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Florida’s secondary seems to have formed a unique tradition: The most hyped cornerback gets outplayed by his teammate.
After a fantastic 2014 season, Vernon Hargreaves III was the star of Florida’s secondary heading into 2015. He put together a four-interception campaign that helped get him drafted by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at No. 11 overall.
While Hargreaves was in the media spotlight all year, it was actually Teez Tabor, then known as Jalen Tabor, who had the more statistically impressive year on the field. Tabor had more pass breakups (14 to 4) and touchdowns (2 to 0) than Hargreaves.
So, naturally, Tabor had NFL Draft hype all offseason leading up to Week 1 of the 2016 season. One draft scout, however, says Tabor is getting outplayed by one of his teammates:
Hot Take Thursday: Quincy Wilson is better than Jalen Tabor and every other CB in the 2017 draft class.
— Matt Miller (@nfldraftscout) September 29, 2016
Miller calls it a hot take, but he’s not alone on the Quincy Wilson bandwagon. Pro Football Focus pointed out that quarterbacks have had trouble throwing Wilson’s way this season:
With just one reception allowed & two INTs recorded, #Florida CB Quincy WIlson is allowing a QB rating of 0.0 on throws into his coverage.
— PFF College (@PFF_College) September 27, 2016
Tennessee coaches showed a tendency to challenge Tabor more than Wilson as well, perhaps being more impressed with the latter’s performance on film:
Florida CB targets in coverage vs Tennessee:
Teez Tabor, 9
Duke Dawson, 7
Quincy Wilson, 2— CFB Film Room (@CFBFilmRoom) September 29, 2016
As last year’s NFL Draft demonstrated with Hargreaves and Keanu Neal, there’s plenty of room for more than one Florida defensive back to go in the first round.
Andrew writes about sports to fund his love of live music and collection of concert posters. He strongly endorses the Hall of Fame campaigns of Fred Taylor and Andruw Jones.
