By Glenn Naughton<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
With news\u00a0of the New York Jets signing free agent cornerback Buster Skrine, JetNation.com takes a look at\u00a0how he fared in what was one of his most challenging match-ups of the year.<\/p>\n
In taking a glance at the Browns schedule, we decided to see how Skrine performed in Cleveland’s week 12 contest against the Atlanta Falcons. \u00a0Defending Roddy White and Julio Jones with Matt Ryan at quarterback is one of the toughest assignments any cornerback can draw.<\/p>\n
For the sake of brevity, commentary will only cover\u00a0Skrines’ performance in pass coverage with additional focus on throws made to a receiver he is covering.<\/p>\n
First Series:<\/strong><\/p>\n It didn’t take long for Skrine to jump out in this game as he was matched up against White on the first pass play of the day. \u00a0Ryan tried to hit White over the middle but\u00a0Skrine timed the pass perfectly, reaching in front of White and batting the ball to \u00a0the \u00a0turf.<\/p>\n Just a few plays later, Skrine is playing off against Julio Jones who Ryan targets on an out route. \u00a0It was a catchable pass that went through Jones’ hands, but Skrine\u00a0had good coverage. \u00a0In fact, he got to Jones quickly enough that the broadcast team initially credited him with swatting the ball out before Jones could get a handle on it.<\/p>\n Second Series:<\/strong><\/p>\n Roddy White runs a slant and Skrine gets caught up in traffic which allows White to make the grab and pick up twelve yards.<\/p>\n Following a coverage sack of Matt Ryan in which the Browns secondary left the QB with nowhere to go with the ball, Ryan finds White on a quick hitter for five yards just in front of Skrine who immediately wraps White up to prevent any yards after the catch.<\/p>\n The drive ends with a Matt Ryan touchdown pass to Julio Jones who is being covered by Joe Hayden. The play is aided by Donte Whitner abandoning the middle of the field to work toward Skrines’ side of the field. \u00a0Replays show Skrine providing tight coverage against Roddy White on the opposite side.<\/p>\n Third Series:<\/strong><\/p>\n Starts with another coverage sack of Ryan who had to pull the ball down with no open receivers.<\/p>\n Fourth Series:<\/strong><\/p>\n Skrine is covering White and sticks with him on short route over the middle. \u00a0Ryan fumbles possession away to Cleveland on a sack.<\/p>\n Fifth Series:<\/strong><\/p>\n Not targeted.<\/p>\n Sixth Series:<\/strong><\/p>\n Playing off coverage again, Ryan hits White on an out route for a short gain. \u00a0White goes\u00a0out of bounds before Skrine gets to him to make the tackle.<\/p>\n Seventh Series:<\/strong><\/p>\n On 3rd and long, Ryan looks to Skrines’ side of the field, pumps and pulls the ball down. \u00a0Tight coverage results in a Ryan check-down to RB Steven Jackson.<\/p>\n Eighth Series:<\/strong><\/p>\n First bad play of the day by\u00a0Skrine\u00a0but he catches a break. \u00a0He freezes on a double move by Roddy White who blows past him instantly. Ryan is under pressure and checks down to Harry Douglas on the opposite side of the field.<\/p>\n Skrine plays off the LOS, gives White \u00a0a big cushion, Ryan hits White for 11 yards and a first down.<\/p>\n From Cleveland’s five-yard line, Ryan hits Roddy White on a quick slant. \u00a0Atlanta receiver is jammed by Cle DB between Skrine\u00a0and White. Skrine takes a step around the two, then steps up and tackles White inside the 2 yard line. \u00a0Very good play to prevent the touchdown. Commentators commend big play by Skrine\u00a0on replay.<\/p>\n Ninth Series:<\/strong><\/p>\n Scrine\u00a0lines up on the left side of the defense and goes out wide when Harry Douglas goes in motion. \u00a0Ryan looks for Douglas but is hit as he throws. \u00a0Skrine\u00a0recognizes the “duck” and immediately breaks toward the ball, appears to have an interception but good play by Julio Jones to knock it loose…good recognition and reaction.<\/p>\n Tenth Series:<\/strong><\/p>\n With Atlanta advancing the ball on\u00a0what could be the game winning drive, Skrine\u00a0lines up to press Roddy White. \u00a0Coverage is solid but may have been getting “cleared out” to open up underneath route where Ryan hits Williams.<\/p>\n Skrine\u00a0lines up in the slot over White who\u00a0runs a slant and has a step on Skrine\u00a0but Ryan opts to go downfield to Devin Hester on an incomplete pass.<\/p>\n Overall Impression\/Notes:<\/p>\n – Very impressed with Skrines’ effort in this game. \u00a0He was Matched up against physically superior receivers and he more than held his own.<\/p>\n – He did play off the LOS quite a bit more than Hayden, rarely asked to press.<\/p>\n – Ryan and company took multiple deep shots down the filed in this game but none against Skrine. \u00a0Hayden was targeted far more than one might expect as Cleveland’s no. 1 corner.<\/p>\n -Despite doing a good job of tackling receivers after the catch, Skrine\u00a0was tentative at best in run support.<\/p>\n -Feeling as though Skrine\u00a0played very well in this particular game, we checked his pass coverage grade acccording to PFF.com and not surprised to see he had earned the highest coverage rating on defense for the Browns at 1.2.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Glenn Naughton With news\u00a0of the New York Jets signing free agent cornerback Buster Skrine, JetNation.com takes a look at\u00a0how he fared in what was one of his most challenging match-ups of the year. In taking a glance at the Browns schedule, we decided to see how Skrine performed in Cleveland’s week 12 contest […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38,"featured_media":21016,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6,1337],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-27953","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-featured-editorials","8":"category-home-slider"},"acf":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/helmet.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/peLffi-7gR","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27953","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/38"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27953"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27953\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27961,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27953\/revisions\/27961"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21016"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/miletestsite.com\/jets\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}