushing the passer this season. He set new marks in pressures (20), hurries (10) and quarterback hits (four). He closed the year with the fifth-most pressures on the team and the highest pass rushing grade while providing a solid extra element to White’s pass rush.

Reimer also led the team in PFF’s Pass Rush Performance metric which accounts for sacks, hits and hurries relative to the total number of times rushing the passer. Bullock and Wright each earned scores above 10 and joined Reimer and James Williams as the only Husker defenders to score in double digits. The largest left-right PRP discrepancy belongs to Wright who was 11.9 points more effective on the left.

Husker Linebackers in Coverage

NameTargetsReceptions/Yards AllowedTouchdowns AllowedMan Coverage GradeMan Coverage StatsZone Coverage GradeZone Coverage StatsJohn Bullock2017/164152.32 TGT,
1 REC,
17 YDS,
0 TDs60.916 TGT,
14 REC,
132 YDs,
0 TDsLuke Reimer1713/90057.93 TGT,
3 REC.
20 YDs,
0 TDs52.813 TGT,
9 REC,
61 YDs,
0 TDsJavin Wright1512/102071.41 TGT,
1 REC,
3 YDs,
0 TDs76.910 TGT,
8 REC,
67 YDs,
0 TDsNick Henrich1310/86062.05 TGT,
3 REC,
26 YDs,
0 TDs66.36 TGT,
5 REC,
41 YDs,
0 TDsMikai Gbayor86/46164.20 TGT,
0 REC,
0 YDs,
0 TDs60.37 TGT,
5 REC,
30 YDs,
1 TDGrant Tagge11/10060.00 TGT,
0 REC,
0 YDs,
0 TDs49.81 TGT,
1 REC,
10 YDs,
0 TDKaine Williams11/8053.91 TGT,
1 REC,
8 YDs,
0 TDs60.00 TGT,
0 REC,
0 YDs,
0 TDsGarrett Snodgrass11/80N/A0 TGT,
0 REC,
0 YDs,
0 TDs52.01 TGT,
1 REC,
8 YDs,
0 TDs

HOL Take: Bullock is the only Nebraska linebacker who truly was exploited in coverage this past season. He led the linebackers with 164 passing yards allowed. The majority chunk of that yardage came in zone coverage in which he surrendered 132 yards on 14 receptions.

Generally, Husker linebackers were targeted more times in zone coverage (53) than man (12). Reimer was the only one of the Nebraska’s top four linebackers to have a worse grade in zone coverage than man. Wright saw a five-point jump from man to zone coverage and led the linebackers in each category with a 71.4 grade against Man and 76.9 when facing zone.

The post Nebraska Football PFF Year in Review: Linebacker appeared first on On3.