Put Joey Bosa and Nick Bosa in the same uniform and they’re not easy to tell apart.
Joey measured in at 6’5, 269 pounds when he arrived at the 2016 NFL Combine. A couple months later, he was picked No. 3 overall by the Chargers. Nick was 6’4, 266 pounds at the 2019 NFL Combine and landed one spot ahead of his brother when he was picked at No. 2 by the 49ers.
That one inch of height and three pounds of weight weren’t easy to spot on the field — especially when both of the Bosa brothers wore No. 97 during their respective time at Ohio State.
Here, look for yourself. We swear these are two different players giving quarterbacks trouble:
Take it from Raiders general manager Mike Mayock, who talked to Sports Illustrated back in 2017 — while still an analyst for NFL Network — about getting his first glimpse at Nick Bosa at Ohio State.
“I just started laughing, because he looked like the same guy [as Joey].”
Joey was Dan Kadar’s No. 1 prospect of the class of 2016. Nick’s in the top spot on Kadar’s big board this year. Joey’s social media accounts reference his “big bear” nickname. Nick’s include “smaller bear.” You can identify each brother without his helmet on, but close your eyes and the two Florida natives have the same exact drawl when they talk.
So it’s no surprise the best pro comparison for Nick Bosa is his brother Joey. In three seasons with the Chargers, Joey has earned Defensive Rookie of the Year honors, a Pro Bowl nod, and 28.5 career sacks. Similar production from Nick will be expected from whichever team takes him early Thursday night.
The brothers aren’t perfect carbon copies, though. There are subtle contrasts between Nick and Joey both on and off the field, even if it’s sort of like playing spot the difference in a Highlights magazine.
Here are the major distinctions between the two brothers.
Nick’s more of a pure edge rusher than Joey (barely)
It’s hard to draw too many conclusions when comparing their combine results.
Nick beat Joey in the 40-yard dash (4.79 to 4.86), the vertical jump (33.5” to 32”), and the bench press (29 reps to 24 reps). Joey won in the broad jump (120” to 116”) and three-cone drill (6.89 to 7.1).
Boil it all down and the significant takeaways are they’re both explosive athletes, but Joey’s a little bigger and Nick’s a little faster.
Watching them on the field is the better way to see those differences in action.
At the combine, Nick told SB Nation his favorite pass-rushing move was the side scissor.
“That’s what people have gotten to see pretty well from me,” Bosa said. “I think it’s a move that will work at the next level as well. It’s definitely something that I pride myself on.”
It’s a difficult speed move where pass rushers swipe the offensive tackle’s hands away and dip around the edge. Joey does the same exact move, but he often found success at Ohio State by bulldozing blockers — like the time he turned a Penn State running back into a blocking sled for a game-winning sack:
According to Pro Football Focus, Nick had 25.5 percent win rate as a pass rusher for the Buckeyes and Joey was at 21.7 percent — the first- and third-best rates PFF has ever recorded.
Both can win inside and outside. Both love the side scissor. And both are a terror for quarterbacks. But the slight size difference is reflected exactly how you’d expect on the field.
Joey’s a defensive end who relies on power a little more often than Nick. The younger Bosa is the one you’re likelier to see tear around the edge.
That’s not all that separates the brothers from each other, though.
Joey keeps his thoughts to himself
At some point this spring, Nick did what all draft prospects should probably do: He deleted a significant chunk of his Twitter history.
Prior to his tweet purge, there were unfiltered thoughts from Bosa like “[Colin] Kaepernick is a clown” and tweets in support of President Donald Trump. As Sports Illustrated put it in 2017, he liked “to needle liberals on Twitter.”
He probably could’ve distanced himself from those opinions, but then he made the mistake of explaining his deleting spree in an interview.
“I had to,” Bosa told ESPN. “There is a chance I might end up in San Francisco.”
Just like that, he made it clear that he wasn’t suddenly a different person. Nick is just a guy who wants people to ignore that part of his personality. His attempt clearly backfired, because it quickly became a well-covered story in the media, even if it probably won’t matter much to NFL teams.
For all we know, Joey holds the same opinions as his brother. But you can’t tell from his Twitter account — Joey admitted he did some deleting of his own before he got drafted. While Nick has over 2,600 tweets even after combing through and deleting many of them, Joey probably isn’t going to hit 200 any time soon.
Drawing attention to himself has never really been Joey’s modus operandi. Via Sports Illustrated:
Joey’s a bit more intense and introverted. When you meet one of Joey’s pals, his parents joke, “Congratulations! You’ve met all of Joey’s friends.”
When he was at Ohio State, Joey moved out of an apartment that he shared with running back Ezekiel Elliott because he wanted to focus on football. When the Chargers moved from San Diego to Los Angeles this year, the main difference for Joey was that he needed new takeout menus. “I didn’t go out [partying] once in San Diego,” he says.
Nick’s not exactly a party animal, but as their mom Cheryl told ESPN: “Nick’s a little more outgoing, and Nick adapts to situations probably a little bit better” than his older brother.
Still, Joey’s the one who filmed a cameo in an episode of Game of Thrones. He’s also the more active of the pair on Instagram:
The 49ers shouldn’t expect to get a Joey Bosa clone. But Nick’s probably going to be pretty damn close, at least on the football field.
