Vic Beasley Set for Huge Breakout in 2nd NFL Season

Vic Beasley was selected with the eighth overall pick of the 2015 NFL draft by the Atlanta Falcons and posted four sacks during his rookie season. Despite that level of production, he’s still on track to be an impact pass-rusher in the NFL.

Most of the knocks on him are anecdotal. Early on in his college career at Clemson, he was a tight end after playing running back in high school. His size, listed at 6’3″ and 235 pounds on the Tigers’ official site, was a major reason for that. It slapped him with the “tweener” label and led some to question whether a non-blue blood defender was worth a top-10 pick.

At the NFL combine, Beasley showed up at 246 pounds, over 10 pounds heavier than his Clemson projection, and he stole the show as an athlete. From there, doubters brought up the name Vernon Gholston, a one-time sixth overall pick who posted zero sacks in his professional career, as a singular data point as to why you can’t trust “workout warriors.”

The fact Gholston was believed to be a “workout warrior” is more of a reflection on the average fan’s knowledge of combine metrics more than anything else. The former Buckeye ran a good 40-yard dash, which is the only drill most fans and media members have a frame of reference for, but agility drills, the three-cone and short shuttle are much better in predicting an NFL prospect’s success at pass-rushing positions.

In the three-cone, Beasley ranked in the 90th percentile for defensive ends since 1999, per Mock Draftable, while Gholston fell in the 67th percentile. In the short shuttle, Beasley ranked in the 94th percentile, while Gholston was in the 54th percentile. The former New York Jet covered 40 yards in a short amount a time, a function pass-rushers are almost never in a position to display, but he was average in his ability to bend corners or change directions, tested by agility drills, which edge defenders are asked to do on every play they attack quarterbacks against an open offensive tackle.

Gholston, along with players such as Aaron Maybin, who ranked in the 11th percentile in the three-cone drill in 2009, are miscast as superior athletes because of the way we pick and choose which combine drills matter in pre-draft conversations despite what data or common sense suggests.

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Beasley, at least on paper, was an elite athlete by any form of measurement. This was after he earned two seasons of consensus All-American and All-ACC honors as a starter. Still, the labels “tweener” and “workout warrior” stuck.

After 16 games, those who opposed Beasley as a top-end prospect might be feeling good about themselves, but you have to put his rookie year in context. According to Pro Football Focus, Beasley ranked seventh in terms of snaps for the Falcons in 2015 with 547 reps. He earned a plus-5.9 grade for the year, ranking fifth on that defense, and a plus-10.0 grade in pass-rushing, which put him second on the team.

As far as rookies were concerned, he ranked only behind Markus Golden, who is two years older than Beasley, in hurries. Beasley’s four …

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