It probably shouldn’t come as a surprise to most, if not all, of the people reading this that the Panthers could really do with adding a free safety to pair with Eric Reid for the upcoming season.
While a lot of attention has rightly been on the Panthers’ pass rushers and offensive linemen, the safety position was the other big concern going into the offseason and is possibly the biggest concern going into the draft – the Panthers at least somewhat addressed their line on both sides with the free agent signings of Paradis and Irvin, but they’re entering the season with Da’Norris Searcy and Reid – both ostensibly strong safeties – currently at the top of the depth chart.
While it would be something of a surprise to see the Panthers go with a safety at 16, it is very much in play in the second or maybe even later in the first should they trade down; with that in mind, the Panthers are probably interested in safeties at the very top of the draft class, and in 2019, that could well be Chauncey Gardner-Johnson – after all, he’s the #1 safety on my big board.
Athletic Outlook
Gardner-Johnson is neither the biggest – 5-11 and 210 pounds, nor the fastest – 4.48 40 yard dash – safety in this draft class, but he has the size and speed that teams look for in deep field safeties; while his long speed is something that I will come back to in more detail when we look at his ability in coverage, he certainly flashed good quickness on how he was able to come down to the ball on screens and the like:
He also has some of the best movement skills in the class, with a nice smooth backpedal:
Which both allows him to mirror receivers through routes:
And allows him to break back to the ball effectively in both off-man and underneath zone coverage:
Of the safeties in this class, he is probably the most suited to playing a large amount of underneath man coverage, but any team that asks him to play in this way should be aware of the fact that he does have something of a tendency to stop his feet at the head of routes, which can make it harder for him to break on routes or to pivot vertically, such as on the following play:
This is more a matter of technique than athleticism, and is something that he should be able to improve upon, but the Panthers don’t tend to ask their free safeties to play much underneath man coverage and so this shouldn’t change their grade on him in a significant way. So how can he benefit the Panthers’ pass defense?
Up Next: Coverage Ability and How He Fits With The Panthers
