Defensive Line and Edge Rushers

I've been getting great pressure and a lot of sacks with my D-line but I'm curious to hear your suggestions on if i should change any players or abilities. For a little background, I run a 42/40 Legends theme team. (So your suggestions don't need to have legends chem) On defence I rush 3 out of Nickel 3-3 50% of the time (Haley, Clark, Milkman). The other 50% of the time I rush 4 out of Nickel (Haley, Ngata, Clark, Milkman) 

Charles Haley (ETE, DON [1AP])

Haloti Ngata (IS, DON [1AP])

Frank Clark (IS, DON, Defensive Rally [2AP]) *I use clark as an interior lineman but I'm saving up to replace him for 97 Mario Williams bc he gets the same ability stack + legends chem 

Milk Man (His X-factor + DON [2AP])

(TOTAL OF 6 AP)

6 AP for all these abilities kinda seems like a lot which is why i'm writing this post... 

Should I replace Milkman for one of the newer pass rushers who gets the ETE, DON stack for 1AP like: Bosa, Parsons, Freeney etc..

OR

Should I take DON off of Ngata so he is only running Inside stuff for 0 Ap

OR

Both!

Lmk your opinion and tell me what defensive line AP setup has been working for you! Thanks for reading!

BeepBoopBoop said:

I've been getting great pressure and a lot of sacks with my D-line but I'm curious to hear your suggestions on if i should change any players or abilities. For a little background, I run a 42/40 Legends theme team. (So your suggestions don't need to have legends chem) On defence I rush 3 out of Nickel 3-3 50% of the time (Haley, Clark, Milkman). The other 50% of the time I rush 4 out of Nickel (Haley, Ngata, Clark, Milkman) 

Charles Haley (ETE, DON [1AP])

Haloti Ngata (IS, DON [1AP])

Frank Clark (IS, DON, Defensive Rally [2AP]) *I use clark as an interior lineman but I'm saving up to replace him for 97 Mario Williams bc he gets the same ability stack + legends chem 

Milk Man (His X-factor + DON [2AP])

(TOTAL OF 6 AP)

6 AP for all these abilities kinda seems like a lot which is why i'm writing this post... 

Should I replace Milkman for one of the newer pass rushers who gets the ETE, DON stack for 1AP like: Bosa, Parsons, Freeney etc..

OR

Should I take DON off of Ngata so he is only running Inside stuff for 0 Ap

OR

Both!

Lmk your opinion and tell me what defensive line AP setup has been working for you! Thanks for reading!

Love the details here. I personally think Milk Man's stack is very nice whether it be Unstoppable Force and El Toro for 1 AP or DON instead for 2 AP. I think as long as you have a couple DON's and an Inside Stuff, you should be fine. That’s all I really have on my DL but do run Dollar most of the time. 

Hope this helped you a bit!

Moderator hurc said:

Love the details here. I personally think Milk Man's stack is very nice whether it be Unstoppable Force and El Toro for 1 AP or DON instead for 2 AP. I think as long as you have a couple DON's and an Inside Stuff, you should be fine. That’s all I really have on my DL but do run Dollar most of the time. 

Hope this helped you a bit!

Thank you for the response! I’ll test out that 1AP stack you mentioned so I can apply another coverage ability to one of my DB’s.

Curious to hear who’s on your defensive line and what their abilities are!

BeepBoopBoop said:

Thank you for the response! I’ll test out that 1AP stack you mentioned so I can apply another coverage ability to one of my DB’s.

Curious to hear who’s on your defensive line and what their abilities are!

Right now I have -
DE: DoN and Unpredictable (1 AP) on TOTY Heyward, Milk Man (1 AP) as discussed above
DT: DoN and El Toro (1 AP) on Mean Joe

That's really it, it's not bad but it's not great. Might switch it up soon.

Moderator hurc said:

Right now I have -
DE: DoN and Unpredictable (1 AP) on TOTY Heyward, Milk Man (1 AP) as discussed above
DT: DoN and El Toro (1 AP) on Mean Joe

That's really it, it's not bad but it's not great. Might switch it up soon.

That sounds like a good scheme! 

Since you run DON on a few of your guys, I'm curious to hear if  you sub anyone in with Defensive Rally on 3rd and 4th downs? 

Also, how does TOTY Heyward play for you?

BeepBoopBoop said:

That sounds like a good scheme! 

Since you run DON on a few of your guys, I'm curious to hear if  you sub anyone in with Defensive Rally on 3rd and 4th downs? 

Also, how does TOTY Heyward play for you?

I used to run a free defensive rally but don't atm. Definitely going to look into it again.  Cam has been decent, I probably get the most production out of Mean Joe though.

BeepBoopBoop said:

I've been getting great pressure and a lot of sacks with my D-line but I'm curious to hear your suggestions on if i should change any players or abilities. For a little background, I run a 42/40 Legends theme team. (So your suggestions don't need to have legends chem) On defence I rush 3 out of Nickel 3-3 50% of the time (Haley, Clark, Milkman). The other 50% of the time I rush 4 out of Nickel (Haley, Ngata, Clark, Milkman) 

Charles Haley (ETE, DON [1AP])

Haloti Ngata (IS, DON [1AP])

Frank Clark (IS, DON, Defensive Rally [2AP]) *I use clark as an interior lineman but I'm saving up to replace him for 97 Mario Williams bc he gets the same ability stack + legends chem 

Milk Man (His X-factor + DON [2AP])

(TOTAL OF 6 AP)

6 AP for all these abilities kinda seems like a lot which is why i'm writing this post... 

Should I replace Milkman for one of the newer pass rushers who gets the ETE, DON stack for 1AP like: Bosa, Parsons, Freeney etc..

OR

Should I take DON off of Ngata so he is only running Inside stuff for 0 Ap

OR

Both!

Lmk your opinion and tell me what defensive line AP setup has been working for you! Thanks for reading!

I’d do both especially if ngata only see 50% of snaps and inside stuffer for free it’s great. If you do upgrade to bosa you’ll notice a difference. Don and ete is constant pressure especially if you get defensive rally

Likeabaus said:

I’d do both especially if ngata only see 50% of snaps and inside stuffer for free it’s great. If you do upgrade to bosa you’ll notice a difference. Don and ete is constant pressure especially if you get defensive rally

Yeah I changed Ngata’s ability stack and it hasn’t affected his play that much. I’ll saving up to pickup one of the new premier pass rushers Like bosa!

Amazing post and i wanted to quickly hammer out my reply before clouding my thoughts with the great suggestions and pro-tips from the rest of the community, so please forgive me for not doing my due diligence before chiming in.  I've been thinking a lot about this aspect of the game lately, specifically my struggles generating pressure of late.

For some brief background, running 50/50 49ers TT, had been running Bosa (both 97 OVR Honors, then the 98 OVR TOTY) and Haley on either end, both with ETE + DoN (for 1AP total, per player), but now that most folks run some combination of Secure / Edge Protector, it feels significantly less effective.  Despite tinkering with Milk Man (96 OVR AKA) off and on, i hadn't fully committed to that... until late last evening when i finally built Maniac (LE) and paired with Milk Man (RE), with Haloti holding down the middle of the line for us in pass rush scenarios.  At this point i'm spending 2 AP total (1 per X-factor ability) for both DEs and the other 10 points go into my DBs, some form of Flat/Deep Zone KO, depending upon position.  SUBLBs (Warner & Seau) both get Mid Zone KO on top of their free abilities, so guess these technically are not DBs, however most folks tend to run big hitting Safeties here.

It's far too early to tell, as i only have ~half an evening worth of H2H games to base this on, but i'm thus far happy with the continued adjustments.  This team building sure is fun.

EDIT: I may consider adding Fred Warner's Defensive Rally (1AP), but things are extremely tight right now, i need the KO abilities on my defensive backs, otherwise they get absolutely cooked -- being able to generate pass rush and force folks to throw the ball before they are ready is absolutely crucial, but almost nothing outweighs the potential for pass breakups.