Is There Enough Depth At Corner For DeMeco Ryans & Texans Defense?

Is There Enough Depth At Corner For DeMeco Ryans & Texans Defense?

Question number one, how do they play BL uh base defense at full strength? I think this will be interesting because last year we saw Jaylen Petri play a large percentage of the snaps at what you could consider cornerback uh for the most part. I mean, and they didn’t have Christian Harris, so I don’t know if that fact if if that would have been the case had it not happened, but they obviously liked what they saw uh with Petri. I think a big reason why they drafted Jaylen Reed out of Penn State in an ideal scenario to develop behind Jimmy Ward and Jaylen Petri was because maybe they like the way that they play football uh in that set. But it will be interesting to see how they place play base defense at full strength. And let’s pretend that Christian Harris and Jaylen Petri are healthy. What do those splits look like and and how does De Mo attack it? That’s question number one that impacts the corners. Well, you don’t pay Jaylen Petri $10 million a year to put Christian Harris on the field instead of him. So, I I would tell you that most of the time they’re going to have two quarterbacks and Jaylen Petri and two linebackers on the field. That would be my educated expectation. Yeah. Question number two, how do they handle the inevitable short-handedness? Now, you showed off your vocab early. I don’t know if this is a word-handedness, uh, but I did not get corrected in the spell check. So, how do they handle the inevitable short-handedness? Last year, it was D’Angelo, not TJ Maxx, more Ross, uh, out there looking like a bad Ross, uh, with the perfect passer rating against Jordan Love. How do they handle it? What do they do if it if slashin Lacier or Stingley misses time? Are we seeing Smith as CB1? Uh, Jaylen Smith, what are we seeing? How are they going to handle that? Do they become more open if something happens to bringing in a Stefon Gilmore? I think that I think those those corners that are on standby that we hear about a lot if Stingley or Lacier is going to miss more time. I think you become more open-minded to bringing those guys in. But it will be interesting because it’s inevitable. It’s the only certainty in football is that you’re going to be short-handed at some time. How do they handle the inevitable short-handedness? uh piggybacking off of how they how they play defense base defense at full strength and Jaylen Smith is my hope on how they handle it. I hope he finds a way to solidify himself as that guy should one of those outside guys miss time or even if if Petri has to miss time. Hopefully they they would trust Smith enough to maybe be able to do what Petri does as well. That’d be my hope. Obviously, you know, before he retired, they had a veteran to compete with Smith, but you know, it’s it’s going to be it’s it’s it’s hopefully going to be Smith after that. It’s Oh, crap. Yeah. And then it’s also Well, at least you have a good edge duo that can perhaps pressure the quarterback and lower the uh lower the uh the amount of time that they have to cover. Question number three, who’s gonna be quarterback three? Yeah, J Jaylen Smith’s my hope. And I I think, you know, you don’t spend a third. That’s the best case scenario is that he’s the unquestioned CB3. Correct. Correct. I mean, when you trade up for a guy that early and then the guy that was in front of him is gone, you would hope that naturally he would step up. That that would have been the the ultimate scenario even if Darby had been here if Smith was just head and shoulders above him. But yeah, that’s I mean that’s that’s what you hope when you draft a guy in the third round that he could he could lock down a for sure spot on the two deep at the very least. Like there’s not a path for him to start. So the best spot he can end up on the depth chart is is a backup that you trust behind Stingley outside and behind Lacer outside. No doubt. No doubt. Question four. How good can Kamari be? That’s that’s what’s the next step for Kamari Lacader? How good can he be? Can he be a fringe Pro Bowl quarterback? Uh is is he going to be one of those guys that is gets talked about because it does seem like Mitchell and Dejene get talked about like at a higher level. Uh maybe maybe just because they’re on good teams. I don’t I don’t know. But like Kabari Lacader, how good can he be? It it’s to me it’s not out of the question that he ends up as, you know, one of the 30 best corners in football. And you think about, okay, you got either the one the number one or number two corner and then the, you know, 25th best cornerback in football. It’s like it’s that’s a great duo. Nobody else has anything really close to that. Um, could could he could he clam into the top 20? this seems, you know, a pretty high bar to get to, but after the incredible rookie season and the way that he approaches things, and I wrote about this last week on Houston football, they had the guys walking over for like the final day of of uh mandatory mini camp. It’s what are you doing with your break? It’s like one guy’s getting married. Stingley said, I’m going to go to sleep. Demo is like I’m going to Cabo. Kamar Lasser goes working and kept walking. And it’s like it’s see the guy is just always putting in time. He’s always paying attention to it. He wants to get better. He said he understands the game better than he did last year. Last year was just, you know, go a million miles an hour, try to make a play, but he understands the game better. Like I believe him when he says that. And he’s going to be really good this year is my hope. Yeah, he’s solid. He’s everything you want in in a CB2. I mean quite honestly like if Dererick Singley didn’t exist I would be intrigued to see you know can Kamari Lacader emerge as like a CB1 that you feel okay about like and that’s that’s that’s how high I am on him but but you have Derek Stingley so now now it’s kind of like okay well he’s CB2 he’s going to be CB2 for the next at least however long Stingley’s here. Uh, but you feel good about Kamari Lacer. Like if you you didn’t have Derek Stingley, there’d be a lot of concern about the position obviously, but you you would at least be intrigued to see what Kamari Lacier can be. And I’m a I’m a big fan of of the young man uh in in in many ways. Uh number five question about the corners. Uh who not on the roster gets a shot? And this could this could be just some rando that’s gonna happen. Like it might happen a couple of times, but we’re going to walk up to practice and Aaron Wilson is going to report that Needle Dong Johnson has signed a deal with the Texans or this guy um Whack Jackson has signed a deal with the Texans. There’s going to be other guys that get opportunities because they are going to churn the corner position and there’s going to be some guys that emerge. Sometimes those guys come into camp and they end up making the team. But it is going to happen.

The Texans have arguably the best cornerback duo in the NFL, but Landry Locker has five questions about the position during another edition of S&L Texans Talk with Cody Stoots.

Subscribe to the most credible daily digital Houston Texans content and enjoy the LIVE videos, analysis, post-game shows and more. WE ARE IN THIS TOGETHER!: https://t.co/utJTUfOyxl

Landry also streams with Cody Stoots each weekday LIVE at 4pm on S&L. Subscribe Here: https://t.co/ntghco47Xk

For business and advertising inquiries e-mail: landry.locker@gmail.com