The best pass rusher in football is no longer a debate. NFL players, coaches, scouts, executives, fans, pets — everyone knows that Myles Garrett stands on a tier of his own after last year’s historic final season as a member of the Cleveland Browns.
But what about defensive tackle? The common NFL fan has probably never heard of Denver’s Zach Allen or Carolina’s Derrick Brown. Most have heard of Leonard Williams, but would they list the 32-year-old as the No. 1 interior lineman in football entering 2026? That feels unlikely.
NFL insider Jeremy Fowler unveiled his latest top-10 positional player rankings on Thursday based on a poll of league scouts, coaches, and executives. The results produced a fun list that should create plenty of organic debate as fans wait impatiently for the start of training camps later this month.
Fowler’s list did include one omission that Browns fans could find interesting. Maliek Collins was unequivocally one of the best interior defensive linemen in football last year. Had it not been for a season-ending quad injury in Week 13, he might have had a case for his first All-Pro nod.
Collins didn’t receive the love that Browns fans might expect in Fowler’s poll. He didn’t even make the "also receiving a vote section" with players like Cameron Heyward, Kobie Turner, Osa Odighizuwa, Kenny Clark, David Onyemata, and Ed Oliver.
That’s a crime. The Browns may legitimately have the NFL’s most underrated star in the middle of their defensive line this season.
Maliek Collins was a dominant force in 2025 prior to his season-ending quad injury
Despite some serious question marks surrounding former second-round pick Mike Hall Jr. and the team’s depth at the position, the Browns opted not to make a splash signing at defensive tackle this offseason. They also didn’t use one of their 10 draft picks to bolster the position.
Cleveland is clearly banking on the upside of Mason Graham, last year’s No. 5 overall draft selection.
Oh, and Collins is returning, looking to pick up where he left off during what was shaping up to be a career year in 2025.
It would be a stretch to call Collins a top-10 player at his position entering 2026. The Browns are the 31-year-old’s fifth NFL team, and he hadn’t really put together a breakout season prior to being paired with Garrett last year.
He probably needs another season of top-tier production to land on the national radar. But the league seems to be forgetting just how good he was prior to last year’s brutal injury.
Collins was essentially unblockable over the first half of the season. His 6.5 sacks led all defensive tackles entering Week 13, and his pass-rush grade of 87.2 ranked him among the NFL’s elite, per Pro Football Focus. He added 12 quarterback hits and seven tackles for loss.
Perhaps the best compliment to Collins was that Cleveland’s defense took a bit of a nosedive after his injury, especially against the run. In the four games immediately following his exit, the Browns surrendered a woeful 621 yards on the ground, or about 155 per game.
Collins turned out to be a key sidekick for Garrett, whose sack record chase got noticeably more difficult after he left the lineup. Garrett averaged 1.7 sacks per game with Collins wreaking havoc on the interior, and 0.8 per game without him from Week 14 on.
"I mean as far as his trajectory, he was going to have a double-digit sack season which he had yet to do,” Garrett told reporters after the 49ers game last season. “And it sucks seeing him go down, and just hurt seeing that look on his face, just disappointed, knowing that he had so much left for the year and giving more to this team.”
It’s possible that a player who missed the final month of the regular season slipped off the radar of NFL execs, coaches, and scouts. To be fair, Collins did kind of come out of nowhere in 2025. He had never topped five sacks in any of his nine seasons before arriving in Cleveland.
That perception should change when Fowler's list comes out next year, though, assuming Collins can come back fully healthy and help usher the Browns into their post-Garrett era. Through that lens, anything close to a repeat of 2025 would be impossible for the NFL to ignore.
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