Kaiir Elam

Context

Plays as a mostly outside CB, mostly in press man but has played some off and zone too.

Coverage

He has excellent length for the position and he deploys it well at the line of scrimmage. He can disrupt the receiver with hand usage mainly. He has the footwork in short areas to match angles and he uses hand placement and an aggressive temperament to take advantage of the first five yards. Against Wide Receivers with a better plan and hand usage at the line of scrimmage, he could be more patient when his hands get disengaged initially, he can chase the Wide Receiver with a secondary re-direct, over-balance, and get beaten early in the route.

He processes well and can read the WRs hips in coverage, when he does this, he can cheat on his transition mechanics somewhat and stay in phase at the break-point. However, when facing a disciplined Wide Receiver who doesn’t tip his routes, he can take too many steps to transition, resulting in a half-second delay to his mirroring. His drive mechanics specifically can be off in this scenario as he will take an extra step and linger too long on his plant foot before driving. This leads to challenges on comebacks and curl routes especially, on more hard-angle breaks from the receiver this deficiency is more pronounced. On less hard-angle routes, his hip fluidity is solid and he can open his hips up quickly but his pedal can be a little choppy and on his heels, he’s not as angular as you would like. He is a superior athlete at the position, has good recovery speed when he does lose in these short areas and good closing speed to bring his ball skills into play.

When moving to the ball or moving sideways, his timing/placement on his attempts to disrupt the pass are very good. He’s able to periph the ball when running sideways and tracks it well. When going backwards on deep balls thrown over his shoulder, he doesn’t locate and track the ball as effectively. He can rely on the WRs hands but those with late hands can beat him deep consistently if the ball is well thrown. He’s physical at the catch-point and throughout the route – at times a little too grabby but his physicality is a strength and when he is appropriately physical he can be hard to uncover from in short areas.

Run Support and Tackling

He reads run/pass well and plays as the force player with discipline. He won’t constrict the running lane but he will maintain gap integrity. He is a willing run defender and wants to be physical. In short areas, he can make tackles on all types of ball carrier but bigger Running Backs can run through him. In genuinely open-field tackles he can take bad entry angles and over-pursue leading to a missed tackle.

SUMMARY
Long, athletic press man CB who could be more patient at LOS. Can give up half-second delay mirroring in short areas. Excellent ball skills on anything thrown short or intermediate

PRODUCTION
JR: 27 Total Tackles, 1 INT, 3 PBUs
SO: 1 QB Hit, 39 Total Tackles, 2 INTs, 9 PBUs
INJURY: Missed 4 games with knee injury (JR)

RAVENS FIT
Athleticism 4
Intelligence 4
Versatility 2
Grit 4
Scheme 5