The Bengals will be hoping the other young corners can replicate his progress last year. There’s no Chidobe Awuzie to count on for more experience.
Let’s take a look at the past performances of the Bengals’ current cornerbacks and how they are expected to stack up in 2024 with help from some analysis and data from Pro Football Focus. This is the last in a series of pieces breaking down each position group for the Bengals before training camp begins July 24.
Credit: AP
Credit: AP
CORNERBACKS ON THE ROSTER
Projected starters: Dax Hill, Mike Hilton, Cam Taylor-Britt
Reserves: Jalen Davis, Josh Newton, DJ Turner
Others in the mix: Allan George, DJ Ivey, Lance Robinson
HILL BY THE NUMBERS
2023 stats: 110 tackles, six tackles for loss, five quarterback hits, two interceptions, 11 passes defended at free safety.
PFF grades for 2023: Hill ranked 90th of 95 safeties in defense grade (50.9), 90th of 94 safeties in coverage grade (43.0) and 36th of 92 safeties in run defense grade (70.9). He also had a pass rush grade of 67.2.
PFF ranking for 2024: Hill is not ranked going into the 2024 season.
HILTON BY THE NUMBERS
2023 stats: 84 tackles, 12 tackles for loss, two interceptions, eight passes defended, 2.0 sacks in 17 games (13 starts)
PFF grades for 2023: Hilton ranked 18th of 127 cornerbacks in defense grade (77.4), 12th of 17 cornerbacks in pass rush grade (61.7), 15th of 126 cornerbacks in coverage grade (80.4) and 15th of 126 cornerbacks in run defense grade (64.2).
PFF rankings for 2024: Hilton was not ranked in PFF.com’s Top 32 cornerbacks list this year. Going into last summer, PFF put Hilton at No. 22 on its list of top 32 cornerbacks and in 2022 when there was a distinction between outside and inside corners, he was the No. 2 slot corner in the league.
TAYLOR-BRITT BY THE NUMBERS
2023 stats: 50 tackles, one tackle for loss, four interceptions, 11 passes defended, one forced fumble in 12 games (all starts)
PFF grades for 2023: Taylor-Britt ranked 62nd of 127 cornerbacks in defense grade (64.5), 40th of 126 cornerbacks in coverage grade (70.3) and 105th of 121 cornerbacks in run defense grade (46.7).
PFF ranking for 2024: Taylor-Britt was not among the top 32 cornerbacks ranked by PFF.
TURNER BY THE NUMBERS
2023 stats: 50 tackles, seven passes defended, one fumble recovery, 1.0 sack, one quarterback hit in 17 games (12 starts)
PFF grades for 2023: Turner ranked 109th of 127 cornerbacks in defense grade (51.5), 111th of 126 cornerbacks in coverage grade (48.4) and 52nd of 121 cornerbacks in run defense grade (64.4). He also had a pass rush grade of 63.8.
PFF ranking for 2024: Turner was not among the top 32 cornerbacks ranked by PFF.
FURTHER ANALYSIS
Cincinnati’s secondary was all over the map last year. The team relied on Turner more than anticipated, first as Awuzie was still working back from 2022 ACL reconstruction and then when Awuzie couldn’t live up to his past standards.
Now, the Bengals have moved on from Awuzie, and Hill is competing with Turner for an outside starting spot. That competition will be an interesting one to watch this training camp and preseason, but it makes predicting the strength of the cornerbacks difficult. Hilton is still one of the best slot corners in the league, but is in a contract year. The Bengals might be looking at his future replacement and Taylor-Britt has shown a lot of promise, but that other outside corner job isn’t a lock.
PFF.com doesn’t separate safeties and cornerbacks in its position group rankings but listed the Bengals’ secondary as the 14th best. The New York Jets have the top-ranked secondary.
John Kosko, in his analysis, noted the return of Hilton and Taylor-Britt as strengths of the secondary and credited the Bengals for going out and improving the clear weaknesses at safety in free agency. He wrote “a bounce-back year for the unit could be in the cards.”
The cornerbacks had the least amount of turnover among the Bengals defensive backs, and if Hill takes to the position and Turner looks more like he did before he hit that rookie wall, depth could be much better in 2024. That’s still a lot of “ifs.”
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