dead_poet wrote:
What plays?
I mean he had 3 INTs last year. In other words, making plays. He also had 11 pass breakups. Tied with guess who? Xavier Rhodes. Not try to compare him to Rhodes but the guy made plays. It's not like he's being routinely burned for touchdowns. He needs to get better yeah. But to compare him to Chris Cook is asinine. As for PFF, They had Newman as the #9 overall cover CB, Rhodes at 29 and Waynes at 85. Is Xavier Rhodes really the 29TH best cover CB in the league? Come on now. So that doesnt tell me a whole lot.
Absolutely not. I don't expect Waynes to be at Rhodes' level. Few cornerbacks are. But when he gets picked on time and again and allows 80-90% of passes to be completed, come on. You don't have higher standards for a corner than that?
Well who else are they going to "pick on" DP?? You arent going to pick on Rhodes. Nickel CBs arent always on the field so obviously you have to pick on someone. And obviously it's not going to be the superior CB so I'm not sure what you really expect there[/quote]
But he also wasn't part of the solution. His coverage responsibility consistently caught the ball. Just because others also didn't give him any help doesn't absolve him of failing to prevent the completions.
But if a very hard headed coach that has no problem calling out his players says Trae Waynes did his job, then I'll side with him. Zim could've easily had Waynes playing way off guys for a reason. You dont know. If Zim called out Waynes, then yeah, he played like garbage but that wasnt the case and you have no idea what he had Waynes doing on those plays. I feel that if it was for the one long completion Waynes wouldnt even be brought up.
It was good coverage but, yet again, he didn't prevent the completion. That's the story with him. And that's the problem.
You can only prevent so much. Especially when you're 10 yards off a WR and he runs a 5 yard hitch which happened alot all game. Also given the fact that nobody in the NFL has a quicker release than Brees.
Bottom line is, if Mike Zimmer say Trae Waynes, "tackled well, got turned around and beat on a double move but overall did his job", then I agree with Mike Zimmer. It's easy to sit behind a TV screen and pick apart why he isnt preventing completions but when you arent on the sideline calling the plays and then hear Zim publicly say he's doing his job, you tend not to worry. Maybe thats just me.
I'm not saying the guy is some stud CB by any means but I believe he's an average to slightly above average CB. I just feel like he gets exposed a lot more because teams arent throwing to Rhodes nearly as much.