{"id":137800,"date":"2025-06-17T20:06:12","date_gmt":"2025-06-17T20:06:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/137800\/"},"modified":"2025-06-17T20:06:12","modified_gmt":"2025-06-17T20:06:12","slug":"ravens-cbs-chidobe-awuzie-t-j-tampa-to-compete-for-starting-spot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/137800\/","title":{"rendered":"Ravens CBs Chidobe Awuzie, T.J. Tampa To Compete For Starting Spot"},"content":{"rendered":"

Four-time Pro Bowler\u00a0Marlon Humphrey<\/a>\u00a0and 2024 first-round pick\u00a0Nate Wiggins<\/a>\u00a0are slated to occupy starting roles at the cornerback spot for the Ravens this season. Aside from those two, however, there is plenty of uncertainty on the depth chart. \"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Baltimore lost veteran Brandon Stephens<\/a>\u00a0as well as trade acquisition Tre\u2019Davious White<\/a>\u00a0during free agency. Neither of those developments came as a surprise, but their departures created a first-team vacancy on the perimeter (provided Humphrey primarily works in the slot<\/a> moving forward).\u00a0Chidobe Awuzie<\/a>\u00a0represents a candidate to fill in as a starter.<\/p>\n

The former Cowboy, Bengal and Titan took a one-year Ravens pact<\/a> shortly after being released by Tennessee. Awuzie has 94 appearances and 81 starts to his name, giving his latest team a highly experienced option in the secondary. Injuries have been an issue for the 30-year-old, however, and after taking a deal worth $1.26MM he is far from a lock with respect to first-team action.<\/p>\n

As a result, training camp will feature competition for a starting gig. Awuzie is obviously a strong contender in that regard, but Jeff Zrebiec of The Athletic writes\u00a0T.J. Tampa<\/a>\u00a0can be seen as his primary challenger for the CB3 role (subscription required<\/a>). The latter was a fourth-round pick in last year\u2019s draft, but injuries limited him to only seven games played. When on the field, Tampa played almost exclusively on special teams and logged just 18 defensive snaps.<\/p>\n

Given that lack of experience, the 23-year-old would require a strong showing this summer to play his way into a starting spot. As Zrebiec notes, though, Tampa impressed during spring practices and he could carry that momentum into training camp and the preseason. Baltimore\u2019s pass defense improved dramatically during the second half of last season, but on the whole the unit ranked 31st in yards allowed; needles to say, improving on that figure will be a key goal in 2025.<\/p>\n

The Ravens also have Jalyn Armour-Davis<\/a> on their CB depth chart, although the fourth-year defensive back may be in line for a transition to safety this summer<\/a>. Baltimore added a pair of rookies during this year\u2019s draft in the form of Bilhal Kone<\/a> and\u00a0Robert Longerbeam<\/a>,\u00a0but those sixth-rounders will of course face modest expectations in 2025. As a result, the play of Awuzie and Tampa through training camp will be worth watching closely.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Four-time Pro Bowler\u00a0Marlon Humphrey\u00a0and 2024 first-round pick\u00a0Nate Wiggins\u00a0are slated to occupy starting roles at the cornerback spot for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":137801,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2052],"tags":[184,117,2282,4689,7,6,169,13202],"class_list":{"0":"post-137800","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-baltimore-ravens","8":"tag-baltimore","9":"tag-baltimore-ravens","10":"tag-baltimoreravens","11":"tag-chidobe-awuzie","12":"tag-football","13":"tag-nfl","14":"tag-ravens","15":"tag-t-j-tampa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114700510024490222","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137800","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137800"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137800\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/137801"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}