In the midst of a very strong draft class, there was one name that managed to fall to the bottom of people's draft rankings despite being a dedicated member of the class. This player was none other than strong safety and run support archetype Ryan Cobalt, who has been having an excellent season in San Antonio with the Marshals. His continued quarrels with Portland Pythons running back Antonio Summer have been few and far apart in the past few months, and with no suspensions on his record so far this year it would appear that Cobalt has moved past his previous ways of aggression on the field. He is truly being considered a changed man since his high school days where the local sports association had him clocked in at suspended for between 10-15 games over his high school career (around 20%). The real reason we're talking about Cobalt today though, is because a case needs to be made to support him for the safety of the year in the DSFL, and even as a possible candidate for Defensive ROTY/POTY.
Cobalt is playing this season on a team that is by most people, considered to be very weak. During the draft the Marshals struck very low on both of their first round picks, including the third overall which they traded for. Selecting Jamal Slick at first overall was the biggest mistake the Marshals made on draft night, especially after all-star quarterback prospect Andrew Reese went at second to the Kansas City Coyotes. Following this, the Marshals selected Gordon Ramsey Jr. who in his short career so far, has been extremely underwhelming in terms of both growth and performance. The Marshals wouldn't pick again until #17, with their previously traded picks all being held by the Pythons (which turned out to be Sunnycursed [5], Summer [9], and Becker [13]) where they selected linebacker Clark Kent who fell short compared to some of the talent selected after him.
In the sixth round the Marshals selected Adrian Pitcher at 17th, before shortly after trading him along with a pick for... the player who went at 19th, Harvey Kindle. This trade still makes no sense to me, and was one of my first signs that I wasn't going to be on a successful team. Then in the 7th round, Cobalt was scooped up in what may have been the biggest steal of the draft, before the Marshals closed it out with their 8th round selection being Ty Justice, who has been an exceptional addition so far. All in all, I wasn't very impressed heading into my first season in the DSFL with the prospects I had at a championship, but since then I've been pleasantly surprised. I think my initial reaction to joining San Antonio was mostly negative, due to them being a team that had little to no strong players returning for another season via send downs, but this perception quickly changed as I realized the competence of my GM duo. With the very little talent they have to work with in San Antonio, my management team has done an excellent job at keeping us competitive.
So here we are, currently sitting at a healthy record of 7-3 and currently ranked first among any teams in the league, including my room mate and rivals Portland Pythons. It's a good feeling to be at top, and I have to say that Donno and Cosborn have definitely been the reason behind our success as of late. To take a win off the Pythons, who were looking to be a 13-1 team was amazing, and I'm super ecstatic that the success is carrying over into the last push of the season. There is no question in my mind that we are going to be able to keep up with the best of teams come playoffs and really make a solid push for it. Now let's talk about Cobalt.
Okay, so from looking at Cobalt's play so far this season we can see a couple of key things just from his basic stat line. For starters, my employment of the run support strong safety archetype is definitely working out the way that I planned, because while I'm able to put up a lot of tackles, a TFL, and 2 FF/FR, I'm still useful in the air game with 8 PD's and 2 interceptions. It's actually been really interesting to watch me in games too, because I get to see things like my strength and agility be utilized on the field, where it seems that my progression path has aided me tremendously. I don't think I would be wrong to say that Cobalt has looked like on of the most exciting defensive players in the league thus far. I don't doubt there will be a slight drop off in my stats though as we have some pretty fierce competition heading into playoff season these next few weeks.
So you may be asking, what's the case for defensive back of the year? With competition as stiff as Lennox Garnett, Dan Schneider, and Bobson Dugnutt, I have a lot of players that I'm going to have to come up against. But here's my reasoning, and it really is quite simple. Schneider can immediately be knocked out of the competition based upon the fact that Portland's defense has been simply complete lock down, and that he exists as a stronger cog in a more cohesive machine. The better your defense functions, the easier it is for players to get defensive stats by utilizing the opportunities presented by their team. Schneider is surrounded by possibly the best defense in the entire league, with players like Slick, Becker, Spector, Mbanefu, and Methane all being huge parts of the successful run they're making. This same principle can be applied to Dugnutt, who when looking statistic wise has been a small part of the success in Tijuana compared to his counterparts.
This brings the debate down to Garnett and Cobalt, who have both been having amazing season for San Antonio and Kansas City respectively. Currently Garnett slightly edges out Cobalt in tackles with 2 more, interceptions with 1 more, and TFL's with 3 more while having a giant lead in sacks with 5, but when archetypes are taken into account we can eliminate sacks from the equation on Cobalt's side as they are of little importance. We have to remember that Cobalt's role is primarily that of a coverage linebacker who will have the speed needed to break and fill gaps on the defensive line should an inside run be called, as well as to take edges on short passes and bring down receiving backs and tight ends. Cobalt is often used in a role that demands a lot more of a physical tole against larger opponents then Garnett, who's tackles will normally come against opposing slot receivers and the odd wide outs. That's why I find it interesting that while Cobalt has been used in a more run support esque role, he has posted double the PD's of Garnett. These two are closely matched, so next we break it down into defensive value for their individual team.
Garnett accounts for approximately 0.3% more of his team's tackles then Cobalt (14.8% vs. 15.1%) while Cobalt's fumble ratings come in at 33% (FF) and 25% (FR) compared to Garnett's 0% in both stats. Garnett leads in interception percentage, this team winning on a margin of 3.3% (21.4% vs. 18.1%) while in the last stat important to both players Cobalt takes the win with 17.4% of his team's PD's compared to Garnett's even 10%. In relative statistics, both players lead in two categories, but the margin of error heavily favors Cobalt. This formula for success is only strengthened when we take into account the extremely weak defense that currently exists in San Antonio, while Kansas City hosts talents such as Sackerman, Selich, Boogie, Verden, Miles, and Boucher. While it's a close race, I think the information is there to support that in the Cobalt should be ranked as the top defensive back in the league. There is a lot to take into consideration when voting for this, but I hope the awards committee will read my article and reflect on it when it comes time to make their decision.
Of course these statistics are only relevant to the current week, and will change once we finish off the last two weeks of the season, so hopefully they don't have a drastic alteration or else this entire article that I just wrote will be for nothing. I hope that I continue to stay on top, but naturally this means that we will need to have some more success in San Antonio. I will also include in my recap article to come next week my perspective as to how playoffs will account into this, and I'll come up with some formula to equate level of scheadule difficulty at current periods due to updates into how I grade who had a more valuable season this year. Statistical analysis like this is really fun to do, and mixing it in with a little storytelling makes it a lot more enjoyable to sit down at my desk and write for hours while Nick continuously makes fun of my writing ability.
Cobalt is playing this season on a team that is by most people, considered to be very weak. During the draft the Marshals struck very low on both of their first round picks, including the third overall which they traded for. Selecting Jamal Slick at first overall was the biggest mistake the Marshals made on draft night, especially after all-star quarterback prospect Andrew Reese went at second to the Kansas City Coyotes. Following this, the Marshals selected Gordon Ramsey Jr. who in his short career so far, has been extremely underwhelming in terms of both growth and performance. The Marshals wouldn't pick again until #17, with their previously traded picks all being held by the Pythons (which turned out to be Sunnycursed [5], Summer [9], and Becker [13]) where they selected linebacker Clark Kent who fell short compared to some of the talent selected after him.
In the sixth round the Marshals selected Adrian Pitcher at 17th, before shortly after trading him along with a pick for... the player who went at 19th, Harvey Kindle. This trade still makes no sense to me, and was one of my first signs that I wasn't going to be on a successful team. Then in the 7th round, Cobalt was scooped up in what may have been the biggest steal of the draft, before the Marshals closed it out with their 8th round selection being Ty Justice, who has been an exceptional addition so far. All in all, I wasn't very impressed heading into my first season in the DSFL with the prospects I had at a championship, but since then I've been pleasantly surprised. I think my initial reaction to joining San Antonio was mostly negative, due to them being a team that had little to no strong players returning for another season via send downs, but this perception quickly changed as I realized the competence of my GM duo. With the very little talent they have to work with in San Antonio, my management team has done an excellent job at keeping us competitive.
So here we are, currently sitting at a healthy record of 7-3 and currently ranked first among any teams in the league, including my room mate and rivals Portland Pythons. It's a good feeling to be at top, and I have to say that Donno and Cosborn have definitely been the reason behind our success as of late. To take a win off the Pythons, who were looking to be a 13-1 team was amazing, and I'm super ecstatic that the success is carrying over into the last push of the season. There is no question in my mind that we are going to be able to keep up with the best of teams come playoffs and really make a solid push for it. Now let's talk about Cobalt.
Okay, so from looking at Cobalt's play so far this season we can see a couple of key things just from his basic stat line. For starters, my employment of the run support strong safety archetype is definitely working out the way that I planned, because while I'm able to put up a lot of tackles, a TFL, and 2 FF/FR, I'm still useful in the air game with 8 PD's and 2 interceptions. It's actually been really interesting to watch me in games too, because I get to see things like my strength and agility be utilized on the field, where it seems that my progression path has aided me tremendously. I don't think I would be wrong to say that Cobalt has looked like on of the most exciting defensive players in the league thus far. I don't doubt there will be a slight drop off in my stats though as we have some pretty fierce competition heading into playoff season these next few weeks.
So you may be asking, what's the case for defensive back of the year? With competition as stiff as Lennox Garnett, Dan Schneider, and Bobson Dugnutt, I have a lot of players that I'm going to have to come up against. But here's my reasoning, and it really is quite simple. Schneider can immediately be knocked out of the competition based upon the fact that Portland's defense has been simply complete lock down, and that he exists as a stronger cog in a more cohesive machine. The better your defense functions, the easier it is for players to get defensive stats by utilizing the opportunities presented by their team. Schneider is surrounded by possibly the best defense in the entire league, with players like Slick, Becker, Spector, Mbanefu, and Methane all being huge parts of the successful run they're making. This same principle can be applied to Dugnutt, who when looking statistic wise has been a small part of the success in Tijuana compared to his counterparts.
This brings the debate down to Garnett and Cobalt, who have both been having amazing season for San Antonio and Kansas City respectively. Currently Garnett slightly edges out Cobalt in tackles with 2 more, interceptions with 1 more, and TFL's with 3 more while having a giant lead in sacks with 5, but when archetypes are taken into account we can eliminate sacks from the equation on Cobalt's side as they are of little importance. We have to remember that Cobalt's role is primarily that of a coverage linebacker who will have the speed needed to break and fill gaps on the defensive line should an inside run be called, as well as to take edges on short passes and bring down receiving backs and tight ends. Cobalt is often used in a role that demands a lot more of a physical tole against larger opponents then Garnett, who's tackles will normally come against opposing slot receivers and the odd wide outs. That's why I find it interesting that while Cobalt has been used in a more run support esque role, he has posted double the PD's of Garnett. These two are closely matched, so next we break it down into defensive value for their individual team.
Garnett accounts for approximately 0.3% more of his team's tackles then Cobalt (14.8% vs. 15.1%) while Cobalt's fumble ratings come in at 33% (FF) and 25% (FR) compared to Garnett's 0% in both stats. Garnett leads in interception percentage, this team winning on a margin of 3.3% (21.4% vs. 18.1%) while in the last stat important to both players Cobalt takes the win with 17.4% of his team's PD's compared to Garnett's even 10%. In relative statistics, both players lead in two categories, but the margin of error heavily favors Cobalt. This formula for success is only strengthened when we take into account the extremely weak defense that currently exists in San Antonio, while Kansas City hosts talents such as Sackerman, Selich, Boogie, Verden, Miles, and Boucher. While it's a close race, I think the information is there to support that in the Cobalt should be ranked as the top defensive back in the league. There is a lot to take into consideration when voting for this, but I hope the awards committee will read my article and reflect on it when it comes time to make their decision.
Of course these statistics are only relevant to the current week, and will change once we finish off the last two weeks of the season, so hopefully they don't have a drastic alteration or else this entire article that I just wrote will be for nothing. I hope that I continue to stay on top, but naturally this means that we will need to have some more success in San Antonio. I will also include in my recap article to come next week my perspective as to how playoffs will account into this, and I'll come up with some formula to equate level of scheadule difficulty at current periods due to updates into how I grade who had a more valuable season this year. Statistical analysis like this is really fun to do, and mixing it in with a little storytelling makes it a lot more enjoyable to sit down at my desk and write for hours while Nick continuously makes fun of my writing ability.