Pro Football Focus Grades Penei Sewell

Pro Football Focus released the news yesterday that rising junior left tackle Penei Sewell was graded as the best tackle in the PFF era.

This is a tremendous honor for Sewell as he tops the list of a pretty impressive list of linemen graded by PFF.

According to PFF, he grades similar to the Saints’ Ryan Ramcyzk, Colts’ Quenton Nelson, and Patriots’ Shaq Mason. Nelson is already among the best guards in the NFL at such a young age while Ramcyzk is one of the better young tackles in the league. PFF also states that Sewell is the only lineman to produce 90.0 or above in both pass and run blocking.

To be the highest graded tackle since 2014 means that Sewell is more highly thought of than Jake Matthews, Taylor Lewan, Brandon Scherff, Jack Conklin, and Mike McGlinchey. These are NFL tackles that have had a lot of success in their college careers before moving onto very good pro careers. PFF graded him as the highest graded freshman offensive tackle by their metrics ever.

Sewell is the reigning Outland Trophy and Moore Award (given to the best blocker in the Pac-12). He’s the first Duck and Polynesian to win the Outland and a rare sophomore to do it. Not to mention he was an unanimous First Team All American and First Team Pac-12.

He’s so dominant that if he was eligible for the draft this year, he would’ve been guaranteed the first offensive tackle off the board. As a junior, it is widely expected that he will be the top offensive tackle on the board for the 2021 NFL Draft should he pursue that route. If he declares and is selected within the top ten, he can make anywhere from $20 million to $38 million on his first contract with a pretty nice signing bonus*

*based on Forbes contract estimations of the 2019 draft selections