Kansas City Safeties - Not Good Enough

……………I happened to watch quite a few Kentucky games and he IS a tackling machine. He returns kicks as well. BAMF even had some good things to say about him. He said he needed some polishing but I’m all for The Crennel $25 wax job!

Depth has proven to be lacking as well.

He may go as high as late 2nd round. I’m hoping it’s more like 3rd and he’s there for us to take.

That dude was always out of position

Still love the idea of Minnifield as FS

Per CBSSports.com on Markelle Martin:

Man Coverage: Not a major liability in man coverage. Good enough foot speed and length to stay with slot receivers in four-wide sets on short patterns. Reads receivers’ routes and anticipates throws at the first down marker. Best lined well off the line of scrimmage, though, due to high, stiff backpedal. Also lacks elite speed to recover if beaten on double move.

Zone Coverage: Covers a lot of ground in a hurry when in space. Reads the quarterback’s eyes and see the routes very quickly, then has straight-line speed to arrive with or just after the ball. Aware in the red zone, stays on the back line to take away fade throws. NFL quarterbacks may take advantage of his aggressiveness in man and zone, eyeing up short routes and going over the top behind him.

Ball Skills: Capable of making quarterbacks pay for late throws. Closes to the ball quite well and possesses the hands to snatch throws away from his frame. Straight-line speed allows him to return the pick to the end zone. Not fully consistent on making the interception in front of receivers, but gets to the ball regularly.

Run Support: See the ball well, even when deep, and explodes to the ballcarrier on stretch plays to either sideline. Cognizant of tight end and linemen blocks when coming downhill; won’t bully them one-on-one, but frees himself whenever possible by extending his arm.

Tackling: Unleashes big hits on receivers, making them hear footsteps later in the game, using closing speed and tenacity to arrive with maximum impact. Strong upper body allows him to drag down backs to the ground in the space. Ducks his head and swipes too often on open field tackles, however, and will draw the occasional personal foul flag. Not asked to blitz often, but should be solid in that capacity once learning how to beat pass blocks with his hands given his strength and tenacity.

Intangibles: Plays through the whistle, sometimes on the other side. Very good student, won 2010 team award for his academic performance. Missed 2011 spring practices after having surgery on his left shoulder, also missed time in 2009 with a hip injury.

—Chad Reuter

With his bad form arm tackles.

He did look better the last quarter or so of the season though.

One awesome highlight reel tackle doesn’t erase a year and a half of bad tackling.

I really like the guy, and I’m glad he showed improvement toward the end of the season. Hopefully he can continue that.

But you never want your last line of defense between you and the end zone being a guy who can’t tackle.

His play did improve throughout the season, as did the whole defense adjusting without Berry

The stats that PFF shared were all about tackling. It doesn’t take into account anything else. But what I think it does show is that other than Berry who was a tackling machine last year, our safeties aren’t technically sound in tackling. Plus our depth is total crap, as we all know. One really good safety to compete + Berry back and healthy could really help us in coverage and the run game.

I would hope we are beyond point were we are replacing a bad player for an OK player. We need up grades from pretty fair to good and very good to great as well. Any up grade can help the team at any position.

Lewis is far from slot and has pretty good instincts, especially in the run game to make up for any perceived lack in speed.

Lewis has good vision and reacts well, and gets to where he needs to be. Him not setting the world on fire with his 40 time on an iffy hamstring isn’t really a big deal.

He’s usually where he needs to be when he needs to be there.

He’s just not very consistent at making the tackle.

That’s why I’m saying that we can get some real quality in rounds 3-5. The best free safety and the best strong safety in the draft are the only two safeties that look to be picked in the first two rounds. I’m advocating for going after the 2nd or 3rd best safety at one of those position in 3-5.

And how this is turning into even more of a passing league and the emergence of TEs which is going to become even more trendy, a high pick safety is a guy that we can put in right away and that will get alot of snaps.

Mr I’m-gonna-knock-you-ou…-oh-I-missed

It is, however, a vital part of the position. And something you want your guy whose big responsibility is preventing the big play, to be able to do.

And our guys didn’t, this year.

It means that we can improve there. And in fact, there’s a need to improve there.

And as soon as Lewis becomes enough of a threat that OC’s have to adjust their entire game plan for him like they do for Reed, a few more missed tackles are more forgivable.

I’d be all about that.

He may have been cut from Cinci for all I know though

with plenty of room to get better.

I wouldn’t call them “easily” the best combo in the league… but they could easily be on their way… and and those saying Lewis is “not a starter in the league” are not watching the same guy I am

Berry and Lewis are a VERY good pair, but “easily best in the league” is stretching things, even for a homer like you … Berry is awesome but even he has room to improve, and Lewis has much more room still … not a knock on Lewis, great guy and good player, but he’s not “all that” yet by any means

That we look at our starters and see bigger glaring holes. RT, QB, NT, OG, ILB, and then we think…you know, Lewis is pretty damn good. He’s NOT bad…but if we patched up those other holes with decent players, I think we might start looking at safety as a question mark. Not a knock against Lewis, just reality. He’s good, not great, and we’ve got a lot of other areas that are just BAD. So we don’t look his way all that often.