I know PFF isn't the end all, be all around here, but a lot of teams are relying on their stats. This is an interesting article on each team and how "close" they are to being Super Bowl contenders. The actual reasoning isn't that thrilling to me, but there is some good in depth stuff in the body of the article, so I thought it was worth a read:
DE Malik Jackson: As was the case in 2013, Jackson proved to be one of the Broncos' most efficient players. He played just 53 percent of the team's defensive snaps during the regular season yet was third in tackles for loss (eight), second in QB hits (20) and ninth in tackles (42) -- which led all of the team's defensive linemen. The Broncos kept him a rotational player because that was defensive coordinator Jack Del Rio's way -- none of the defensive linemen played more than 69 percent of snaps in 2014. We'll see if that changes with a new coaching staff in town.G Orlando Franklin: The Broncos moved Franklin from right tackle to left guard this season in hopes he would improve Peyton Manning's protection up the middle. Even though he committed a team-high 10 penalties, Franklin allowed just one sack, per PFF, and helped propel the Broncos run game. Denver averaged 5.4 yards per carry on run plays over his left guard spot in the final six games of 2014. Several personnel executives said in recent weeks that Franklin was playing near an All-Pro level over the season's final month. He'll draw plenty of interest as a guard in free agency.Good News: Denver had the best cornerback in football this season. Coming off an ACL injury, Harris allowed just 0.57 yards per coverage snap. That was a full 0.2 better than Richard Sherman, the next closest qualified CB. And when quarterbacks dared to target Harris, they had a passer rating of just 47.8. That was second in the league among starters.
Bad News: Of the six Broncos offensive linemen to play more than 450 snaps this season, just two (Franklin and Montgomery) had positive PFF grades. This comes a year after four of the five regulars up front had plus-ratings. Left tackle Ryan Clady, coming off a major foot injury, fell from the fifth-ranked tackle in 2012 to 41st overall this season.The rest (just click on each team): http://espn.go.com/espn/feature/stor...uper-bowl-teamThe Best, Worst Values
by Kevin Seifert, ESPN.com
Best -- WR Emmanuel Sanders: His $6 million salary did fall within the top 20 for wide receivers, but Sanders ranked fifth in the NFL in both catches (101) and yards (1,404) while starting all 16 games. That production -- by far a career high -- came after signing a three-year, $15 million deal in 2014. In fact, the total value of Sanders' deal is equivalent to the guaranteed money former Broncos receiver Eric Decker got from the Jets this past offseason.
Worst -- RT Ryan Clady: Generally speaking, the Broncos' talent, production and pay scale match up as well as any team's in the league. But Clady did not play to his history in 2014, based on PFF's reckoning, while earning $8 million and consuming $8.6 million of the salary cap. PFF graded him as average for this project and ranked him 41st overall among NFL tackles. To put that in perspective, fellow Bronco Orlando Franklin earned just $969,000 in 2014 but ranked as PFF's 13th-best guard.
H/T to the Orange Mane for posting the article - I don't know if I would have seen it otherwise