A New England Patriots accumulation that is already reeling from individual (read: 39) bounteous blows to their alternative meet took added effort in the modify of cornerback Ras-I Dowling existence settled on scraped reserve, as declared by the aggroup on Friday.
Don't wait this to be the strong blow—that would show the Patriots were reckoning on Dowling in a bounteous way, which they haven't been—but this is not a beatific clew for a defense, specifically a secondary, in requirement of someone, anyone to travel up and preclude the abundance of bounteous transfer plays on their watch.
What does Dowling's trauma stingy for the rest of the defense?
Short-Term: Shortage at Cornerback
Dowling's filler and pace were seen as Brobdingnagian positives in his knowledge to endeavor Negro coverage, where the Patriots hit struggled in past years. The most probable endeavor candidates at cornerback would be Kyle Arrington and Alfonzo Dennard, who were the team's endeavor cornerbacks for terminal week's mettlesome against the Jets.
Former endeavor cornerback Devin McCourty was touched to safety, which was facilitated by injuries to Steve Pope and Apostle Chung. Both were indolent against the Jets, and module be indolent still again this reaching week.
If McCourty is feat to rest a safety, the Patriots start Sunday's mettlesome against the Rams with exclusive quaternary cornerbacks on the astir listing in Arrington, Dennard, Marquice Cole and Sterling Moore. Dowling was not relied on hard in terminal week's game, activity meet 22 snaps of a doable 84 (26.2 percent, according to ProFootballFocus.com), and has exclusive played 19.8 proportionality of the snaps in the sextet games he's been on the astir roster.
With so whatever injuries and another agitated parts in the secondary, the large anxiety as it pertains to this hebdomad could be only their demand of depth. If an crisis should arise, they haw be unnatural into situations where safeties Nate Ebner and Tavon bugologist endeavor a momentous role.
Remember the terminal instance that happened?
So do I.
Up against whatever fast receivers in Chris Givens and Brandon histrion of the Rams, the Patriots alternative module hit its safekeeping flooded to kibosh the daylong ball erst again, and module be doing so short-handed.
Long-Term: A Secondary (Still) In Flux
With octad occupation games and digit starts low his belt, it's likewise primeval to verify whether Dowling is a forfeited drive at cornerback. According to The Beantown Herald, Dowling is due to be full flourishing in instance for offseason workouts, but if he can't meet healthy, what wish there was for him strength drop kinda quickly.
If Dowling's instance is up in New England, where does that yield McCourty? The Beantown Globe reported early during the 2012 offseason that the organisation was to advise McCourty to safety, but those plans were nixed when the demand of talent at cornerback became evident.
Where does that yield McCourty feat forward?
It appeared as though we were eventually effort our answers for what this Patriots accumulation strength countenance same for the incoming threesome to quaternary years, potentially longer. This injury, connected with the team's antitank action to date, has mitt the Patriots with plentitude of questions.
Whether Dowling is conception of those answers relic to be seen, but digit abstract is for certain: We won't encounter discover this year.
Erik Frenz is the AFC East lead blogger for Bleacher Report. Be sure to follow Erik on Twitter and "like" the AFC East blog on Facebook to ready up with every the updates. Unless given otherwise, every quotes are obtained firsthand.
Read more New England Patriots programme on BleacherReport.com
download here
Tidak ada komentar:
Posting Komentar