David Cobb to Tennessee Titans: Full Draft-Pick Breakdown

The Tennessee Titans keep up their strategy of building up offense with the selection of Minnesota running back David Cobb.

This is a great pick, even though it might surprise some. The Tennessee Titans just spent a second-rounder in 2014 on Bishop Sankey, but he was a bit of a disappointment in his rookie season, only rushing for 569 yards and two touchdowns.

Sankey wasn't the only running back the Titans had problems with. Shonn Greene has become a concern after missing a good chunk of 2014 with injury. He's also entering the last year of his contract.

When Greene was out, the Titans used Jackie Battle, who was also their fullback, as the battering ram, but he's no longer with the team. The Titans need a powerful runner to put on the field for short-yardage situations and stacked boxes.

Enter David Cobb.

Cobb is a big, powerful back who is tough to bring down. At 5'11" and 229 lbs, his size speaks for itself. But if that's not enough, 54 percent of Cobb's yardage in 2014 came after initial contact.

Sankey was not very effective in that category, so having Cobb there to mix things up ought to help both runners. Cobb can churn through tacklers to get short yardage, while Sankey can handle the other runs.

Being as big as he is, Cobb isn't the fastest running back out there: He ran a 4.81 second 40 yard dash at the combine. But straight-line speed isn't everything, and Cobb's 38.5" vertical jump shows that he has some burst for a player his size.

In his time at Minnesota, Cobb was incredibly productive. In his two years as a starter, Cobb racked up 1,828 rushing yards and 20 touchdowns, averaging over five yards per carry both years.

Now one of the knocks on Cobb is his ability to catch. He has average hands at best and only saw 33 receptions in the last two years, none of them for touchdowns.

He's not a do-it-all back, which is why he's still around in the fifth round, but the things he can do, he can do well, and those are areas that the Titans need help in.

Cobb should compete immediately with Greene to be the Titans' go-to power back, and if Sankey doesn't show some serious improvement in his sophomore season, Cobb could start taking away time from him as well.

Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, with Marcus Mariota coming from a spread offense to the NFL, his transition is going to be a bumpy road. If he can have a great rushing attack to fall back on, that will make things a lot easier for him as he gets the hang of being an NFL quarterback.

The Titans' staff and front office knows that they need Mariota to succeed to keep their jobs, so in this draft, they're pretty clearly doing everything they can to see to it that he has as much help as they can give him.