2016 Clemson Football Cornerback Participation

As is tradition at STS, we are once again taking a look at the participation numbers for each player at Clemson during the 2016 season. While number of games played is a nice top level number, looking at snap counts provides a much better idea of how much experience a player is getting. It is also a good way of determining if a player should have redshirted or not. Ideally, a player should get at least 100 snaps in a season as a freshman, otherwise a redshirt would have been a better idea barring issues with depth. Also note that all snap counts are through the Ohio State game; totals for the Alabama game have not been published by Clemson.

Cornerback was always going to be an interesting position this year. Clemson fans at the very least knew what we were getting with Cordrea Tankersley, but the loss of Mac Alexander was going to be a blow, the question was just how much of one. Thankfully a combination of several players stepping up meant that the pass defense was still extremely strong in 2016. Ryan Carter, Mark Fields, and Marcus Edmond all contributed at CB while Tankersley filled the lock down role vacated by Alexander.

The good thing from the snap totals here is that even though we are losing Tank, there is a lot of experience for CB. Carter and Fields are fairly known quantities at this point, and Edmond has certainly had his fair share of big moments. If Fields can step up in 2017 we could certainly be in good shape at CB.

Another key to note is that both Wallace and Mullen got over 100 snaps at CB. They barely got over it, but that is some meaningful experience that should pay off going forward. Wallace in particular got snaps in meaningful games against Louisville, NC State, and Pittsburgh. If both of these guys can really push the above trio, Clemson could have 5 CBs that we can realistically play. That’s pretty awesome, especially from a depth perspective, but it is going to require these guys to execute and that is the concern. There is a lot of potential but that also means a lot of uncertainty.

Once again though Clemson is going to be looking to replace our shutdown corner in 2017. Tankersley, who was probably our best CB in 2015 as well as 2016, leaves a big hole to fill. And unlike last year when we lost Alexander we didn’t have an obvious candidate to be “The Guy.” It will be interesting to see how a team with potentially 5 CBs does compared to one where you have a shutdown corner and then several options for the opposite corner spot. Theoretically it could end up working out better.