Injuries at safety where we have very little depth

[fredtoast]

Starter George Iloka is out a few weeks and back up Derron Smith is also injured.

 

The Bengals obviously did not have much faith in our back up safeties last year. Derron Smith only played 102 snaps (43 in the Buffalo game where Williams first got injured) and Fejedelem only played 40 (20 in one game against the Eagles).  When Shawn Williams was out against Baltimore in week 11 Josh Shaw moved to safety.

 

We drafted Brandon Wilson in the 6th round, but he is a project who was originally listed as a RB.

 

This is a good chance for Shaw and/or Dennard to get a lot of snaps at safety.  In today's NFL the safety is more of a CB than in-the-box run stopper.  PLus, as long as Williams is healthy that would be his job anyway.

 

Anyone out there that we could pick up?  We already signed Cedric Thompson (5th round pick by Miami in '15) but I have never heard of the guy.  he has just bounced around from team to team on practice squads.

 

Any reports on how Brandon Wilson is doing in camp?

[omgdrdoom]

Wilson is on the NFI list IIRC, so there's another to add to the concern.

 

Fej is an in-the-box, LB/S hybrid style of safety and he's one of the only healthy S on the team right now.

 

I could see the plan being Shaw @ safety, but I'd personally like to see them throw a couple bucks at a guy like Corey Graham that's just sitting on his couch right now. I don't think it would hurt to let a vet come in and fight for a spot when there are so many injuries at the position right now. Maybe Graham wants too much money or wants to be a starter or something, but past that I have no idea how he's still unemployed. He's actually a pretty good true FS style of safety that we could use at the moment.

[fredtoast]

4 hours ago, omgdrdoom said:

Wilson is on the NFI list IIRC, so there's another to add to the concern.

 

Fej is an in-the-box, LB/S hybrid style of safety and he's one of the only healthy S on the team right now.

 

I could see the plan being Shaw @ safety, but I'd personally like to see them throw a couple bucks at a guy like Corey Graham that's just sitting on his couch right now. I don't think it would hurt to let a vet come in and fight for a spot when there are so many injuries at the position right now. Maybe Graham wants too much money or wants to be a starter or something, but past that I have no idea how he's still unemployed. He's actually a pretty good true FS style of safety that we could use at the moment.

Graham was a star for the Ravens in their '12 Super Bowl run.  IN 4 postseason games he had 32 tackles, a sack, 2 ints, and a td.  In their 38-35 win over the Broncos he picked off two Peyton Manning passes.  He returned one for e td and the other was in Denver territory in overtime that set up the game winning FG.

 

That was a few years ago, but in 2015 he finished 8th in the league (2nd among DBs) with 127 tackles.

[omgdrdoom]

For anyone that cares about PFF's grading, Graham graded out at an 80 last year, 0.6 points lower than Shawn Williams, and 1.9 points higher than George Iloka.

 

For anyone that doesn't care about PFF's grading but likes them statz, "Despite missing more tackles than any other defensive back in the league, with 16, Corey Graham managed to finish the season as the top-graded defender for the Buffalo secondary. Graham cut his touchdowns allowed from six to three while allowing only 220 receiving yards on the year. The longest pass he gave up was 25 yards, and he never allowed more than 50 yards in a game."

 

I know that another DB that misses tackles likely isn't what the Bengals need with how poor they tackled in 2016, buuuutttt, Graham can cover and play the true FS role that we don't really have at the moment with all of our injuries. Hell, I'm not even sure we have a FS like Graham on the roster if everybody was healthy, we have a lot of more SS style guys that have transitioned into playing either spot. The dude is on the wrong side of 30, but he never gave up a pass over 25 or allowed more than 50 yards in an entire game just this past year, and that was playing on a dog shit secondary. There has to be a reason behind him not being on a team currently. Sorry for hijacking this into a "sign Corey Graham" spree, but IMO he makes a LOT of sense for us right now.