David Santiago brings versatility to defensive end position
David Santiago’s transfer process went pretty quickly. The former Michigan State Spartan entered the portal on December 31. One week later after taking an official visit, Santiago announced his commitment to Kansas on January 6.
Santiago received a lot of calls after a productive redshirt sophomore season for Michigan State. However, the visit to Kansas sealed the deal.
“I think Friday [the portal] opened up, and then I was getting a whole bunch of calls, and then Kansas was really pushing it,” Santiago said. “I got on a flight out here Saturday morning, the next morning. So, yeah, it was great. I loved it. I went on another visit, and then I pretty much made my decision that day, literally that day or the day after, and I was coming here.”
Defensive ends coach Joe Dineen was drawn to Santiago’s ability to do a lot of different things well on the football field. Now that Santiago’s arrived in Lawrence and gone through a majority of spring practice, his IQ has stood out.
“When we got here, he’s really smart. You know, you don’t know that necessarily in the portal,” Dineen said. “You talk to him a little bit and do the, you know, one-day official visit deal, and that’s kind of the extent of what you find out about him.”
Santiago likes creativity of playing defensive end for Kansas
Like most of the other Jayhawk defensive ends, Santiago is learning how to play both defensive end spots. The rush defensive end is tasked with getting after the quarterback, as well as dropping into coverage. At stud, it’s more setting the edge and playing the boundary.
The versatility at defensive end is part of what drew Santiago to Kansas. At Michigan State, Santiago said he felt like he had to “fit in a glove” to play defensive end.
“I think, like, with the scheme at Michigan State, you know, it was kind of like you had to fit into a glove in order to play defensive end there,” Santiago said. “But here I feel like it’s more like, you know, it’s third and five, ‘David, we need to get a stop,’ like, go out and, you know, do it, like within the play call, obviously, but just be able to play more free.”
Santiago said he became a student of the game during his year at Michigan State. Now at Kansas, he’s started to pick things up from Dineen and other coaches.
“But I learned, you know, you just pick different things up from different coaches,” Santiago said. “You pick one thing up from a different coach, and then you pick up another thing, and then you just get better as a player overall.”
