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Copycat League?[/SIZE]
With Seattle setting the trend for big, press-cover corners by utilizing Brandon Browner and Richard Sherman it wasn’t a surprise to see the Jaguars follow suit. Clearly Gus Bradley was always likely to want the Seahawks’ defensive scheme in his new home (although the choice of Bears Cover 2 exponent Bob Babich as his DC was mildly surprising), and Tony Khan talked with me about how that played into the Jacksonville draft in
this edition.
However, it now seems the Titans possibly may be following suit as well, as Tommie Campbell is playing opposite Jason McCourty in mini-camp with last year’s starter, Alterraun Verner, relegated to backup free safety. Whether this is a proactive strategy, an overzealous response to Verner’s lackluster end to 2012 (he graded out
-7.1 over the final five games after starting
+14.2) or simply a bit of harmless tinkering is unclear.
If Campbell does start though, watch out for his work in run support. The past two years Verner has been fine in that regard, but in his single game of substantial action — Week 17 against Jacksonville — Campbell did struggle in that phase. Now, 52 plays is hardly a big enough sample size to predict a trend, but his
-2.4 grade did stand out. To be fair to Campbell he was playing more of a safety role on this occasion, but watch the three consecutive runs from 9:23 in the first quarter and let me know if you see a pattern?
