There has been a lot of conversation surrounding fifth-year options recently. Specifically, as it relates to the Bucs, there has been the continued saga of linebacker Devin White requesting a trade because he does not want to play on his option year this season – despite the fact he’ll make $11.706 million.

Inside linebackers coach and co-defensive coordinator Larry Foote called White’s current contract stance “champagne problems.”

Recently the Bucs also exercised the fifth-year option on offensive tackle Tristan Wirfs for the 2024 season.

I would like to pivot the conversation forward to the future. Following the 2023 season the Bucs will need to make a decision as to whether they should exercise the option on outside linebacker Joe Tryon-Shoyinka, the team’s 2021 first-round pick.

Joe Tryon-Shoyinka Has Underperformed Thus Far

Bucs OLB Joe Tryon-Shoyinka – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

Joe Tryon-Shoyinka had a redshirt season of sorts his rookie year, re-acclimating to football after skipping the 2020 year in college due to COVID-19. While playing as a part-time starter due to injuries to Jason Pierre-Paul, JTS logged 340 pass rush snaps as a rookie in 2021. He created 33 pressures, 23 hurries, six quarterback hits and four sacks during that season.

In his second season in Tampa Bay, Tryon-Shoyinka improved every one of those numbers except the most important. His overall snap count increased from 560 to 843. His pass rush opportunities ballooned to 429, pressures improved to 46, hurries jumped to 31, and QB hits rose to 10. But his sack total remained constant at four. He missed as many sacks as he made.

And four sacks per season usually does not get an edge rusher’s fifth-year option exercised.

Since 2011, 21 edge rushers taken in the first round have had their fifth-year option picked up or signed a long-term contract with the team that drafted them. Only three have had 12 sacks or less at the time (fifth-year options have to be exercised following a player’s third season, so 12 sacks represent four per year). Those players were Melvin Ingram, Jadeveon Clowney, and Marcus Davenport.

Looking At Past Edge Rushers And The Fifth Year Option

For the Bucs to exercise Joe Tryon-Shoyinka’s option he will need to show production in-line with other edge rushers who have had their options exercised. As I mentioned previously 21 have had their options picked up since 2011, while 14 have not. That’s a pretty solid hit rate. I wanted to look at the differences in the two groups to see what kind of production would be needed from Tryon-Shoyinka to earn the fifth-year option pickup.

Group One – Those Who Earned The Fifth-Year Option

I looked at four key metrics across two time frames. Those four metrics were sacks, pass rush snaps, pressures and pressure percentage (the number of pressures divided by the number of pass rush snaps). The sack figures I took from Pro Football Reference, while the rest of the information I pulled from Pro Football Focus. I looked at that information for each player’s first three seasons (the totality of their pro careers leading up to the decision) as well as their platform year (third season).

It would be difficult for me to create a readable screenshot of all of the data, so in lieu of that here is a link to the data. Here is the average of those players along with the 25th and 75th percentiles for that group.

The big outlier among this list is Melvin Ingram, who had his option exercised despite only recording six sacks in his first three seasons. However, Ingram dealt with multiple injuries that also kept his playing time very low. His 568 pass rush snaps is 29% lower than the next closest player on this list and 66% lower than the player who logged the most.

Group Two – Those Who Did Not Earn The Fifth-Year Option

The group of players who did not get their options picked up had considerably worse production.

This group provides it’s own outlier as well. Aldon Smith was drafted by the 49ers in 2011 and had an incredible three-year run to start his career. He recorded 42 sacks and 189 pressures in just 40 games. Unfortunately, Smith’s production was only matched by his off-the-field issues.

San Francisco ultimately decided those issues were not worth the fifth-year option and they declined it. Smith would go on to eventually miss the 2016-2020 seasons due to suspension before attempting a comeback with the Cowboys in 2021 and running into more legal troubles thereafter.

At each level the three-year sack production is about 12-14 sacks lower in the non-pickup group. Pressures are about 50-60 lower at each level for the second group as well. Similarly, the pass rush snaps are less in the second group. That stands to reason as the second group under-performed and therefore would be given less opportunities. Finally, at all three levels the pressure rate was higher in the first group anywhere from 1.25-2.5%.

Interestingly enough, the 75th percentile of the non-exercised group lines up pretty close to the 25th percentile of the exercised group. This gives us a baseline for the minimum level of performance JTS would have to be at to get his option exercised.

However, if we remove Smith because his inclusion in this group was due to factors not related to his production we see a more pronounced separation between the 25th percentile of the exercised group and the 75th percentile of the non-exercised group. Here is the new tiers for the non-exercised group.

Creating a Lower Band For Joe Tryon-Shoyinka’s Performance in 2023

Bucs OLB Joe Tryon-Shoyinka – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

We now have enough to create a lower band of performance for what Tryon-Shoyinka needs to achieve to have a realistic shot at having the Bucs pick up his fifth-year option. Focusing first on the three-year production he needs to at least be at the 25th percentile for that group. That production is 15.5 sacks, 108 pressures and a pressure percentage of 10.82%.

Currently Tryon-Shoyinka has amassed 79 pressures and a 10.22% pressure rate to go with his eight sacks. Barring injury, his 2023 will need to include at least 7.5 sacks and 29 pressures along with a bump in pressure percentage based on this information.

Using his 2022 season as a base line for playtime we can reasonably estimate whether he has a shot at hitting these goals. Last year JTS had 429 pass rushing opportunities for the Bucs and generated 46 pressures. If he were to replicate those pressures in 2023, it would give him 125 for his career and he would easily clear the 108-pressure threshold. It would also raise his career pressure percentage to 10.40%.

But that wouldn’t get him to the 10.82% he needs. In order to reach that plateau (assuming the 429 pass rush opportunities) he will need to generate 51 pressures – not 46.

Going back to the sack number, 7.5 sacks on 51 pressures would represent a 15.7% conversion rate. That number would be a bit low for an edge rusher based on my previous research, which says edge rushers tend to convert pressures to sacks at around an 18% conversion rate over a large enough sample size.

Those single-season results – 7.5 sacks, 51 pressures, 11.9% pressure rate – would all fall just shy of the average platform season for the group that had their option exercised. It would also represent a solid season of growth that would most likely make the Bucs leadership happy.

Joe Tryon-Shoyinka Seems Poised To Earn His Fifth-Year Option

Bucs OLB Joe Tryon-Shoyinka – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

All of this is to say, based on his performance jump from 2021 to 2022, there is more than enough evidence to suggest Joe Tryon-Shoyinka is primed to meet the necessary performance thresholds to buy himself another season in Tampa Bay. He’ll have a new outside linebackers coach working with him this year in George Edwards, who believes he has all the tools necessary to make such a leap.

“You see a guy that skillset-wise can do a lot of different jobs,” Edwards said on Wednesday. “Between dropping, rushing and playing behind the ball, he has a unique skillset. I think the more that he grows and the more he is comfortable within the system… you can see he’s not thinking as much right now, at least in the phase that we’re in right now as far as the training part of it. Now, I think you’ll see a lot more of his athleticism taking off where he’s not thinking as much and just going and playing.

“Joe – I’ve really been impressed with him. I’ve only been with the guys probably about seven days, but just with the habits and work habits that he’s exhibiting right now, I foresee him feeling pretty comfortable. The terminology and all of that is the same. We’re doing some tweaks to some things schematically, but I think he really does a nice job of paying attention to the details of those things.”

Bucs fans may be surprised to hear this considering the lack of flashy sack numbers, but Joe Tryon-Shoyinka is progressing better than you might think.