Is Tyson Jackson living up to his potential as a 3-4 defensive end and Top 3 pick?

After reading the article about Tyson Jackson being one the 50 highest-earning American athletes made me think about his performance up until now. 

It seems like most people in the press consider T. Jax's rookie performance lackluster, with a few more controversial bloggers and writers throwing around the dreaded B-U-S-T word. 

Let's compare his performance to that of some historically good modern era 3-4 DEs. 

via i27.tinypic.com

"But wait" you say, "defensive linemen take 3 years to develop."

Let's test that hypothesis by looking at the first three years worth of stats from historically good modern era 3-4 DEs.

Notes:

1. Because the 3-4 emphasizes lineman/linebacker collaboration I've combined solo tackles and assisted tackles. 

2. The tackles per game factors in injuries so as not to distort the overall data.

3. These stats don't tell the whole story. In a 3-4 the DE and NT soak up the blocks for the linebackers. Excellent DEs can eat double teams all setting the table for the LBs to make all the tackles and sacks -- generating no stats at all while playing an excellent game of football.

4. Click on the links in the introduction

Conclusions:

While there seems to be a jump from rookie to sophomore season there is not a huge jump from second to third year.

Critics may say that Glenn Dorsey is miscast as a 3-4 defensive end but the stats show that he's as good as any of the top flight 3-4 linemen in the league. 

It may be a little too early to tell but it looks like Romeo Crennel's got the makings of a nasty good defensive line.