Despite their struggles, Minnesota had the fifth-best defense in 2019
If someone told you on a 2014 summer day, “I am worried about the Vikings upcoming season because Christian Ponder won’t be the quarterback,” what would you think?
You’d look at that person like they were crazy.
This is the perplexing part about those concerned with Minnesota’s current group of cornerbacks. Opposing quarterbacks in 2019 had a collective 123.8 passer rating when targeting Xavier Rhodes. In an extreme contrasting example, New England Patriots cornerback Stephon Gilmore had a 44.1 passer-rating-against. So Rhodes nearly tripled his mark.
Rhodes flat-out was not good in 2019. His co-pilot, Trae Waynes, at a 107.9 passer-rating-against last season, was not much better.
Between the Vikings two starting corners last year, opposing quarterbacks targeted them on 35 percent of all their passing attempts against Minnesota in 2019. This is why the Vikings passing defense waned a bit last season.
Any combination of cornerbacks, no matter who, on Minnesota’s current depth that is selected to defend the opposing wide receivers will do a better job than what Rhodes and Waynes did one season ago. It is just mere mathematics at this point.
If you feel this is false and that a duo of Mike Hughes and Jeff Gladney would do just as poor, we then know by 2019’s final verdict that the Vikings ranking as the NFL’s fifth-best defense is still achievable. Why? Because despite undesirable cornerback play, Minnesota’s defense, as a whole, managed to remain a top-five unit last season.
You can thank Harrison Smith and Anthony Harris for that though. If the performance from this year’s group of Vikings cornerbacks echoes that of 2019, Smith and Harris are still on the team to pick up the slack.