Rolle Demoted to Second Team

(AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)

Arizona Cardinals head coach Ken Whisenhunt announced that cornerback Antrel Rolle will be demoted to second team for Saturday’s preseason game against the San Diego Chargers.  This change will move Rod Hood onto the first team along side of Eric Green. Whisenhunt seemed to be downplaying the demotion saying coaches just wanted to look at Eric Green and Rod Hood as a tandem.

“We’ve rotated through the weeks of the preseason, so this is a chance to put those two out there together and see how they do on the field,” Whisenhunt said. “It’s an evaluation process.” 

“Hood and Green have both played well this preseason,” Whisenhunt said. “After this week, I think we’ll have a better feel of how we’re going to go at that position.” 

This demotion may only be temporary but Rolle has struggled so far in the preseason and has done nothing special in his last couple regular seasons.  I’ll give Rolle a little while longer before I consider him a bust, but it looks like it’s getting to that point. Rolle has 2 interceptions in 2 seasons and has struggled against any wide receiver with speed. Coaches have said a lot of Antrel’s struggles are because of technique or lack there of.  It seems to me he just doesn’t have the speed to play with a lot of the top receivers in the league.

 This is all really too bad, I don’t consider Rolle to be a terrible football player at all. I’ve always felt the issue with him is he plays in the wrong position. Antrel played a lot of safety at the University of Miami and it seems that was the more natural fit for him. Rolle is very strong and can tackle better than most defensive backs in this league. A transition over to safety would not be extremely hard for him. For whatever reason the coaches have never wanted to test him at safety(maybe because of lack of depth at CB), they all really want to see if they can make things work for Antrel at cornerback. Some time in the future I hope the coaches try him out at safety. But for the time being Rolle is a cornerback and the weakest link for the Cardinals is just that position. Antrel is going to have to step it up if the Cardinals defense plans to have any kind of success this season.

Original post by Eli Wahlstrom

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