David Harris: Where’s the Love?
As ugly as the 2007 season was, one of the undeniable bright spots was the emergence of rookie inside linebacker David Harris.
From the beginning of the season, Harris was in the linebacker rotation, but it wasn’t until week 8 against the Buffalo Bills when he stepped in for the injured Jonathan Vilma that he began to shine. In his first start, he logged 17 tackles (10 solo) and a sack, which seemed impressive — until the next game, where he followed up with a 24-tackle (20 — 20! — solo) effort. Although his monster tackle numbers leveled off a bit, he still wound up leading the team by the end of the season, notching 127 according to the NFL and 117 according to the Jets staff. Jets stat master Randy Lange notes Harris also led the Jets with 9.5 tackles for loss/no gain.
Of course, being a Jet in a losing season, Harris’ remarkable rookie campaign failed to attract any national attention. When it came time to award NFL defensive rookie of the year, the honor went to linebacker Patrick Willis of the San Francisco 49ers, who also had a brilliant season, leading the NFL in tackles with 174. Harris got scant consideration, let alone an actual vote — Carolina’s Jon Beason came in second with two votes.
Still, I couldn’t help but feel that Harris’ impact was at least equal to Willis’ — and decided to do a little statistical comparison. I took Harris’ numbers from his nine actual starts and then projected them out over 16 games. When you place them next to Willis’ numbers, it’s hard not to see that Harris is a very special player also.
(Numbers in parenthesis are Harris’ actual numbers over nine games)
Not that Harris deserved defensive rookie of the year — Willis did post his numbers over an actual entire season, and obviously deserves the accolades. It’s just nice to see that the Jets also may have a true impact player roaming the middle of their 3-4 defense for years to come.
Filed under: Main Page, Opinion/R in CT
Don’t forget, Harris was a second round pick to Willis’ first as well.
Awesome post, very interesting statistics! Harris was a guy who flew up the draft board right before the draft, and I am proud that the Jets were able to snag him. Looking forward to many more years of him doing this kind of thing!
Were you wearing the titans hoodie when you wrote this?
Obviously the big difference is Willis played a full season and Harris played a half season. There’s no question that Harris’ emergence was one of the best bright spots this season, if not the best.
The Jets’ FO has done pretty well the past 2 drafts (aside from Schlegel). It will be interesting to see what they do in April. Revis and Harris were solid picks last year.
its funny. i remember a lot of criticism from beat writers on this move.
most were shocked that the FO only had a few picks overall in the draft and some of those picks went into moving up to get harris.
great pick, hopefully we see progression and a great player
Tackles are such a stupid stat. First of all, they’re not an official stat, and second of all, they’re based on opportunity as much as skill.
Willis has a lot of them, Harris was projected to have a lot of them. Both teams were run on like hell, so it’s a bit overrated. The difference between the two is, Harris makes more actual plays than Willis. Harris had more sacks, and matched his amount of FF in 7 less starts. He was also on pace to match his PD’s.
Oh well. Next year with Harris starting from week 1, there will be no hiding who the better LB is.
I think we have all seen that the MOST important part of a winning football team is the offensive and defensive lines. Lets go out and sign Faneca and draft either Chris or Jake Long and get more big bodies. The skill guys are in the NFL for a reason, let the big guys do the work.
Ilan, to add to your post, Willis was a #11 pick and Harris was picked over 1 round later at #47.
To me, it comes down to solo tackles. With assists being such a ubiquitous stat, it seems like people can rack up the tackles by just being in the area and being opportunistic. I’d like to see Harris do it over a full season but I think we got a great deal when we nabbed this kid.
i think both stats have value. solo and assisted tackles. it guages a def players nose for the ball.
a better stat though would be number of times the def player is the 1 st player to get too the ball carrier.(sp?). then use the # of tackles to know if the guy can make plays or not. football outsiders has to have a catagory for that.
droseatwork –
Uh, as a matter of fact, I did have my Titans of NY hoodie on — it was Sunday, game day!! Come on! Stop laughing . . ..
Sure, it’s not as cool as a Barton jersey, but then again, what is?
What’s he got against Titans of New York hoodies?
I didn’t realise they made hoodies in those days.
Muff, to set your mind at ease, you did spell carrier correctly…but you failed to spell “to” correctly. ;oP
One thing is certain, Harris made more “impact” plays last year than Vilma did in 2006. If Vilma returns and Harris moves back to the TED spot (where he would do more of the dirty work, occupying blockers etc), be prepared for his numbers to fall, but if Vilma can prosper with Harris alongside him, this could lead to an overall improvement in the defense. Big if…
Harris will be just as valuable to our team as Willis will be to his, each have their strengths and although they play a differant style , both are extremely effective, I think that Harris will emerge as more of the player who gets into the backfield and sacks and tackles for loss much better than Willis, Willis is a faster player and can zip to a spot and keep the runner from breaking through into the secondary. We are all blessed to see these two in action for many years to come.