3 reasons why LA Rams Aaron Donald leads NFL in 2020 QB sacks

The LA Rams have new faces on the roster, but familiar to all is All-Pro DT Aaron Donald. Here are 3 reasons why Donald will lead the NFL in QB sacks

LA Rams‘ All-Pro defensive lineman Aaron Donald is the best at what he does in the NFL. What he does is a list of about 50 or so items. But one of the marquis items for any defensive player is the quarterback sack. That is the gold standard set by media and embraced by fans as the ultimate standard of a defender’s value.

Of course, defensive backs are judged by interceptions, and linebackers are held to the number of tackles as their gold standard. But all defenders who record a high number of quarterback sacks are considered the best in the NFL.  For Donald, a player who has averaged 12.0 sacks per season over six years in the NFL, that’s a pretty accurate measurement.

But Donald recorded 20.5 sacks in 2018. That was a season that the LA Rams paired Donald up with another powerful defensive lineman, Ndamukong Suh. In that season, Suh was the blocker-gobbler, and Donald took advantage of the single man blocking.

Suh returns to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers this season, so the Rams will not be able to pair him up with Donald this year.  But the team knows what it takes to free up Aaron Donald, So can the Rams use lessons learned from the past, and apply some additional new techniques in the future, to recreate that 20-plus sack performance from the All-Pro defensive lineman? Here are three reasons why we believe the LA Rams can do that in 2020.

Reason 3: Aaron Donald can do 20 plus sacks in any year.

The LA Rams have one of the best defensive linemen to have ever played the game of football in our lifetime. That is saying far more than you realize, and I do not do so irresponsibly. He is truly THAT good. In any given game, at any given moment, he can suddenly and overwhelmingly take over and change the momentum, single-handedly.

Aaron Donald makes it seem too easy, as though anyone who lines up on the defensive line can devastate in a similar fashion. But he does so from a 3-4 defensive front, and that’s that makes him that much more impressive. Like this big moment in a huge NFL game.

And there’s more where that came from. Donald has no equal in the NFL in the rarest combination of intensity, power, speed, and agility. He has the elusiveness and burst of an edge rusher, the pure power of a nose tackle, and the intensity of a middle linebacker all rolled into one player. Depending on the circumstances of any given play, he can use the skillsets needed to win any battle at the line of scrimmage and get to the quarterback. In 2020, he will get a bit of help from a defensive scheme that makes that task a bit easier for him

Reason 2: Don’t underestimate A’Shawn Robinson’s impact

The best thing to happen for Aaron Donald’s career may very well be adding defensive lineman A’Shawn Robinson as his teammate. Most of the fans who seem to comment so far on articles discussing Robinson as a new LA Rams’ player seem to begin and end at his statistics sheet, and specifically his personal sack totals.

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But in a 3-4 defense, the biggest and strongest guy in the defensive line is not supposed to get the most sacks. Instead, they are the players responsible for “containment”. They create the pocket and then slowly collapse it into the quarterback. That pocket is designed defensively to ensure the quarterback does not escape on foot, rushing for a first down at the expense of defenders who have turned their back to the offense and are chasing receivers downfield. To sum it up, A’Shawn Robinson did what he was supposed to do.

What will Robinson do to help Donald? Well, for starters, he is likely the strongest teammate Aaron Donald has ever had. Suh is 6-foot-4 and 313 pounds., Robinson is 6-foot-4 and 330 pounds. The extra weight is all muscle. That muscle means the Rams have added an “Atlas” to pair up with their All-Pro “Hercules”.  The last time that happened? Suh helped Donald to record over 20 sacks.

A’Shawn is a solid teammate. The perfect compliment for the Rams’ defensive line. He is versatile enough to slide around to any position but strong enough to land the nose tackle role. His power over-center will force offensive lines to turn their guards inward to protect their A-gaps, and allowing Donald to beat single blocks frequently.

Reason 1: Incredible defensive line rotations

In 2018, Ndamukong Suh played 88 percent of the Rams’ defensive plays. In that same season, Aaron Donald played 90 percent of the defensive snaps. The third starting defensive lineman, Michael Brockers, played in 67 percent of the defensive plays in that year.  Of the possible 3,120 snaps for the defensive line, those three players accounted for nearly 2,600. the remaining 520 snaps were distributed among the rest of the team.

While that creates plenty of opportunities for sacks, imagine the wear and tear on the defensive lineman who is playing game 15 or 16 with that amount of players already behind him. How easy is it to remain fresh all season long?

Thankfully, the Rams have the makings of a far better defensive line rotation in 2020.  If the LA Rams defense is up to the task, the team will face 1100 defensive snaps per player or 3,300 for the three defensive line positions. Second-year player Greg Gaines will see 400 snaps while returning player Sebastian Joseph-Day will see about 600 snaps. Veteran Michael Brockers and A’Shawn Robinson will each see about 750 snaps. That will leave about 800 snaps for veteran Aaron Donald, the fewest snaps he’s played since his 14 game season in 2017.

But that is a very good thing. Fewer snaps in 2020 will mean a stronger healthier Donald in the last month of the year. While that means Donald must generate a sack 2.5 percent of the time, it is certainly within reach.  He would have recorded 18 sacks in 2018 at 800 snaps at that pace. With a strong defensive backfield in 2020 forcing quarterbacks to hold the ball longer, 20 sacks can happen.

Of course, part of this scenario is the Rams jumping out to the lead and forcing their opponents to pass more than they had planned to do. That will likely happen as well, but we’ll save that for another discussion.