Keep doing this? Why not!
I believe PFF scored 69 offensive snaps for Wisconsin two weeks ago. Again, it shouldn't surprise you to know most of NU's defenders declined a bit across the board. I'll make not where it's different, but there are only a couple examples.
I'm diving the line into semi-arbitrary interior and edge again per PFF designations because we have so many linemen with snaps at this point.
EDGE Defender - This is the best position on the team, in PFF's opinion, as the Cats have four players with grades above the replacement level 60.
McLaughlin - 49 snaps, actually edging out Tomi this week. McLaughlin is still ranked at 67 overall after the tough week.
Tomi - 48 snaps. Still a 74 overall after slipping a couple points.
Johnson, R - 17 snaps, which is down big for him as he'd been up over 40 vs PSU. PFF liked his game and his overall and rush defense scores went up a couple poitns each in his limited time and he's sitting at 69 overall.
Pate - 20 snaps. 62 overall.
Hubbard - 15 snaps, only 3 vs the run and 12 vs the pass. Hubbard is the edge PFF hates at 54 overall, and it's been interesting to see his usage drop and drop and drop this year. NU simply does not allow him to appear vs the run, and he's got a terrible 49.1 PFF grade vs the run to show for it. He is capable of rushing the pass though, even after a bad week vs Wisco, with a 66 in pass rush still.
Interior Defender
O'Rourke - 50 snaps.
Butler - 31 snaps. PFF is grading him really, really badly, worst on the line at 47 overall. His composites are a bit higher though, so I believe his overall is impacted by penalties.
Holmes - 29 snaps. Dunno if he got dinged but it's a small snap count for him and PFF thinks he struggled quite a bit as his numbers fell a little more than most and he's barely above 60 for the year now.
Story - 10 snaps.
Gold - 4 snaps
Bastone - 2 snaps
Brendan Flakes - His first and only snap of the season.
Linebacker
Mueller - 69 snaps. Disappointing he wasn't one of the ones rotated out.
Metz - 58 snaps. Another high week for him, partially forced by the hurt personnel in the secondary forcing Heard to play safety. Still, PFF calls Metz NU's best overall linebacker with an overall score of 70 on the season respectable play of 65 vs the rush and continuing to cover well at 74. Metz also has the most varied usage of all the linebackers: n his 204 snaps this season, 95 were classified as "box" snaps with a massive 42 classified as "d line" snaps. TBH, I don't know exactly what PFF uses to define exactly when a LB (or nickel/safety) goes from being tightly in the box to explicitly on the line), but obviously it implies they have him walked up more aggressively than other LBs. He's also been n coverage in the slot 64 times and even out wide 3 times. All the other LBs are almost always defined as in the box by PFF, so Metz really is the versitile guy at his heavy star role. His snaps vs Wisconsin mirrored these usages.
Gallagher - 57 snaps. I'm modestly interested what happened here to get Gallagher out of the game. Gallagher has caught his fair share of criticism around here, including from me, but he has been able to stop the run at times and PFF has actually graded him very well vs the run this year, reaching as high as the high 70s. His issue has been in coverage, where he's been terrible. Well that popped up vs Wisconsin as his grades across all phases collapsed pretty hard, basically the worst fall on the team. His coverage score in particular fell to an abysmal 47 with his overall just hanging on at 63, down several points. His run defense is still up at 72, but that fell a bunch of points too. He had a bad day and he's just painfully easy to pick on in the passing game. I'm sort of curious to see vs Maryland if Gallagher comes out playing. Did he get benched, or just dinged up vs Wisconsin?
Uihlein - 12 snaps in replacement of Gallagher. Graded well vs the run (67) but badly vs the pass (52).
Davis and Soares DNP
Safety/Nickel
Lewis - 69 snaps. I believe Lewis has only missed one defensive snap all year. He's bee the stalwart on NU's defense, and to PFF's eyes the best player in our backend at 66 overall (though not grading great in coverage). Lewis spent a whopping 44 snaps in the box vs Wisconsin, meaning NU very often had 3 LBs on the field plus Lewis up in the box. The first three games Lewis was much more used as a normal free safety and walked out into the slot, but for the last three games they've been stuffing him in the box more and more often. He's not a star, but Nu is using him in interesting ways and he's been steady.
Heard - 38 snaps. If Rod was on the field, he was in the box or in the slot almost entirely.
Wallace - 18 snaps.
Turner - 24 snaps. 13 in the box and 9 back at free safety. He was the msot frequent NU safety by far to be back at FS on a rate basis.
CB - All these guys pretty much always play out wide. None graded well (except Hollis vs the run, who is all the way up to 83 after the last couple of weeks).
Mitchell - 60 snaps.
Hollis - 56 snaps
Johnson, T - 22 snaps
