Penei Sewell’s historic night: The best single-game run-blocking grade in PFF history
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- Sewell was a monster during the Lions’ big rushing night: The star tackle received a positive grade on 15 of his 37 run-blocking snaps.
- The best ever contest for an offensive lineman: Sewell’s 98.7 overall grade is the highest in PFF history among qualifiers.
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Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes
While much of the focus on the Detroit Lions’ win over the Baltimore Ravens on Monday Night Football has been on the Ravens‘ struggles in the trenches, there was a historic evening for Lions right tackle Penei Sewell.
Indeed, Sewell set a PFF record with the highest single-game PFF grade by an offensive lineman in PFF history, in addition to the highest single-game PFF run-blocking grade of any player with 10 or more run blocking snaps in a game.
On the field for 37 run-blocking snaps, Sewell earned a 99.3 PFF run-blocking grade, overtaking Tony Richardson’s Week 13 outing for the Minnesota Vikings — which ironically came against the Detroit Lions.
Highest PFF Run-Blocking Grades, 2006-2025 (minimum 10 run-blocking snaps)
| Position | Player | Team | Grade | Game | Snap Count |
| T | Penei Sewell | Detroit Lions | 99.3 | Week 3, 2025 | 37 |
| FB | Tony Richardson | Minnesota Vikings | 99.1 | Week 13, 2007 | 12 |
| TE | Casey Fitzsimmons | Detroit Lions | 98.0 | Week 9, 2009 | 10 |
| G | Charlie Johnson | Indianapolis Colts | 97.8 | Week 3, 2008 | 18 |
The most impressive part of that is the sample size, too. Everyone else in the top four did so on less than half the snaps that Sewell was on the field for as a run blocker, meaning that their highly graded plays would be more likely to skew the overall numbers.
Likewise, Sewell’s 98.7 overall PFF grade in the game was the highest ever for an offensive lineman, beating Andrew Whitworth’s 98.4 PFF mark for the Cincinnati Bengals back in Week 15 of the 2010 season. That game by Whitworth saw him post a higher PFF pass-blocking grade than Sewell this week, but the Lions star edges him thanks to that dominant run-blocking grade.
Highest PFF Grades for Offensive Linemen (2006-2025)
| Position | Player | Team | Grade | Game |
| T | Penei Sewell | Detroit Lions | 98.7 | Week 3, 2025 |
| T | Andrew Whitworth | Cincinnati Bengals | 98.4 | Week 15, 2010 |
| G | Logan Mankins | New England Patriots | 98.2 | Week 9, 2008 |
| C | Brandon Linder | Jacksonville Jaguars | 98.0 | Divisional Round, 2017 |
How he got the grade
So, how does someone secure a 99.3 PFF run-blocking grade in a single game? Well, for starters, he received a positive grade on 15 of 37 run blocking snaps, compared with a negative grade on just five of those plays. For context, no other offensive tackle this week generated more than eight positively graded plays as a run blocker.
It was also the manner in which Sewell delivered those blocks. The Lions star recorded five blocks which earned a +1 PFF grade, three more than any other offensive tackle this week. One such block came on one of the biggest plays of the night — a 72-yard run by Lions running back David Montgomery.
Look at how well Sewell blocks Ravens linebacker Roquan Smith at the second level, completely taking the former All-Pro out of the play.
In the same week that saw Isaiah Rodgers set a record for the highest-single game grade in PFF history, don’t sleep on what was a historic night in the trenches for Penei Sewell.
