NFL draft preview: Seahawks’ need for cornerbacks starts after 2020. They have options
They are shutdown cornerbacks. Cover cornerbacks. Bump-and-run and ball-hawking cornerbacks.
Then there are Pete Carroll cornerbacks.
Those are the ones the Seahawks have targeted in almost every draft since 2010 with Carroll and general manager John Schneider in charge.
Pete Carroll cornerbacks are long and lean, quick as much as fast. They are above 6 feet tall. And they have arms that are 32 inches or longer.
That last number has become synonymous with Seattle’s defensive backs. Carroll has never drafted a cornerback with arms shorter than 32 inches. That’s nine cornerbacks taken in 10 drafts, all with arms at least that long.
He even trades for them that way. Last month the Seahawks acquired Quinton Dunbar to be their new candidate to beat out Tre Flowers and start in 2020 at cornerback opposite Pro Bowl cover man Shaquill Griffin. Dunbar was a starter for Washington. He is 6 feet 2. His arms are 32 5/8 inches long.
The Seahawks’ idea is the longer the arms, the sooner that cornerback can reach a pass in flight as it arrives to an opposing receiver in Carroll’s tight, step-kick technique of coverage. Longer arms also allow Carroll’s corners to ward off and control receivers when positioning becomes the key determinant to who wins a ball in the air.
When the Seahawks drafted Michael Tyson in the sixth round in 2017, Schneider was asked why the Seahawks intended to turn the safety from the University of Cincinnati into a cornerback in Seattle.
“He has 32 1/2-inch arms,” the GM said.
In 2018, the Seahawks drafted Flowers in the fifth round to be a cornerback. The Oklahoma State safety had never played cornerback. But Flowers is 6-3. His 33 7/8-inch arms are the longest of the nine players Carroll has drafted to be a Seahawks corner.
That’s what Flowers became in his rookie season, a starting one, and again in 2019 for Seattle. Griffin (32 3/8-inch arms, by the way) became so good in his third season as a Seahawks starter opponents picked on Flowers on the other side. And they succeeded.
That’s why Seattle traded a fifth-round pick to Washington for Dunbar this offseason.
Dunbar gives the Seahawks three cornerbacks who have starting NFL experience at the position vying for two jobs in 2020. That makes it appear the Seahawks don’t need cornerbacks in the draft April 23-25.
But they may need more soon.
Griffin and Dunbar, who set a career-high with four interceptions last season for Washington, are both entering the final years of their contracts. The Seahawks’ goal will be to re-sign both, if they continue their play from 2019. But that will be costly. High-quality cornerbacks are coveted in the pass-happy NFL, where rules stacked against them make the cornerback position the hardest in the league to play outside of quarterback.
Taking a 10th cornerback in 11 drafts this month would give that rookie a year to learn Carroll’s trick step-kick technique and defense without, barring injury, having to start in 2020. That rookie could also compete as a bigger option at nickel defensive back inside, where the coach wants second-year man Ugo Amadi to have more, varied competition this year.
The fact it’s a not a primary need makes it unlikely the Seahawks will take cornerback with their first pick, whether at 27th overall in round one or after Schneider’s expected trades down in round one. The GM has traded his first-round choice in eight consecutive drafts.
TOP CORNERBACKS IN 2020 NFL DRAFT
1. C.J. Henderson, Florida
2. Jeff Okudah, Ohio State
3. Trevon Diggs, Alabama
4. Jeff Gladney, TCU
5. A.J. Terrell, Clemson
Those top cornerbacks are unlikely to become Seahawks. The 6-1 Henderson is viewed as the draft’s best coverage corner. He may get drafted in the top 10. (Plus, his arms aren’t 32 inches long).
But cornerbacks such as Bryce Hall from Virginia and Michael Ojemudia of Iowa could become options for Seattle on the second day of the draft April 24.
Tacoma’s Rob Rang of NFLdraftscout.com rates Hall as a second- or third-round pick. Hall is 6-1, 202 pounds with 32 1/4-inch arms. Like Richard Sherman and Dunbar, Hall is a former wide receiver. He started all four of his years at Virginia and led the nation with 22 pass break-ups in 2018. His 2019 senior season ended after six starts because of ankle surgery. That could scare off some teams.
Ojemudia is 6-1, 200 with, yes, 32 (and 1/4)-inch arms. Assessments of Ojemedia have a common description: long and lean. He also started games in all four of his college seasons.
Because of a belief he lacks NFL skills to go get passes in the air, some see him as a third-day draftee, perhaps in round five. That’s the round the Seahawks drafted Sherman in 2011.
That worked out OK for Seattle.
An even later-round sleeper or perhaps undrafted free agent Seattle could be considering: Kevin McGill from Eastern Michigan. He had 22 passes defenses in four college seasons. He ran the 40 in 4.54 seconds at his pro day last month, just before the coronavirus pandemic shut down pre-draft workouts. His size fits the Seahawks’ profile: 6 feet, 200 pounds with 33-inch arms.
Signing undrafted free agents are going to be a particular trick this year. The NFL’s edict of coaches, GMs and scouts each conducting drafts remotely linked from separate locations to adhere to current social-distancing standards in our world means even more of a mad scramble of trying to coordinate simultaneous calls to multiple free agents as the draft is ending April 25.
GMs assign area scouts familiar with such players to make the calls trying to get them signed at the end of the draft. And these usually do it hey-you style amid the chaos of the same draft room while competing with 31 other teams to sign a dozen or so rookie free agents. Scouts bring in GMs and coaches, sometimes with a head nod or yell, for them to give final recruiting pitches and signing-bonus offers to undrafted players before. Then the coach and GM move on to the next free agents.
This year, all of that will need to be done by telephone and video conferencing while apart.
That is one of many ways the Seahawks have an advantage of Carroll and Schneider being together running the franchise, drafts and signing undrafted free agents since 2010. That’s by far the longest coach/GM partnership in the NFC West.
The longest pairing is coach Mike Tomlin and GM Kevin Colbert. They’ve been together since 2007.
This story was originally published April 14, 2020 at 2:57 PM.
