Things are getting pretty crazy in the defensive backfield for the Seminoles. It was announced today that sophomore cornerback Tony Carter will miss 2-4 weeks after hurting his knee returning a punt against Rice this past weekend. This means that Michael Ray Garvin will move from boundary corner over to field corner. This is happening one day after Garvin learned that he would be starting at that corner spot ahead of J.R. Bryant. Bryant, after starting 10 straight games for the Tribe, was demoted to the 3rd team after not performing as highly as anticipated so far this season.Taking over the starting position at boundary corner appears to be freshman Jamie Robinson. True freshman Patrick Robinson will back up Garvin at field corner, but can play some at the other corner spot, if necessary. Another freshman, Korey Mangum, will be available to back up either corner position. Are you confused yet? So am I.
Defensive backs graduate assistant coach James Colzie cross-trained his corners at both positions during the off-season. I'm not too sure how difficult it is learn how to play field corner as opposed to boundary corner, but I'm confident even our players will be able to handle it.
It will be fun, yet risky, to see how all of these young corners perform with an increase in their playing time. Garvin is the fastest player on the team, having run in the 4.3s last spring. Patrick Robinson has really impressed a lot of people around the team since arriving this summer.
The sooner Carter returns from his injury the better. Teams have very rarely thrown the football in his direction this season. That is an amazing amount of respect for a corner that stands only 5'9". What Carter lacks in size, he makes up for with incredible quickness and speed.
Considering that all of these highly touted cornerbacks are freshmen and sophomores (with the exception of Bryant, who is a junior), it is nice to think that ACC receivers will be finding it close to impossible to get open in the coming years.
