So you paid child support. When Shields get extended - Cha-Ching! for you.
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Shields has been a blessing this year and is playing beyond anyones expectations. Hopefully he will continute to get better...
I wonder how Underwood or Lee would have played if thrown in there this year? Underwood is still an unknown, Lee has started to show flashes of his athleticism in special teams play. I feel good about both and think they both would have held their own this year if given the opportunity. Maybe not as well as Sheilds, but just another example of the depth this team still has after all the injuries.
I am on the wait and see bench with Shields. I've seen a lot of guys run through this town as a flash in the pan.
There's no denying that the talent is there and his potential is pretty scary. The guy's closing speed is off the charts, which makes him perfect for zone coverage. What really surprises me is that when he's in man to man coverage, and teams have thrown his way, he more often than not finds a way to get a hand on the ball and blow up the pass. I didn't see him as a man guy in the beginning of the season but he's slowly proving me wrong.
If he can continue to improve over the course of the next few years, when he gets his chance to start, he'll take the league by storm. If he rests on his laurels or starts making some poor personal decisions, that's the end of him. I think he has a good chance of becoming great though, because of the all star cast around him. When you've got talent, it's hard not to succeed in those circumstances.
Sam Shields is absolutely the real deal. After the season he has had he would start for the majority of teams in the NFL. If you're not sold yet you will be soon enough, doubt not.
I'm not at all convinced that Underwood or Lee could have held their own. Playing cornerback in the NFL is a hard job where weakness will be exposed (see the Vikings secondary). The fact that he never had a brutal game, and in fact was rarely beaten over an entire season is proof that he is a good cornerback. Furthermore, Joe Whitt has always spoken reasonably highly of him and Whitt is not a bullshitter.
He is always open is his assessment of his players to the media. From the start he has said the Shields was the most talented cornerback in the draft, he just had no idea what he was doing. Add on a marijuana arrest and he goes undrafted.
Whitt has also said that this year Shields can be a good corner, but he has a chance to be a great corner. I'm not sure what his ceiling is, but I think he can be a Pro Bowl corner.
He has speed, fluidity, and is assignment sure. I would rate him above Tyronne Williams, who I think also wore 37, because he has superior ball skills. You're not just going to jump up over him and take the ball without a fight as Maclin found out last Sunday. His study habits seem strong and he is steady.
Just to take my Sam Shields love letter totally over the top I want to point out one other thing. Our defense changed dramatically after Al Harris went down last year. If we have two solid DBs on the outside then Woodson can be a jack of all trades destroyer of offensive gameplans. I still believe that the biggest problem with Harris getting injured was not getting more Jarret Bush on the field it was having to turn Woodson into a more typical cover corner.
With Shields playing at a high level we've been able to get back to operation wreak havoc. Because of this I would say that the play of Sam Shields makes it possible for us to make a Super Bowl run.
Shields worst play of the season could have been when he turned his back and guess on the Maclin TD in game 1. I don't think I saw him do that ever again...
SS eventually starts. Woodson is getting to the stage of becoming a safety.
I would say I am president of the wait and see club in general, but one thing that makes me get excited about SS is that he has been tested. A guy can get sacks when a team isn't ready for him, or a defense is designed to give him a free run (Bishop first play). An LB can make tackles for a stretch by guessing well. A RB can get yards with superior blocking for half a season, but a DB in isolation gets tested over and over again. A rookie undrafted FA gets picked on. SS put a stop to that early, and every time a team tested him he passed it. You can't luck into that, you can't fake it. He is the real deal.
he and williams have pretty much been "shutdown." we're set for a loooong time. (knocking on wood)
Tramon is definitely a blueprint.
Snake has ALWAYS been a Tramon fan and wanted him locked up to a 4 year 8 million dollar deal a year and half ago, when several said, no way....that's too much money for an unproven player. LOL. He got his money and is pretty damn good.
Shields has 3 more years of getting paid crap to prove himself, but I said it here and don't know (no one said it isn't true) if ANY GB rookie DB has EVER had as much impact in their rookie year as Shields.
I was a kid loving FL STATE with Terrell Buckley and it was the first draft I cared about in 1992, and he had an OK career overall with the Dolphins, but NO ROOKIE at CB EVER DOMINATES.....but Shields has played as well as ANY CB ROOKIE this side of Cromartie did a few years ago. He's not been picked on and takes on the TOP speed guys on the OTHER team weekly. He hasn't been beaten yet, and plays well....AKA..tackles, makes INTS, etc. He's amazing as a rookie and hope he keeps doing better and really he's only a young 21 with a rookie contract at the min. God TT just fleeces the league with these min. wage undrafted rooks. Unbelievable, but really, Shields has all the talent (speed, athleticism) but after seeing him shutdown dudes with Caper's D....It's only a matter of time till he takes over Wood's CB spot (Wood will move to safety) and keep on this awesome D.
Snake;
You have made this statement several times. I didn't comment about it before because it seemed like a trivial matter. But since you mention it repeatedly, are you trying to make a point about Shields being 21? The reason I ask is because he is not 21, he has already turned 23. Personally, I don't think it matters, but I'm not sure what significance you are attaching to it, if any. The important thing is that he is a rookie, and a more inexperienced one at his position than many are. But he is not "young" relative to other rookies, if that is what you were implying. Not like Jermichael Finley was, who is only 8+ months older than Shields.
"EVER" is a petty long time when talking about the Packers! Just off the top of my head, I would have to mention Willie Buchanon, NFL Rookie of the year in 1972 as a cornerback. It only took a few games for teams to realize that you absolutely could not throw at Willie Buchanon. Tim Lewis is another one who came in and was pretty impressive as a rookie corner.
At this point, the theological implications of a bad game by Shields are staggering.
Wow Patler. First off I've always loved your logic and posts.
Secondly, didn't know I've posted enough (I post once a week since coming back...nowhere near what I used to post) about Shield being 21....LOL...Ok...He's 23...and great. My bad. Hope all is good. Didn't know it was a big deal though. Wow. He's 23. Sorry for anyone offended. LOL
What scares me is that he is far ahead of the TWill learning curve and that one ended pretty good.
Getting a great corner like the guy from oakland is more so to replace Woodson eventually. Woodson was still a probowl caliber player this year (closing in on 100 tackles, 3 picks, 5 forced fumbles), but he is also 33. He can most likely keep this play up until he is 35, and at 36 is where we will start seeing a true decline in his ability. Of course, he could be the exception and be able to play well tillhe is 38 - others have done this, but it's more likely that at 36 is when he will be getting to the end of the line. WHo knows, it's freakin' Charles Woodson. Barring an injury maybe he can be this good for 4 more seasons.
It's just a matter of how long you think Woodson can continue to play at this high of a level, and if you are considering moving him to SS. I think a move to SS prolongs his career honestly. It wouldn't really be any different then the role he has now, except he would man up as much and Collin's would usually be the only single high saftey in blitz packages. This is all assumign the packers, and Woodson, would want to make sucha move. That free's upa position in the top 3 next year, and that is where bring in the oakland guy or a high drafted CB comes into play. Otherwise, if we're going back to Burnett (which isn't bad, if he recovers well) it's just matter of how many mor eyears do we think woodson can stay an elite corner. He is still up there. He's no Revis, and he doesn't have the abilit yto shut down a guy man to man like Williams, but Woodson does such much of the dirty work and can cause so much havoc out there that he becomes a top flight DB for other reasons.
Sam Shields is a great story, and he can't get any worse than he is now. That means that, worse case scenario, he stays our nickle back for a long, long time. Best case is he continues to improve and becomes a starter that eventually replaces woodson. I am sure we did use coverages to disguise him some, but several times this year he was man up on the other teams "fastest" wr - which was clearly a ploy to take advantage of his speed. Anyone else remember him frequently lining up on Desean Jackson when we played the eagles? I sure did, and last I checked, he was relatively shut down.
Our defense, however, is made in a way that it's playing together that makes them great, more so then being great individually. I think that is largely why we have been abled to plug so many guys in, becuase the schemes have been just so amazing that it sets everyone up to succeed.
The last decade or two has not been all that good for CB's. It has been a long time since a 4.3 flat/sub 4.3 prospect at DB "got it". You know a guy that would still be a very good DB given 4.5 speed instead of what they are blessed with. There were a couple in the late 80's early 90's (Sanders/Green). Since then the guys that could play have been 4.4 guys or so, with none really pressing below the 4.35 line. None have been like Shields, who has a noticeable gear beyond the 4.4 guys (legit 4.35 guys generally don't appear to have an extra gear relative to the 4.4 guys).
Shields still has a long way to go overall before he is in the great discussion, but he picked up inside leverage sideline play freaky fast. Which has made him extremely useful. A lot of teams have a sideline burner that runs deep as their big play passing threat, that isn't actually that good of a WR, their game being to out run coverage (see Knox, Johnny). Shields is really good at shutting down these guys. Although the way he gets the job done is different, his use is actually quite similar to Al Harris'.
Shields does have a learning "disability" but our coaches know how he learns and have figured out how to teach him. Not that it relates to the Packers, but I was listening to Kirwan the other day, he was talking about different types of learners and how coaches have to get through to them. Said they figured out (in NY 'bout a decade ago) that they had a couple tactile learners, who just couldn't get it with normal teaching, that struggled learning the play book. However they got magnet boards and magnets to represent the players, all of a sudden their learning issues went away when the players could feel the formations and concepts as opposed to seeing or hearing.
Chris Johnson had that crazy speed, but just didn't get it for the few years he was here. Is he still starting in Oakland?