Safety might be the NFL’s most volatile position.
When you look at what makes the best safeties in the league from year to year, not only do the requirements change in certain ways, but the players at the top tend to vary quite a bit. This was reinforced to me when I put together last year’s list of the NFL’s best safeties, and there were just five safeties who made the list in both 2021 and 2022.
There’s similar turnover as we move to 2023. Minkah Fitzpatrick, Tyrann Mathieu, Quandre Diggs, Kevin Byard, Justin Simmons, and Jordan Poyer made the cut last year and this year. That’s six of the 13 top safeties from last season, so here’s to the new blood.
Derwin James, Micah Hyde, Marcus Williams, Xavier McKinney, Antione Winfield Jr., Jimmie Ward, Devin McCourty (retired) didn’t make the list from last year. Not that any of them had horrible seasons or anything; there’s just a run of guys who were better last season who I think deserved more merit.
My criteria for the positions this year were…
- Ability at post safety is a must. And if you don’t need another safety in the deep third to patrol it correctly, all the better.
- A majority of snaps at safety. A lot of players who are classified as safeties are basically slot defenders, and those guys will have their own list.
- A minimum of explosive plays allowed. You’re always going to give up completions, of course, but the fewer explosives you give up, the better. Safety is as much or more a position of preventing explosive plays as it is about doing stuff that shows up on highlight reels.
- Run support is important, but in today’s NFL, that’s probably not going to get you close to the top if it’s your primary thing.
- The ability to create pressure with blitzes is also a factor, but not a primary one. We’re looking as much or more here for safeties who allow other defenders to create pressure with their own coverage.
With all that out of the way, here are my 11 best safeties in the NFL as we all prepare for the 2023 season — and next month’s list of the top 101 players in the game today.
(All advanced metrics courtesy of Pro Football Focus and Sports Info Solutions unless otherwise indicated).