He's definitely a lock down CB, without a doubt. is he a Revis? Nah, but definitely a top 3 Corner. People don't like him because he runs his mouth, me honestly i love that shit lol!
There's no such thing as a lockdown zone corner. They are always dependant on other players for help. Revis was a lockdown because he could minimize the effectiveness of one player almost completely, and by himself. When you play zone, your assignment can leave your zone. People gave Revis so much about for that stood Ted Ginn touchdown. It was quarters zone. The guy left his zone and let Kerry Buttplug Rhodes blow the play.
Question: lets say Seattle was playing Detroit next week...Megatron lines up to the Left for the majority of the game...does Sherman follow? Highly doubt it. Anyone remember Nnamdi? Nobody threw at him for 3 years...scared as fuck. He gets to the nfc east, and Eli lit his ass up. After that people came to realise: if he can't knock you off your route, he's average. They play an identical style, Physical at the line, disrupting timing forcing the qb to bail. If your strong and can eat the initial contact ,you can beat Sherman. If you dont let him jump you at the line, you can beat Sherman. Too bad you still got eliete safety help waiting once you manage to get by him. And that help is basically what makes sherm look better then he is... he plays great zone, that's it. Revis on the other hand just doesn't give a fuck..usually the smartest defender on the field by a mile..finnesse, smaller wrs..the Wes Welkers and Jeremy Kerleys of the NFL..he just eats em up, trashes em at the line, bumps off routes, becomes their shadow...qbs bail... while staying in the hip pocket of bigger, more physical (usually slower) wr's better then any db I have ever seen.
Let me tell you as a Patriot fan....Revis isn't the same Revis this year. He has that tenacity but he is getting beat consistently.
Revis seems to be in position, but just can't make a play on the ball anymore. Call it aging, but he is not the same. I'm loving it since he's a Patriot now and Browner is definitely going to be flagged multiple times once he comes back. Pats invested 12 mil in Revis and still can't stop the run or protect their quarterback. Pats are a first round elimination at best.
So he is just a Darrin Walls that gets paid 11.5 million more. But if we are talking prime Revis vs Sherman, Revis wins by a mile. He shadowed the opp #1 across the field with no saftey help, and still smothered guys. Not just scrubs, but guys like Calvin Johnson. He plays with perfect technique, and if the receiver messes up the route he will run it for them, and he was able to press the small shifty receivers and the giant ones alike. Even when he had saftey help, which wasn't often, it was from the likes of Jim Leonhard and Eric Smith. Sherman is a very good player that looks better than he is due to his system. Seattle plays mostly Cover 3 with Sherman staying on his side of the field, and having Earl Thomas looking over your shoulder lets take ALOT more risks going for INTS than Revis with Cover 0 most of the time. Heck, I like Patrick Peterson more than I like Sherman.
Earl Thomas tends to play on right side of the field opposite of Sherman. Regardless having those 2 safeties out there in Earl Thomas and Cam Chancellor make one hell of a difference. Patrick Peterson is highly overrated in my book - 7 TDs in his last 12 games or so. Great athlete, but average technique in my opinion.
Revis had Jones all day and let him catch 3 balls for 43 yards, and Jones was lining up in the slot alot and that makes it a tougher assignment. He was beaten on 1 route all day (an out and up). He had position and just missed knocking two of the passes down.
This. Revis is allowing short underneath completions for little to no yards and making immediate tackles. I've also seen him get blamed for a reception or 2 when he came into someone elses zone who was out of position to make the play. Revis is still good, he's obviously not 2011 Revis, that was 3 years ago, but he's still Revis. He's still the most important defensive back on the #1 ranked pass defense and #2 overall defense (in yards, tied for 4 in points, #1 in takeaways). And while competition matters and it's only been 3 games, the 2011-2013 Patriot's would be ranked in the high 20's against the teams we've faced so far. Edit: And his only touchdown allowed he actually defended it textbook perfectly, he batted it straight to the ground, enough credit isn't given to Mike Wallace for somehow bouncing it off of his knee after the deflection back up into his own hands, it was a lot of luck and a great second effort on his part AFTER Revis beat him.
