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PFF: The 49ers Have the NFL's 2nd-Best Defensive Line
Pro Football Focus is a big fan of the 49ers.
PFF recently asserted that the 49ers have the best group of receivers and the second-best head coach in the NFL. Now PFF says the 49ers have a second-best defensive line, too.
"Even with the loss of Arik Armstead this offseason, the star power from this defensive line is too good to ignore," writes PFF analyst Sam Monson. "Nick Bosa is a perennial Defensive Player of the Year candidate, racking up 95 quarterback pressures in the 2023 regular season. Javon Hargrave is close to as good as it gets as an interior rusher, and the team added Leonard Floyd as a complement on the outside opposite Bosa. Depth is an issue, but the top end of this group is outstanding."
I'm extremely surprised by PFF's analysis considering the 49ers' most disappointing position group last season was their defensive.
For starters, Bosa was not a Defensive Player of the Year candidate last season -- he got zero vote points. And that's because he recorded just 10.5 sacks and didn't defend the run well.
In addition, Javon Hargrave is not as "close to as good as it gets an interior rusher." He was invisible for long stretches last season and his run defense was a liability.
The 49ers defense ranked 14th in yards per carry allowed and 20th in sack percentage last season -- their defense drastically underperformed. Swapping out Arik Armstead for Maliek Collins won't move the needle much. And Leonard Floyd certainly should help the pass rush, but he won't help the run defense.
Until further notice, this defensive line is overrated.
GRANT COHN
Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.