The NFL is past the mid-way point of the season and it’s time to look at what rookies will win the offensive and defensive rookie of the year awards.
The rookies who have stood out so far this season are quarterback for the Washington Commanders, Jayden Daniels and edge rusher for the Los Angeles Rams, Jared Verse.
According to Fox Sports, both players are favored to win these awards.
While Daniels is coming off back-to-back losses against the Philadelphia Eagles on Nov. 14, 2024 and the Pittsburgh Steelers on Nov. 10 2024, he still has a good resume to win the offensive rookie of the year award.
The amount of impact Daniels has had on the Commanders is a huge reason why he is heavily favored to win the award.
The Commanders have a current record of 7-4 and are placed 7th in the NFC playoff seeding as of week 11.
Daniels has brought Washington from a bottom-tier offense to a top tier as they are ranked third in expected points added per passing play, while last year they ranked 27th EPA per passing play according to NFL Pro.
To understand why EPA is important I will refer to Pro Football Focus explanation.
Their explanation is that “EPA is a measure of success which defines the value of each play by the effect it has on the offense’s likelihood to score.”
Daniels is leading rookie quarterbacks in passing yards and is 14th among all quarterbacks while also being 11th in quarterback rating according to NFL Pro as of Nov. 18, 2024.
Since the retirement of Rams 8× first-team all-pro, defensive lineman Aaron Donald, fans wondered how good this Rams defense would be without him.
The Rams addressed this issue by drafting Verse in the first round at pick 19 of the 2024 NFL draft.
While no player can really replace Donald due to how big of a game-wrecker he was, Verse is still keeping this Rams pass rush strong.
LA leads the league in quarterback pressure rate with 41.9% and is ranked 5th in total quarterback pressures with 145 according to pro.nfl.com.
Verse is about 34% of those pressures with 50 pressures on the season after the victory against the New England Patriots.
He is now ranked 4th in quarterback pressures in the league throughout week 11 according to pro.nfl.com.
Verse also ranked 12th in pass rush win rate among NFL edge rushers as of Nov. 12, according to ESPN.
Pass rush win rate is a metric that shows how much a pass rusher can beat their block according to ESPN.
That is the highest win rate compared to all 2024 rookie edge rushers.
Next Gen Stats tweeted that Verse is top three in pressure rate among rookies since 2018 being in company with Micah Parsons ’21, Josh Hines-Allen ’19, Nick Bosa ’19 and Will Anderson Jr. ’23.
Verse ranked second in sacks among rookies from this 2024 draft class with four and a half, right behind his teammate Braden Fiske who has five.
