Ravens Might've Finally Found New Shifty Slot Corner This Offseason

The slot corner has become an increasingly important position over the last decade with college philosophies bleeding into the pro game.

Teams are living in shotgun more and adopting spread looks on offense trying to flood diverse body types all over the field – including in motion – to try to attack defenses. Smaller, twitchy players with a two-way go are taking games over in the slot.

It’s a way of life.

And defenses must adjust or pay serious consequences. The Ravens have lacked that body type to run with those types of players and hold up in man coverage, which had us thinking the Ravens will have big plans for a fifth-round pick. Chandler Rivers should help them in sub packages against the jitterbug receivers of the NFL in a way that guys like Arthur Maulet did at times and, hopefully, as a young Tavon Young did for several seasons before injuries derailed his career.

Despite some other prevailing needs, and with a secondary that already boasted many assets, general manager Eric DeCosta grabbed Rivers with the 152nd pick in a move we believe was harkening back and reminding him of some transactions from the near and more distant pass.

Size Matters, But Not How You Think

A lot has been made of Ravens corner Marlon Humphrey's declining play and him heading to the slot perhaps, despite his $19.25M salary, but he wouldn’t be as adept at dealing with these types of receivers as Rivers, potentially. A nuanced role for Rivers makes a lot of sense to me; hybrid safety/linebacker Kyle Hamilton is better in zone than man and he is better against tight ends than small receivers. And while rookie head coach Jesse Minter prefers large outside corners, Rivers is here for a reason.

The comps between Rivers and Young, when he came out of the combine, are pretty similar.

Rivers is 5-9 1/2, 185 pounds, who ran a 4.4 40-yard dash and earned all-state honors in Texas in track-and-field in Texas in high school. He played at Duke, hardly a football factory, and was one of three fifth-round picks.

Young was 5-9, 183 pounds at the combine and ran a 4.46 40-yard dash and was an accomplished track-and-field star in high school in Maryland. He was a fourth-round pick from Temple, hardly a football powerhouse, and one of five selections the Ravens used in the 2016 draft.

The Ravens didn’t hesitate to make Young one of the highest-paid slot corners in the game, and I’m sure DeCosta would love to be considering a similar scenario with this draft pick. We’re a long way from there, but Rivers should find his way on the field this season, and the Ravens haven’t gotten contributions from this brand of slot corner since Maulet’s late-career surge under Mike Macdonald with a stylized role (with lots of effective blitzing) as part of an historic defense in 2023.

Minter’s defense is very similar to Macdonald and if Rivers can be weaponized in the slot, and they find complimentary blitzers from the slot it will help make Hamilton that much more difficult to account for.

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