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I hope Baxter can come in and make an impact for the Brownies next year.The Top Five
Rating the free-agent cornerback signings
Posted: Thursday March 17, 2005 2:35PM; Updated: Thursday March 17, 2005 6:01PM
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Seahawks CB Ken Lucas had six interceptions in 2004.
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<SCRIPT>if(cnnEnableCL){if(!(location.hostname.indexOf('cnn.com')>-1)) {cnnAddCSI('contextualLinks','/.element/ssi/misc/2.0/contextual/story.html','');}else{ cnnAddCSI('contextualLinks','http://cl.cnn.com/ctxtlink/jsp/si/cl/2.0/si-story.jsp','category=sihome&url=http:/\/robots.cnnsi.com/2005/writers/don_banks/03/17/top.five.cbs/index.html&desccharcnt=80&site=cnn_si_dyn_ctxt&origin=si');}}</SCRIPT><IFRAME id=iframecontextualLinks style=\"VISIBILITY: hidden; POSITION: absolute\" name=iframecontextualLinks align=right src="http://cl.cnn.com/ctxtlink/jsp/si/cl/2.0/si-story.jsp?domId=contextualLinks&time=1111166620055&category=sihome&url=http://robots.cnnsi.com/2005/writers/don_banks/03/17/top.five.cbs/index.html&desccharcnt=80&site=cnn_si_dyn_ctxt&origin=si" width=0 height=0></IFRAME></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>In the opening 15 days of this year's free-agency period -- when the dollars have been flying and the deals fairly furious -- it has been the corner market that has been most active. And we're not talking about any Ma and Pa type operation down on Main Street.
Cornerback has been the hot position in this year's personnel shopping spree, with a bevy of front-line players being snapped up and awarded contracts that all fell close to the range of six years for $30 million, with $10 million to $13 million to sign.
Samari Rolle, Ken Lucas, Fred Smoot, Anthony Henry and Gary Baxter all got deals in that ballpark. And another major domino fell when two-time defending Super Bowl champion New England cut Ty Law and then replaced him by trading a third-round pick to Arizona for Duane Starks.
Still on the market via trade are Miami's Patrick Surtain and Oakland's Charles Woodson, with Law and Tennessee's Andre Dyson available as unrestricted free agents. That's a lot of starting cornerback talent for one off-season.
Here's our top-five take on which of the free-agent cornerbacks were the best long-term investment:
1. Ken Lucas, Carolina -- Playing in Seattle, so far from the nation's media spotlight, Lucas didn't have the name appeal that many of his free-agent counterparts did. But personnel folks within the league considered him the best all-around cornerback available, at least given the fact that New England's Ty Law was coming off an injury-marred 2004 season. At 6-0, 205 pounds, Lucas is big enough to match up well with more physical receivers, and fast and light enough to run with the quicker ones.
He's aggressive in press coverage, and doesn't get lost in open space when playing off a receiver. He's also not shy about sticking his head in there on run defense, which is a growing rarity among top-rated cornerbacks (a trend that began with Deion Sanders' don't-hit, don't-tackle policy). No less of an authority than Cowboys head coach Bill Parcells had Lucas rated as the most complete cornerback in free agency.
Did the Panthers have to overpay to get Lucas? With a reported signing bonus approaching $13 million, probably so. But that's the free-agency game. You pay through the nose -- especially for a quality young player -- on the open market, and hope that he can be the exception rather than the rule in terms of the return on a big-money contract. At 26, entering his fifth NFL season, Lucas was the best bet out there this year at cornerback.
2. Samari Rolle, Baltimore -- One of the most athletic corners in the NFL, Rolle is known for his excellent speed and change of direction, superior hands and coverage instincts. He's a gifted man-coverage defender, whose ability to use his superb body control allows him to make up for mistakes during the course of a play. With Baltimore, he'll make one of the league's perennial top defenses even better, and with Chris McAlister on the other side of the field, Rolle won't always have to draw an opponents top receiver.
But Rolle did come with some question marks this offseason, and that's why he lasted as long as he did on the open market. Arrested last month on a misdemeanor domestic assault charge against his wife, Danisha, Rolle gave teams a character issue to consider. He also was limited to a career-low 12 games last year, with an injured left knee that required arthroscopic surgery. Throw in the concerns that Kansas City had about his congenital narrowing of the spinal column -- and Rolle did suffer two neck and spinal injuries in seven seasons in Tennessee -- and there's at least reason to wonder if Rolle has already played his best football.
Rolle won't be 29 until August, and his six-year, $30.5 million (including $11 million to sign) deal was in line with market standards. But entering his eighth year in the league, with some health and off-field issues on the radar screen, some teams wouldn't have touched him at those prices.
The Top Five (cont.)
Posted: Thursday March 17, 2005 2:35PM; Updated: Thursday March 17, 2005 6:01PM
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3. Gary Baxter, Cleveland -- Baxter is a bit of a projection as the Browns' No. 1 cornerback, because with the Ravens he played in the shadow of McAlister and that dominating Ray Lewis-led defense. But new Cleveland general manager Phil Savage is entirely familiar with Baxter's game from his days in Baltimore and believes the the fifth-year pro is up to the task of establishing his own reputation as one of the league's premier coverage men.
Baxter does have something to prove, because when the Ravens went out and signed Deion Sanders as a nickelback last year, it was in essence saying that Baltimore thought Baxter worthy of covering no more than an opponent's third-best receiver. With that in mind, some people within the league think Cleveland has paid No. 1 cornerback money to a player who hasn't remotely proven himself ready for that kind of high-profile position.
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<SCRIPT>if(cnnEnableCL){if(!(location.hostname.indexOf('cnn.com')>-1)) {cnnAddCSI('contextualLinks','/.element/ssi/misc/2.0/contextual/story.html','');}else{ cnnAddCSI('contextualLinks','http://cl.cnn.com/ctxtlink/jsp/si/cl/2.0/si-story.jsp','category=sihome&url=http:/\/robots.cnnsi.com/2005/writers/don_banks/03/17/top.five.cbs/index.html&desccharcnt=100&site=cnn_si_dyn_ctxt&origin=si');}}</SCRIPT><IFRAME id=iframecontextualLinks style=\"VISIBILITY: hidden; POSITION: absolute\" name=iframecontextualLinks align=right src="http://cl.cnn.com/ctxtlink/jsp/si/cl/2.0/si-story.jsp?domId=contextualLinks&time=1111166767582&category=sihome&url=http://robots.cnnsi.com/2005/writers/don_banks/03/17/top.five.cbs/index.html&desccharcnt=100&site=cnn_si_dyn_ctxt&origin=si" width=0 height=0></IFRAME></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE><!--endclickprintexclude-->But in fairness to Baxter, there were also days in Baltimore when he outplayed the more highly regarded McAlister, and he is big and physical enough to play both corner and free safety, where he got eight starts in 2003. Baxter will get beat badly at times, but at 26, he's still young enough to significantly improve his skills.
4. Anthony Henry, Dallas -- The critics will say that Henry is just a one-season wonder, and he's still living off the reputation he forged as rookie in 2001, when he picked off 10 passes after being an unheralded fourth-round pick out of the University of South Florida. And there's some truth to that. He has intercepted just seven passes in the three seasons since that boffo debut.
But Dallas jumped on Henry pretty quickly in free agency for a couple of reasons: First off, new Cowboys defensive backs coach Todd Bowles had the same job with the Browns the past four years and sold Parcells on Henry. And secondly, Henry is the kind of no-nonsense, do-as-he's-told player that Big Bill loves to coach. If you ask Henry to help out on the scout team and pitch in on special teams, he'll step right in without complaint. He's a team player through and through.
Henry can look over-matched at times, but he doesn't have to be great to be a successful signing for the Cowboys. He just has to significantly upgrade the right cornerback slot, which was declared a federal disaster zone last season. And the hope is with him providing solid play on his side, underachieving left cornerback Terence Newman will develop into the play-maker Dallas envisioned when it took him fifth overall in 2003. On paper at least, it makes sense.
5. Fred Smoot, Minnesota -- Others would rate Smoot much higher than fifth, based solely on his pure coverage skills, which may be better than anybody else's on this list. But Smoot is also the least physical of these five cornerbacks, and with the sorry state of run defense and the restrictions placed on pass defenders in the NFL these days, being able to use your body a little bit is more important than ever. In summary, we think Smoot has been overrated. Maybe not to Champ Bailey levels (another ex-Redskins cornerback, perhaps that's the key), but at least in a relative sense compared to the rest of the league's upper-tier cornerbacks.
There are also those within the league who believe Smoot is a potential off-field problem waiting to happen. While he had no character issues in his four seasons in Washington, there were lingering questions dating from his college days at Mississippi State, and some teams were determined to shy away from him in free agency because of it.
We'll say this much for him: He chose well in signing with the Vikings. With the scrappy Antoine Winfield lining up on the other side of the field, Smoot doesn't have to walk in the door as Minnesota's No. 1 cornerback and face everybody's top receiver. That's Winfield's job, and he's usually up to the challenge. Smoot certainly talks a No. 1 game, but his skills are better suited to a secondary or complementary role.
