Breaking down Vic Beasley’s Tennessee Titans contract and the cost of sacks

Taking a look at the Tennessee Titans deal with Vic Beasley.

The Tennessee Titans don’t usually sign players to one year deals so early in free agency, but for some reason they made an exception for Vic Beasley.

Honestly, when you think about the whole thing it is curious. Sure, the Titans needed an EDGE, but not someone like Beasley.

No offense to him, but the Titans needed a base down defender whose Pros and Cons list started with the ability to create negative plays vs the run. Instead, they opted to spend money on a guy who is asked to get after the quarterback and who is probably going to see the sidelines more than the field.

So why did they do it? Why would the Titans jump in on Beasley despite him not really being what they needed to focus on at that point in free agency, and why would they structure the deal in such a different way than what we are used to seeing from Jon Robinson and the front office?

The only reason I can think of is that Jon Robinson saw this as a great value and thought it was a great opportunity to add a pass rusher at a discount price.

But did they get a good price? There are a few things that we have to talk about before we can figure that out.

What is a DPR?

I’m glad you asked.

A DPR is a designated pass rusher. Call them a sack artist, pass rush specialist, sub package pass rusher, etc. but they all fall into the DPR category.

The job of a DPR is to come in on 3rd and long and sometimes 2nd and really long, and provide a difficult matchup for the offensive tackle. Ideally this guy gets a sack on third downs, but pressuring a QB or forcing a hurried throw is also good to see.

I bring this up because last year the Titans signed a DPR in Cameron Wake.

Despite promises that Wake was the “starter” we all knew that the best course of action was to just have him come in on third downs and get after the quarterback for 10-15 plays per game. Anything more than that and you were going to run into trouble, which the Titans did.

Some teams like to have these specific guys where other teams would rather have several well rounded EDGEs who can plug and play at any time. Under Mike Vrabel, it seems like the Titans prefer to have a DPR with Harold Landry presumably brought in to play that role in 2018, followed by Cameron Wake and now followed by Beasley.

How much is a sack worth?

When you sign a free agent to a new contract, ideally the contract reflects the market value of that player. So how do we figure out if a deal is good or bad?

For a DPR like Beasley, I think you are trying to make a deal that is based around the sacks. Getting to the QB is basically the job description, so why not use contracts from pass rushers around the league to judge value.

So, I looked at every EDGE in the NFL that had 10 or more sacks in 2019 then I removed players who were on their rookie deals. After sorting that out I had 11 players which feels like a good sample size.

While not perfect, I decided that the best thing to do next was:

-Add all of their sacks from 2019 together.

-Look at the AAV of the contracts of those players.

-Then I divided that the total sacks by the total AAV of those players and I came up with (insert drum roll here): $1.1 million per sack.

So in terms of a pure pass rusher, you should try to end up with a contract that fits that math, which is very easy when you are talking about a player like Beasley on a one year deal.

What does Vic Beasley need to do?

Now that we have all the numbers, we can figure out realistic expectations for Beasley this year.

At $9.5 million and assuming the cost of sacks is $1.1 million per sack, then that means that the Titans are paying him like a guy who should get 8-9 sacks this season.

With the goal in mind, the next question is can he do it?

Well, we are talking about the NFL’s leader in sacks in 2016, so of course it is possible. In fact, since 2016 Beasley has had at least 5 sacks in every season and he is averaging more than 8 sacks per year and he had 8 sacks in 2019.

On top of that, he is a freak athlete (more on that in a second) that had great production in college. In his final two years at Clemson, Beasley ended up with 40 TFLs and 22 sacks. That is incredible sustained production as a disruptive force on the line.

Back to the athleticism, look at how he tested:

With all that said, if Vic Beasley wants to earn the contract he signed this year then he needs at least 8 sacks, which is completely possible. If he wants to earn a big contract for the future, all he needs to do is live up to his incredible athleticism and production, and be the guy he was in 2016.