The Isaiah Simmons Dilemma

The Draft’s Best Defender is Positionless

That’s a problem. It’s a problem for his new team. It’s a problem for fantasy owners. But mostly, it’s a problem for opposing offenses. Good luck figuring out what Simmons will be doing to disrupt your gameplan on a snap-by-snap basis.

So how will Arizona use Simmons? Let’s investigate.

What the Team Says

The first place for us to start is what the coaches have said in their post-draft press conferences. DC Vance Joseph gave us several clues when he addressed how he plans to use Simmons.

In that interview, it seems clear that they plan to use Simmons in a number of roles, so let’s looks closer at what Joseph said and what that might look like.

Eraser of Bad Plays - This implies a middle of the field role, ala Reshad Jones during his time with Miami or Harrison Smith in Minnesota. These players are free hitters with little to do other than “find ball, hit guy with ball.”

Think The Waterboy.

Linebacker - While this implies they won’t have him be a safety, a linebacker can be multiple things: cover guy, blitzer, run-stopper, etc. That seems to fit the versatility that Simmons has to offer. But what Joseph said was he can’t guarantee Simmons will play corner or safety full-time. And that’s different than saying Simmons is a full-time linebacker. It sounds like he will play all three.

Kittle-killer - The NFC West has a big problem, and his name is George Kittle. San Francisco’s advantage with Kittle is similar to the advantage the Patriots enjoyed for years with Rob Gronkowski. Offensive wizard Kyle Shanahan knows how to find mismatches with Kittle against most defenses. This is clearly an area that all three NFC West opponents addressed in the Draft, with speedy OLB Jordyn Brooks (Seahawks), S Terrell Burgess (Rams), and arguably the perfect man for the job: Mr. Simmons. Expect to see Simmons and Kittle match up a lot.

Just from the team’s comments, we can assume that Simmons will play in the box and the middle of the field (more on why those are possibly two separate things later), and he will be assigned plenty of TEs and RBs to cover.

What He did at Clemson

One other nugget from Joseph was that they would use him at least partly how he was used at Clemson. Simmons thrived in his final year at Clemson, so we’re going to focus on that year. For starters, here’s where he lined up in 2019 for Clemson:

From here, we can see that he spent 677 of his 822 snaps (82%) near the middle of the field and/or the line of scrimmage. Those snaps are also indicative of a rangy, cover LB like Lavonte David or Darius Leonard. In fact, the only noticeable difference between the alignments of Simmons and those LBs was the 132 snaps at Free (or deep) Safety. Which brings us to a wrinkle in the Clemson defense.

When Clemson switched from a 4-3 to a 3-3-5 defense, Simmons thrived. The version that is worth zeroing in on was the defense they featured heavily in the Fiesta Bowl against Ohio State. This game featured a ton of players taken highly in this year’s Draft as well as some of the highly-touted players set for the 2021 Draft, so it’s as NFL-relevant as we can get for evaluating Simmons.

In that particular version of the 3-3-5 defense, Simmons would sometimes line up as what’s known as the Middle Safety; in the middle of a 3-safety set. The Middle Safety essentially plays 5-10 yards behind the Middle Linebacker and protects the seam route in what some call an “inverted Tampa-2.” So even as a Free Safety (or, in this case, a Middle Safety), Simmons was in the heart of the action more often than not.

In all, Simmons produced 104 tackles, 8 sacks, 8 PD, and 3 INTs in 2019 in 15 games. But we still can’t expect that Simmons will be used exactly like he was in college.

What He Might Do in Arizona

If we take what the team says about starting Simmons at LB at face value, then he would be competing for snaps with MLB Jordan Hicks, newly-signed OLB De’Vondre Campbell for the two ILB spots in Arizona’s 3-4 base D. Hicks had a strong season and has been a consistently strong player at MLB throughout his career. Hicks did see his coverage slip last season, but it was still above average after a few years of elite coverage skills as an LB. Still, it’s hard to imagine Simmons coming in and moving Hicks off his 3-down role, particularly if you give weight to Greg Cosell’s evaluation of Simmons being a more effective safety/dime LB than a true MIKE.

Campbell has been solid against the run, but his coverage skills have proven average at best. Also, Campbell is used to playing on the edge, as he played about 25% of his snaps there during his time in Atlanta. Arizona may elect to have Campbell focus on the run on early downs and be a part-time pass-rusher in certain packages. While we see Campbell getting a decent amount of snaps, there’s certainly room for Simmons to be the 3rd LB in many early-down sets. He’s also very likely to be on the field in passing situations, regardless of whether Campbell is also on the field.

The player who most accurately reflects a role Simmons could fulfill is former Cardinal safety Antoine Bethea. In 2018, Bethea was part of a 3-man safety unit that dominated the team in tackles. Bethea posted 121 tackles and 3 sacks next to Budda Baker (102 tackles and 2 sacks in 14 games) and Tre Boston (79 tackles and 3 INTs in 14 games). These three safeties were on the field for most of the defense’s snaps and were the top three tacklers on the team.

Bethea’s alignment ratio was similar to Simmons’ last season at Clemson as well:

Bethea spent 755 of his 1,122 snaps (67%) near the middle of the field and/or the line of scrimmage. His 336 snaps at Free Safety accounted for 29% of Bethea’s usage. He obviously played more Deep Safety than Simmons, so using Simmons as a hybrid of Bethea and Campbell would seem to make the most sense. That way you can keep Hicks, Baker, and Simmons on the field full-time, and defenses wouldn’t know where the blitz was coming from, nor would they be able to take advantage of mismatches at TE and TB with three versatile defenders who can play the run equally as well as cover receivers.

One issue to focus on immediately is his limited time with the team. Simmons might play a simpler role at first, so he can get comfortable with the defense. All the talent in the world won’t help you if you blow coverages or miss gap-responsibilities. NFL teams will punish those errors, and the Cardinals are likely to ease him into the multi-use role they likely envision for the 8th overall pick.

Fantasy-wise, once Simmons can earn that versatile role, he’s a good bet to put up 100-120 tackles while posting 4-5 sacks, 8-10 PD, and a few INTs. At his best, you could get a combination of Deandre Levy and Antoine Bethea. That’s unlikely to put him into elite LB1 territory in standard and tackle-heavy leagues, but he’d be a difference-maker in big-play leagues at a position that is usually scarce in that category.

Even if it takes a few weeks or an entire season, Simmons will have a ton of fantasy value. Ya know, for a player with no position.