Texas Football: Derek Kerstetter gives Kyle Flood an elite pass blocker

Although he doesn’t get the recognition that one would traditionally command on the Forty Acres, redshirt senior offensive guard/center Derek Kerstetter is a truly amazing pass blocker for Texas football. New offensive line coach/offensive coordinator Kyle Flood is getting a good one back this fall to help anchor the offensive line in Kerstetter.

Last season, Kerstetter lined up as the Longhorns starting center for the first time in his career. Kerstetter had traditionally played at right tackle. He had even taken a good amount of snaps at right guard prior to last season. But nearly every single snap that Kerstetter took last fall came at the center position (605 of his 635 snaps).

Kerstetter is likely to start at offensive tackle this fall for Flood and the Longhorns, opposite of Christian Jones. He’s succeeded in that spot before, but there were a lot of encouraging signs about the direction of Kerstetter’s game, especially in pass blocking, last fall.

Some of the pass blocking numbers that Kerstetter put up in 2020 didn’t get the attention deserved.

Kerstetter was one of just nine centers in the FBS last fall that had a PFF pass blocking grade of at least 75.0 (above average), had at least 300 snaps in pass blocking play calls (and at least 100 in true pass sets), and with an effectiveness grade of at least 95. A true pass set is essentially defined as a play that gives the quarterback time to breakdown the defense in the pocket.

The passing plays that don’t count as true pass sets are rollouts, play action, spikes, and screens.

Moreover, Kerstetter was on the field last fall for 124 plays last fall that were true pass sets. And he only allowed six quarterback pressures when in a true pass set, giving him an efficiency rating of 97.6 percent. Even more impressive is that none of those six quarterback pressures resulted in sacks.

Kerstetter was one of four centers in the FBS last season that met these criteria and didn’t allow a single sack in true pass sets.

Two of the four seasons that Kerstetter has played for Texas thus far saw him go without allowing a single sack in true pass sets. He’s also posted a sparkling efficiency rating in true pass sets of no lower than 95.5 percent in each of the past three seasons.

Texas football has a strong presence at OT coming back in Derek Kerstetter

Just for good measure, you can understand how impressive these numbers are for Kerstetter when you compared him to some of the other best Texas offensive linemen of the past decade. For instance, Connor Williams and Zach Shackelford were not able to post that same efficiency rating in true pass sets in every season they played for Texas.

In fact, the only other offensive linemen for the Longhorns that did so in the past decade was standout offensive tackle Samuel Cosmi (now with the Washington Football Team).

Another trend worth noting for Kerstetter in his last few years with Texas is his improvement in run blocking. He’s improved his run blocking grade in each of the last three seasons, by a sizable mark too.

Texas running backs tended to succeed more often when running behind Kerstetter compared to some other directions last fall. Star sophomore running back (a true freshman at the time) Bijan Robinson had more total rushing yards, yards per attempt (with at least 10 carries), and total first downs gained running behind Kerstetter off the left than any other direction and behind any other linemen last season.

The same was actually true for junior Roschon Johnson (then a true sophomore) running behind Kerstetter, just off the right side, last season.

Texas has a good one coming back this fall in Kerstetter. There is proven production there that shows that this offensive line should be able to rely on him as a true anchor for this group heading into the regular season. It’s a good bet that the two most effective offensive linemen for Flood and the Longhorns this fall will be Kerstetter and junior offensive guard/center Junior Angilau.

It will be important to watch how Kerstetter responds after the season-ending lower-body injury that was so gruesome that he suffered in the regular season finale against the Kansas State Wildcats. He looks good in fall camp for Flood and the Longhorns so far, though.

Kerstetter and the Longhorns are set to open up the regular season slate on Sep. 4 at home at Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium against the Louisiana Ragin-Cajuns. Texas will be leaning on this offensive line to help the entire new scheme under Sark and Flood work well.