My opinion of Clemons is quite low, I think he's a stiff.

If we resign Sean Smith and draft a corner in the 1st round and Patterson returns I think we have our safety on the roster....Marshall.

 

That's basically how I see him too. I'd love to see us make a big splash and sign Jairus Byrd to pair with Jones, but that is probably a pipe dream. Our pass defense was 13th overall last season. The main reason was our two safeties, Burnett and Dansby. Clemons was far from the weakest link on the defense IMO.

 

I don't see much difference from starting Clemons from Wilson, let him walk.

 

Sign Kenny Phillips rather than Clemons if Marshall doesn't make the switch?

 

Sign Byrd. Keep Marshall at corner.

 

That's who I would hope for but I figured Kenny Phillips to be more reasonable considering NY shouldn't have a need to re-sign him and Buffalo can always tag Byrd if need be.

 

if richard marshall is still here in 2013 put him there , its a big IF with his salary and the arrival of patterson makes it even more of a IF
clemons for me be a very good reserve at both spots [if we can afford that??]

i wonder i[FONT=NFLEndzoneSlabBold, Arial, sans-serif]f kelcie mcCary may be in any thoughts next season ?[/FONT]​

 

Clemons is interesting to me. The guy has speed to burn, but doesn't necessarily play fast. At this point, the question Ireland and the coaching staff probably have to answer is whether the game is finally slowing down enough for Chris to be comfortable with his instincts. If his arc is still ascending noticeably in that regard, I'd expect to see him get re-signed. If he's slowing signs of hitting his plateau, they may be hesitant to re-sign him.

 

I really like Chris Clemons as a backup safety. He's pretty good at making tackles when the play is in front of him, but for a 4.3 guy he really seems to struggle catching people. I feel like he takes poor angles. He's not the worst starting FS in the league, but we could certainly do better, and if we get a chance to say, poach Byrd, you have to do it. No matter what. Or say the draft plays out kind of odd and BPA at 12 is Matt Elam, I think you have to pull the trigger.

Reshad Jones, I had a big man crush on him ever since his days as a bulldog. I thought at the time that he was the 3rd best safety in the draft behind Thomas and Berry. Hindsight being what it is, I see that Kam Chancellor or T.J. Ward would have also been awesome picks, but I think Reshad had the best year out of everyone. Outside of Kam, who is just a freak.

 

Chris Clemons played pretty well, and I'm not sure what the people with negative opinions could possibly be basing it on. He's not a turnover machine but he does his job well in coverage, and can handle being the single high safety well.

 

If Miami were going to sign a free agent safety, I'd rather go for Dashon Goldson. IMO, he seems to fit in more with what Kevin Coyle likes to do. Hard for me to see Jimmy Wilson playing safety after having played so much slot CB this year. You could do a lot better than Jimmy Wilson at either slot CB or at S. He's a nice, serviceable depth player, but I wouldn't want him starting.

As for Clemons, yeah, he's a guy you can get away with starting and if you can re-sign him cheap, with all the other holes Miami has, perhaps that's a smart move just for the sake of continuity on defense.

 

I would like to as well, but there are more pressing needs I think.

 

Clemons lacks instincts. He's a solid tackler and nice as a back-up, but he was in a defense that provided many play making opportunities and he was not able to take advantage of them. When I would watch the all-22, I would find myself yelling, "go, go now!" with him too often. He would react later and show up in time to make the tackle. That would make the stats look decent and I imagine a non-scout like PFF may rate him well b/c he made the tackle, but somebody who understands the D would say, a good S would have stopped the completion in that circumstance most of the time.

 

All I can say is that I dont feel safe with Clemons at Safety .

He is not instinctive and I dont think you can teach that.He is what he is and I dont expect any substantial improvement from him.

 

I disagree. He's the definition of below average. He's got the athletic ability. Which makes it even sadder how he plays. He's ALWAYS late. Always. He lacks instincts. 0 what so ever.

 

I agree. I don't see it as even remotely likely that he leaves Buffalo. The S tag is just too low. Even if they can't work out a deal before FA opens him up to the league, they'll just use the tag. The tag is low enough that it won't effect them at all in terms of the cap. In fact, I expect that his cap number after a long term deal is signed may be higher than the cap number under the tag.

 

I disagree actually. I like RJ more in traffic. I think he's the much better player with much better instincts, which is a must IMO at safety, but RJ still takes some bad angles. He was better thus year at it. But his angles still werent great. Which could be much more costly in space as a single high guy

 

I don't think that's Coyle's defense at all. I think likes to use left and right safeties where either one could be at the LOS or deep given what the offense shows alignment wise. That's why it's critical that both safeties be able to make plays.

 

He got Cris Crocker to play good. I am still wondering how he did that.

 

He does it by putting guys in situations where they can use their strenghts and mask their weaknesses. Jones is better closer to the LOS. Not sure what Clemons does well but I didn't see a lot of big plays so I'm content with that. It's be great to see more splash plays from the FS but I wouldn't call it a dire need.

 

That's my impression as well, simply by virtue of the fact that Clemons almost never makes plays on the ball down the field.

And in today's game, which features the pass so predominantly, one of the most important lines of defense is at the safety position. Jones paired with a real stud ballhawk in Clemons's spot would make the pass defense significantly better IMO.

 

Clemons is a free agent. That safety spot is already a pressing need just by virtue of the expiring contract.

It really is amazing how you never find anything wrong with a team with four straight losing seasons.

 

Really? You're amazed? Do you sit back, confused and blink quizzically while unable to proceed with normal activity because I'd prefer to make distinctions between players who are adequate and those who are not?

You're not going to want to draft a significant portion of your team in fantasy football, or buy their jerseys. That's ok, and you should at some point be able to cope with that.

 

Clemons was pretty good this season IMO. I understand the desire to get a lot of INTs out of the position, but you'd be hard pressed to find many safeties in this league that consistently are getting 5+ a season. Dashon Goldson, for as good as he is, only had one more INT than Clemons this season.

 

Exactly. I think a lot of the anger for the team is that people think if the player isn't pro bowl caliber then they suck and we have a giant hole.

 

I figure you can keep him cheaply and a part of me still thinks that Marshall will play safety, even though that probably isnt going to happen

 

I agree. Jones field speed is probably a lot closer to Clemons than his track speed, and Jones is by far the best ball athlete of the two. I want him where he has the most chances to make a play on the ball. I think Clemons is much closer in ability to Jones in regards to playing as an in the box safety. In other words, Clemons won't hurt you in the box, while Jones is much more likely to have int opportunities playing single high.

 

"Plays" are more than just INT's. It's also PBUs or stops that get your D off the field. Clemons didn't do much of those either. The only play I can recall is him causing a fumble during a tackle. IMO there wasn't enough of that or the other stuff even though the D gave him opportunities. I wouldn't agree that he was "pretty good".

 

I think people are underestimating how well Clemons played in coverage because he didn't make plays, when his invisibility isn't a bad thing. He was one of the least-challenged players in the NFL. Only three players were thrown at less often, and only three players(different three) had passes completed on them less often.

Making plays on balls in the air are nice, but you can't suggest a player isn't very good because he's performing in coverage well enough people aren't attempting passes. Especially when he's your more frequent deep safety, and he's letting you let a guy like Rashad Jones be used in a variety of roles.

 

When he's talking about people *****ing about flying lol

 

If you go by passing yards we were 27th in passing yards allowed per game

 

How the heck is a safety "thrown at"?

Hell maybe he was successfully looked off more than just about everybody! Who knows?