The quarterback competition between veteran Matt Cassel and rookie Teddy Bridgewater gets all of the attention at the Minnesota Vikings training camp. It's all about the quarterbacks. The most contested position battle is at the safety position opposite Harrison Smith. In only his third season out of Notre Dame, Smith has quickly become a defensive leader and franchise cornerstone. The other safety position remains unsettled, at best. It's so unsettled that the Vikings signed 34-year old Chris Crocker last week to try and settle it. Not only has he been around the NFL for a while, he's been playing for head coach Mike Zimmer for the last seven years. He knows the defense better than anyone but the head coach. His experience makes him an extra coach on and off the field. With Crocker now added to the mix, there are eight safeties that are competing for that one safety spot next to Smith.
Crocker, Robert Blanton, Kurt Coleman, Jamarca Sanford, Mistral Raymond and Andrew Sendejo all have experience starting in the NFL. Crocker with the Atlanta Falcons and Cincinnati Bengals. Coleman with the Philadelphia Eagles. The rest have started games for the Vikings. Second-year Brandan Bishop is one of only two with little to no NFL experience. Starting or otherwise. The other is rookie Antone Exum. Drafted in the sixth-round of the 2014 NFL Draft, Exum probably has the most athletic potential of the bunch and is the likely future at the position but he has a steep learning curve in his first NFL training camp. Rookies usually do. He also played mostly corner at Virginia Tech. He would have been picked much higher in the draft if not for a torn ACL while playing in a pick-up basketball game in January 2013. Blanton was getting most of the first team reps in OTAs, mimi-camp and early in training camp. He kept getting those reps because he was performing well. It also helped that Sendejo, Sanford and Raymond were all spending a lot of time in the trainer's room. Unfortunately for Blanton, he joined them there with a strained hamstring. He's been sidelined for the past week. That might have prompted the signing of Crocker. Although Zimmer said that adding the veteran safety was the plan all along. The fact that the Cincinnati Bengals, with Zimmer as defensive coordinator, signed Crocker in September in each of the last two seasons supports that plan. Sendejo has returned to the field but Raymond and Sanford are still missing practice time. If they can't get back on the field and stay on the field, the competition could be decided without them. Coleman played well in the first preseason game against the Oakland Raiders. Based on that and the injury situation, the competition may come down to a battle between Crocker and Coleman. Blanton really needs to get back on the field soon but you have to be very careful with hamstring injuries. They can wreck a season if they are rushed.
Competition can, and should, bring out the best in football players. The large number of safeties with a legitimate shot at starting should make for better play at the back of the Vikings defense this season. They need to be better. The secondary, as a whole, was terrible last season. Zimmer and his coaching staff will make this group better. So will the competition. Crocker, with his experience in Zimmer's defense, will improve the play at safety. If he starts, great. If he doesn't, that only means that someone else from the safety crowd performed better. No matter how the safety competition shakes out, the Vikings safeties and secondary as a whole will be better because of that competition.
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