All the focus and attention were on Minnesota Vikings cornerback Isaiah Rodgers in the team's 48-10 blowout win over the Cincinnati Bengals on Sunday. And with good reason.
Rodgers put up a performance of a lifetime with an 87-yard pick-six, forced two fumbles, and recovered a fumble for a touchdown. He's the first player in NFL history to do that. Oh, and he had a Pro Football Focus grade of 99.9, the highest in the site's history.
This is a performance that deserves all the praise in the world. It's one that football fans may not see again for a very, very long time. It's one of those Earth-shattering moments that fans will ask each other where they were when it happened.
There was another stellar performance on Sunday on the same side of the ball for Minnesota that isn't getting a lot of attention. Rodgers' play makes it reasonable, but Rodgers wasn't the only cornerback putting up one of the best performances of his career.
Time to give some flowers to Minnesota Vikings veteran CB Byron Murphy
The Vikings showed they had two lockdown cornerbacks on the field on Sunday with Byron Murphy flexing his muscles in the secondary. Minnesota had the challenge of going up against arguably the best wide receiver duos in the NFL with the Bengals' Tee Higgins and Ja'Marr Chase. Murphy made sure to shut them down.
There were two targets in Murphy's direction when he was covering Higgins or Chase. He allowed just one catch for one yard with a pass deflection. Murphy also added three tackles in the win over Cincinnati.
While PFF did not give Murphy as high a grade as Rodgers in the game, they still appreciated his coverage skills. Murphy finished with a PFF coverage grade of 72.8, finishing in the top five on the team.
It hasn't been the strongest year for Murphy, so far, as he has a PFF overall grade of 52.1, ranking 118th out of 158 cornerbacks in the NFL. He needed the Bengals game to show that he still has it, and the first two games were just a fluke.
There are still 14 games left in the regular season, but Murphy did what he needed to do to get back on track. Watch for him to build off the momentum of the Bengals game and carry it over the next two weeks overseas against the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Browns.