5 reasons why Jamie Collins will win Defensive Player of the Year in 2016

3. Tackling and lots of it (130, to be exact)

Look, Collins may be a little undersized for the traditional middle linebacker, but that hasn’t mattered much for him in the pros. In each of the past two seasons, Collins has led the Patriots in combined tackles with 115 in 2014 and 89 in 2015. The latter is especially impressive considering Collins missed four games last year.

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It’s rare to watch a Patriots defensive snap and not see Collins at least in the immediate area of the ball carrier if not actually bringing him down himself. The Southern Miss product flies all over the field, sideline-to-sideline, and it shows in his tackling stats.

In 2015, Collins posted three double-digit sack performances: Week 2 against the Buffalo Bills (11), Week 5 against the Dallas Cowboys (10) and Week 12 against the New York Jets (12). Look for Collins to flirt with doubling that number this year. Who knows, maybe Collins will crack the top-five of NFL total tacklers, as 130 is pretty close to Paul Posluszy’s 133 last season that was fifth-best in the league.

Next: 2. Opportunistic sacking

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