It’s great that Reeves can stay with his man. That’s half the battle. The problem is the other half, and he’s shown little sign of overcoming that.

I have to assume you’re being tongue-in-cheek about Richard Smith. Every bit of criticism heaped on him is completely deserved.

His cover skills are good, as noted elsewhere, and he has gotten better at looking for the ball (although not so good at actually finding it, as noted by the catch where he overran the wr, Edwards I think, on a deep ball on Sunday). And, bless his heart, he isn’t afraid to tackle.

Coming from the Cowboys system, where he was asked to play more zone, it would make sense that he has some learning to do. If he’s around next year, I suspect he’ll be an average cb.

But let’s not let the fact that McCain has tried to defend him fool you; he’s been pretty crappy this year.

Your second is in saying “stats are for losers”. Statistics are the only unbiased way to look at sports (or anything else for that matter). I was actually shocked and pleasantly surprised to see Johnny Mac try and use statistics. Sadly, statistics in the hands of an idiot merely validate that man’s idiocy.

The conflict here is that McLain is saying that Reeves isn’t that bad, but we all feel that he sucks because he gives up too many big plays (at least one or two a game). Because I don’t have access to STATS, Inc. and Football Outsiders doesn’t have individual defensive stats up to date, I’m just going to use the numbers McLain has in his article.

First off, the stat on “targets” is stupid without context. Not targeting Reeves because you choose to target Petey or run against our crappy run D, is NOT the same as not targeting Reeves because he’s a good corner. Also, and I don’t remember exactly where I read this, unless your name is Nnamdi Asomugha or Champ Bailey, teams don’t really steer away from a particular DB because they’re afraid of him. They just play their offense.

Secondly, McLain tries to use these stats individually as if they aren’t related. What a dumbass. He starts by pointing out those CBs that were targeted more than Reeves and then talks about those who gave up more yards. Hmm… don’t you think you should look at those together?

According to McLain, there are 9 CBs who have been targeted more than Reeves. Yet only four of these have given up more yards. That means the other 5 have been targeted more and given up fewer yards — i.e., clearly they’re better. Those four, Aaron Ross, DeAngelo Hall, Marcus Trufant, and Carlos Rodgers, have given up 8.34, 8.07, 8.11, and 5.74 yards per target respectively compared to 8.51 for Reeves. That means they’ve only given up more yards BECAUSE they’ve been thrown at more.

On the flip side of that list, six DBs have given up more yards but been targeted fewer times than Reeves: Harris, Antonio-Cromartie, Taylor, Barber, Allen, and Henry. Their yards per completion, however, are 14.23, 11.96, 11.72, 14.44, and McLain didn’t have numbers for Allen or Henry. Reeves, on the other hand has given up 16.14 yards per completion. That means that these guys are giving up a few more completions, but they’re less damaging.

We could, and at some point perhaps should, go on and on, but the point is that you can’t use any individual statistic in a vacuum. McLain does this, but again, he’s an idiot. The statistics are valid and what they’re really doing is confirming our suspicion that Reeves hasn’t been playing well.