Detroit was much more balanced this year regardless of who they played and were better for it.
Revis does nothing to help against Demarco Murray or LeVeon Bell.
It's just a numbers game that DE's are in more plays than CB's. Even in this pass happy league, teams only pass 57% of the time. That means 43% of the time Revis' skill and effect is limited. Watt's is not. His ability to rush the passer and stop the run makes his effect much more frequently than Revis.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say Antonio Brown had the highest target % of the league at 30% (could be someone else, I am guessing). The Steelers ran 1068 plays this year, 612 pass and 456 run, and targeted Brown 181 times (17% of offensive plays). Shadowing Brown for the entire game would on average affect 17% of the plays this year.
I like your line of thinking, you understand the intricate parts of the game.
But, here is my counter.
Revis, or an elite corner, as long as they are not pussy tacklers like Deion, can still make tackles in the run game. They arent ever gonna be Watt stopping the run, but they can contribute.
And if the elite corner can fully take away a player like Brown, who Ben loves, the percentages might say Brown is only targeted 17% of the time (lets round up to 20%). But how much production comes out of that percentage? Brown was responsible for almost one touchdown per game (He caught 13 TD passes in 16 games) and accounted for 1,700 of Ben's 4,952 yards. If Brown is a complete non-factor in a game, his production is zero, and that allows the other 10 defenders to focus on stopping Bell and covering Bryant, Miller, and Wheaton. Ben, and other QBs, rely so much on their best WRs as safety blankets especially on third down, and if the best player is completely taken out, it can throw an entire offense off rhythm.
The argument is which is better, getting head from Scarlett Johannsen or Jennifer Lawrence, there is no wrong answer. But I believe having a guy that is capable of totally eliminating a team's best big play threat and a guy that produces touchdowns on a regular basis, is slightly better than having an elite pass rusher.
You made a good point with Detroit, when teams bracketed Calvin, they had to develop other weapons and were better for it, but the team was better overall because of the defense. The offense was flat bad at times last year, but the defense was an elite unit and kept them in games. But the diversified attack on offense did help them improve. The addition of Golden Tate really helped and the emergence of Bell helped the rush game.
