Seattle’s rock Chad Marshall has won the 2014 MLS Defender of the Year award for the third time, making him the first in Major League Soccer to achieve the feat.
The 30-year-old beat out Bobby Boswell of DC United in a tight race.
Boswell earned a higher percentage of the club vote (23.17% to 21.95%) and media vote (36.61% to 32.22%), but Marshall ran away with the player vote (28.42% to 16.67%) to win the award on cumulative score (82.59 to 76.45).
Omar Gonzalez of the LA Galaxy came in third with a 43.38 score, with Columbus defender Michael Parkhurst back in a distant fourth with 18.06.
Marshall made 31 league appearances (all starts) for Seattle in his first year with the Sounders, scoring a goal and assisting three others. He earned just one lone yellow card during the course of the season, an outstanding disciplinary number for a central defender. In fact, he started the season with an astonishing 1,845 card-free minutes before his first booking in week 23 against Portland.
According to Squawka statistics, 6-foot-4 California native led the league in defensive actions, which includes clearances, blocked shots, and interceptions. “Air Marshall” was also appropriately stellar in the air, with the most aerial duels won in Major League Soccer (133) and also earning a high percentage in the air with 73% aerial duels won.
In Seattle’s three matches without Marshall in the lineup, the club failed to win, losing two and drawing one while conceding six goals.
Also announced today was that Mark Geiger is unsurprisingly the 2014 referee of the year.