During my junior year in college, I was fortunate enough to win a prize grant to allow me to cover the Panthers’ 2017 training camp for the student newspaper I wrote for at the time, with my time in Spartanburg culminating with an interview with defensive end Efe Obada. At that time, he was a little known player starting out on the International Player Pathway Program who was hoping to use his year on the program to develop to the point where he could compete for a roster spot in the summer of 2018. A little more than a year from that interview, not only has Obada managed to realize that dream of making an NFL roster, but this Sunday he took a step further and got a game jersey for the first time – a game jersey that he turned into an NFC Defensive Player of the Week award.
Of course, not every player that wins such awards goes on to have an amazing career, and if Obada has a game with both an interception and a sack even once more in his career he will be lucky – there were only 21 such games last season – but given his lack of playing experience and still developing technique, his ability to turn his obvious athletic talent into production at this stage is certainly encouraging. Given that he was only on the field for 19 snaps on Sunday, it will only be possible to fully evaluate Obada over a much longer time scale, but what did Obada show on tape that isn’t immediately obvious from the box score, and why will his production be so important for the Panthers?
The Splash Play
Defensive ends – and pass rushers in general – spend most of their time not doing anything that will show up on a stat sheet or end of season highlight tape, as even the most effective defenses fail to generate either a sack or an interception on at least six of every seven plays. Because of this, the plays they do make tend to stand out, and after his first ‘welcome to the NFL’ moment was reversed on review, Obada was able to come away with another not long afterwards with a sliding interception following a James Bradberry pass break-up:
This play takes a lot of things; awareness, athleticism, good hands and, crucially, quite a lot of luck. This is the kind of play that wins you an NFC Defensive Player of the Week, and maybe even a Super Bowl MVP, but probably won’t win you All-Pro honors due to the infrequency with which such turnovers are generated. However, there are very few players more deserving of a bit of luck in their first NFL outing, and while plays like this are unlikely to form the basis of Obada’s game in the NFL, it certainly acts as a nice added extra.
The Running Game
Obada was only on the field for a handful of rushing snaps, and given his performance on these snaps, this was probably somewhat by design, with the Panthers looking to maximize his impact on passing downs. That is not to say that Obada can’t be a good run defender, but rather that he needs to improve in this area in order to see snaps in all scenarios going forward. His issues in this area can largely be split into two categories – his pad level and his hand usage.
Inexperienced defensive ends often have an issue with pad level, as the natural movement position is standing upright, and this issue is evident with Obada on the above play. By standing upright in this way, Obada allows the tackle to negate his momentum advantage by converting Obada’s forward motion into an upwards motion. Additionally, when Obada gets in this very upward position, it narrows his base making him easier to be put off-balance and maneuver. This is something that Obada can improve on, and as can be seen on some of the passing plays shown later in this piece, this is certainly not due to athletic limitations – however, until he does, he is simply going to be too easy to move in the running game to be used as a regular defender on early downs.
The play height issues can be seen again on the play above, but the hand usage issues are more clearly visible here. His hand location is actually very good, getting both hands inside the frame of the tackle but, partly because his pad level was too high, he bends his arms and so reduces the distance between himself and the tackle. What this means is that the tackle is then loose enough to grab Obada around the shoulder and limit Obada’s ability to release from the block.
If Obada improves his pad level, the straighter arms may come along as a result; but if not, this is an additional thing for him to work on. These bent arms also have an impact on play action plays, such as the following – if his arms were straighter, he would be in excellent position to execute an inside rip move and get to the quarterback.
These might seem like little issues, especially the hand usage, but it is subtleties like this that separate decent defensive linemen from excellent ones – with the athletic talent Obada has, he should not be satisfied with being a decent lineman.
Next Up: Around The Edge
