Mr. Incompletions
January 28th, 2021
Impressive stat.
The Bucs like to think they have a shutdown corner in Carlton Davis. At least, they say so publicly.
And Davis has had excellent games against some of the top receivers in the game. Facing Cheetah Hill of the Chiefs earlier was not one of them.
Joe believes Davis is a good corner. “Shutdown?” For Joe, that’s Deion Sanders territory. Not sure if Davis is there yet.
Now the stats crowd is really big on Davis. For example, the PFF tribe has a stat — not a grade, a stat — that demonstrates Davis is an elite cover corner. Per the PFF tribe, Davis leads all cornerbacks since 2019 in forced incompletions.
The funny thing about the graphic below, Bucs linebacker Devin White snapped a screenshot of the PFF’s tribes stat on Davis and then posted it on his Instagram Stories account all but demanding Bucs fans give Davis his rightful due.
Joe doffs his cap to Davis. Joe well done.
Now go out and help contain Cheetah so he doesn’t run wild, and give your offense the chance to win the game next week.
You know, Super Bowl LV?
January 28th, 2021 at 10:52 am
Dude is good, but does looks lost at times…..but that could be said about the whole D.
January 28th, 2021 at 10:55 am
Joe I love Carlton Davis as much as the next Bucs fan but my concern is his performance when he’s up against tyreek hill who burned him for almost the entire game earlier this year. I hope we have a better defensive stance than how we played kc earlier this year with our DB 10 yards away from their receivers. We have to play tight man coverage or disguise the zone because last time mahomes and hill looked like they were playing backyard football against us. Plus our defense has to remember that mahomes is mobile and pulls plays out of his asz better then anyone I have seen. This game though winnable will be a very difficult test for this defense
January 28th, 2021 at 11:02 am
I’m kind of confused as to who he is tbh. Sometimes he looks fantastic, but he hasn’t looked great lately… Could be that groin ‘stiffness’. Someone inbred board had posted a stat also from pff I thought where it said when targeted hr gave up a very high qb rating. Not sure if it was playoffs only or what. I do remember when he got beat GB game for the TD his coverage was actually pretty darn tight and it was just a heck of a play
January 28th, 2021 at 11:15 am
He didn’t look good against Green Bay, imo. Needs to step up next week.
January 28th, 2021 at 11:19 am
This stat is a little misleading. I think Davis is a good corner but a true shutdown corner they wouldn’t throw at. I think the better stat would be how many % incompletions vs total targets. That they threw that many times at him proves that they aren’t as afraid of throwing at him.
January 28th, 2021 at 11:29 am
He’s not a shutdown corner.
January 28th, 2021 at 11:30 am
Carlton Davis is a top 10 DB but doubt he will ever be top 5. He just doesn’t have the speed to keep up with the faster WRs. He tends to be grabby to make up for his last of speed. I say this when we know the greatest Bucs CB to ever wear the uniform was not lightning fast either but yet Ronde Barber is a future hall of famer.
January 28th, 2021 at 11:36 am
Any corner who consistently takes on the best WR the opponent has to offer will get burned occasionally.
What fans *don’t* see is Davis keeping the QB from throwing the ball to their #1 WR. That does not show up in stats, and that is the purpose of a shutdown corner.
Don’t know what happens with Hill in the SB, but I doubt Davis will be one-on-one like in Week 12.
My guess is man-2.
I like the old Belicick D philosophy: take away a teams’ #1 threat, and make them beat you with the rest. That is a tough task against KC.
January 28th, 2021 at 11:41 am
He is good, he’s just not fast enough to single cover the faster WR’s in the league
January 28th, 2021 at 11:41 am
To be honest, I find the guy overated, I thinks he gets lost easily and he misses a lot of tackles. But also on the other side is comparing with CB of the last years he really shines…..
January 28th, 2021 at 11:49 am
I like carlton too
But go back to packers game. He got torched all game long. He played terribled. I want to say all tds were against him.
January 28th, 2021 at 12:00 pm
He’s a top 10 to top 15 CB in the league for sure. Guys like that will cost money. Heck James Bradberry got 3 yrs/$43mil (avg 14.5mil per year) and he’s not as good as Davis (in my biased opinion lol).
January 28th, 2021 at 12:06 pm
They play a lot of cover 2 lately as ya’ll know that’s a zone coverage. I know it appears soft coverage but a lot of times his job is a zone not a man, so he looks beat but he’s really not… it’s a bend don’t break coverage. What’s neat is he can jam at the line so he’s disrupting routes constantly. When you hear coverage sack most of the time it’s because CD has delayed the receiver to get where he needs to be. He’s very versatile and physically he’s amazing, the body control is off the charts. If he can start ball hawking he’ll be considered elite. I think he’s already there.
January 28th, 2021 at 12:08 pm
I don’t really trust any of the corners that much but they all certainly have their moments
Sean Murphy Bunting for example, will get let up completion after completion but then come away with a clutch play at some point in the game.
January 28th, 2021 at 12:09 pm
@Joe, Sanders and Revis don’t exist anymore in this league. Not after 2004 when the rules changed and the middle of the field became a freeway, to quote Mr. Sapp.
January 28th, 2021 at 12:11 pm
The good news is that the KC running game is nothing to be concerned about. If KC had a great running game I don’t know how anyone would stop them, they are already tough enough to stop.
January 28th, 2021 at 12:23 pm
i hope CD thanked Licht personally for showing smitty the door!!!…lol…kid couldve been ruined….
GO BUCS!!!!
January 28th, 2021 at 12:25 pm
How about this Joe, shutdown Cheatah in the Super Bowl like you were saying and then we can call him shutdown!!!
January 28th, 2021 at 12:53 pm
No one can question that Hill burned him the last game. You don’t have to tell CD!! I’ll bet my ex’s sweet stuff that CD has gone over and over and over that film and that he will do better this time. CD probably will get some help too, which won’t hurt!! GO BUCS!!
January 28th, 2021 at 1:05 pm
Carlton had no chance against Tyreek in the first quarter of the last game. No one can run with Tyreek in man coverage. He is too fast, and the Bucs learned that lesson the hard way. After they figured it out the defense tightened up for the rest of the game. I think the Bucs defense will be great during the super bowl, and there will be a few big plays the Bucs make that we’ll remember for a long time.
January 28th, 2021 at 1:15 pm
Does anyone know Davis’s 40 time? I’m guessing it can’t be lower than 4.5 or so
January 28th, 2021 at 2:06 pm
@Beej CD3 40 time was 4.44.
January 28th, 2021 at 2:16 pm
Coburn. I disagree completely. I feel like he was at his best against Davante Adams. Anyone involved in fantasy football knows that Davante is a slam dunk 25 plus points a week and Carlton more than held him in check. I actually think the NFC Championship was one of his better performances. I do have to admit though that Scantling’s TD in the 1st quarter was on CD.
January 28th, 2021 at 2:44 pm
This defense leaves the corners to fend for themselves at times, and sometimes they get burned. You cant run the ball on the defense unless your name is Cook or Henry, so therefore you have to throw. In a passing league, no balance and throwing it 40 times still gets you beat even if you are the MVP. I think an argument can be made that the pass rush should take just much blame as the secondary during some of those rough performances. This defense is built to thrive on both playing well. Hats off to those guys battling it out in the secondary.
January 28th, 2021 at 3:06 pm
Davis is good physical corner but matchups with receivers who are burners is not good for him. Put him on sammy watkins but please not hill, I think they should put jamel dean who ran a 4.30 forty time with a safety over the top. Or maybe try davis on kelce he could be physical with him and can run with him.
January 28th, 2021 at 3:27 pm
Had so much fun watching this kid develope. The lust of WRs he has shut down is staggering. And hes only getting better.
He could really cement himself as a top Corner if he cant have a day on Hill. Im not doubting him for a second. I welco.e the great competition.
GO BUCS!!!!
January 28th, 2021 at 3:27 pm
Typos**
January 28th, 2021 at 3:59 pm
That’s good and everything, but maybe QBs are throwing the ball at him a lot. It sure seems like some QBs test him a lot.
January 28th, 2021 at 9:34 pm
I think Davis is not quite a true #1 shutdown CB but better than a 2nd CB.
He’s like a 1.5 with a possibility of getting to that sacred “shutdown” corner…but not yet.
He’d better get to that level because he’s the worst tackler in the secondary. He needs to get to the shutdown level of Neon Deion who was also a horrible tackler.
For some reason Carlton always comes in high and the WR’s just stiff arm him out of the way. Perhaps he could get some lessons from Jordan Whitehead who knows how to blast guys in the thighs and blow them up big time.
January 28th, 2021 at 11:27 pm
Davis is an excellent cornerback but he hasn’t proven yet that he is a true shutdown corner. He has had games where he has locked down on certain receivers and games where he has been exploited by other receivers. On the shutting down of Tyreek Hill I don’t think anyone can cover him consistently one on one. Obviously we need to ditch the defense we played against the Chiefs the first half of our previous game with them. You can’t let Hill beat you or Kelce. They also have Hardiman and a couple decent running backs that are quality ball players, not to mention Mahomes. If we can stop the run and contain Mahomes in the pocket we will have a pretty good chance of beating them. Should be a great game to watch.
January 29th, 2021 at 12:33 am
St Pete and Lakeland,
You two Gentlemen are correct , CD is not a true shutdown corner. But the truth is, there’s not a single shutdown corner in the league . Not one!
Sanders and Revis were shutdown corners and the term was coined to describe how they played. Unfortunately, fans hear the term and instantly it becomes an imperative that the team aquire one.
The reality is a shutdown corner is as elusive as bigfoot. Thousands of people report seeing bogfoot each and every year; however no one seems to have spotted the north American shutdown corner in a decade. But this fact hasn’t dissuaded fans from seeking this elusive cryptid. It hasn’t even caused a moment of reflection to ponder the question of why there’s none in a league jam packed with top talent.
Davis is a top tier corner. Is he perfect, no! But no corner is today. Perhaps it’s time to understand what changes have occurred to the game and how these factors have led to an extinction of the species known as the shutdown corner. They’re history Gentlemen.