Last year, we witnessed Maxx Crosby get robbed of more first-place votes for Defensive Player of the Year. I'm not going to sit here and say he was robbed of the award, even though he would have been my pick, but he definitely should have had more first-place votes than the zero he got. The Las Vegas Raiders have the best defensive player in the league.
Based on what we hear from his teammates, that same guy should also be considered for MVP. Not many defensive players make their teammates better. Usually, when you talk about a teammate making another better, it's the quarterback making his wide receivers better, and vice versa.
Crosby's teammates rave over how he fuels them in practice and in games.
"I turn into a whole different person," John Jenkins says when asked about practice with Crosby. "So I always talk sh*t to Maxx. Everybody in the world knows Maxx is faster than me. I still talk sh*t to him, though. And to be honest with you, it kind of lit a fire in me to be more competitive, right? So I was just feeding off his energy and then, you know, and just talking sh*t to everybody else. I'll talk sh*t to Tyree [Wilson], I'll talk to Malcolm [Koonce], I'll talk to Bilal [Nichols], and we'll be in a game. The whole preparation was easier for me because I've been doing it for so long. But it was more of a mental approach on how I'm gonna relight my fire inside of me and be more aggressive and be more of an advocate for the D line."
It seems that Crosby's approach every day fires up his teammates and makes them want to be better—scratch that—it makes them better. That's MVP-caliber stuff. That showed last season, too, especially in the second half of the season. Obviously, Crosby is not the reason the Raiders jumped to a top-five defense, but I'm sure his getting everyone going in practice and motivating everyone definitely helped.
Something tells me Crosby will go crazy next season with Wilkins next to him. He could be in line for his first DPOY or even an MVP award.
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