CB Chris Culliver, South Carolina

Culliver has nickel corner written all over him.

Originally posted by 9erfanAUS:

That's great that he's got athletic talent and I recognize that. But this just seems like Reggie Smith all over again. We needed a guy who could come in right away and I just don't see that happening with Culliver. Plus, we already drafted a safety who was in over his head in Mays.

-9fA

move in right away...you can be happy when a 1st-rounder can start from day one.

Originally posted by WillistheWall:

Originally posted by Travisty13:

Originally posted by TheBlueHell:

Originally posted by Travisty13:

Originally posted by TheBlueHell:
Hate to burst anyone's bubble, but Culliver sucks as a third rounder. I've followed this kid since he was playing high school ball in North Carolina, and he's never lived up to the hype. He certainly has track speed, but he's never done anything with it. On top of that, he has a questionable attitude for sure.

Big reach for a very average player with below average character.

Well then you must be right, and the people at cbssports, S.I., our scouting dept., the people that picked him as an All-SEC, the people who thought enough to include him as a Preseason All-American must all be wrong. Thanks for clarifiying that.

Just got off the phone with my best friend, who's a huge South Carolina fan, and even he was laughing at this pick.

Well, then. Let's fire Baalke. You and your best friend can take over. Cause the 49ers apparently don't know what they're doing.

I dont mean to be a cynical dick, but when in the last 8 years have the 49ers shown that they have any idea of what they're doing?

Willis, Davis, Iupotti, Gore, Harbaugh, J. Smith, T. Spikes, not giving in to outrageous salary demands, trying to get a stadium deal, Giving Jed power since he actually frikkin cares about football... I don't know pick and choose.

Bottom line is keyboard warriors aren't football experts, you may have played and coached before... but get real, if you were the sh*t you'd be in a scouting department.

Delmas, Chung, Mitchell just to name a couple DB's who were considered "reaches: by the draftniks at the time yet have since become established starters.

The Draft is a cross section between College productivity, Players Athleticism and the Coaches ability on the teams that drafts that player to maximize potential. Keep in mind its a business... do you really believe a league team is basing their future off of scout.com or any other news related scouting services? Not a chance! Every team has their own crew and every crew thinks something different about a player... we only hear the opinions of the people that got fired from their scouting departments lol.

Do you honestly think the Patriots or Ravens have a crystal ball and know who is gonna be successful? Nope, its called identifying a player that fits your system and coaching him up.

Originally posted by communist:

Originally posted by 9erfanAUS:

That's great that he's got athletic talent and I recognize that. But this just seems like Reggie Smith all over again. We needed a guy who could come in right away and I just don't see that happening with Culliver. Plus, we already drafted a safety who was in over his head in Mays.

-9fA

move in right away...you can be happy when a 1st-rounder can start from day one.

Agreed. I don't know what world these people live in where they think skilled positions drafted outside of round 1 should be starters on day 1. Outside of positions like running back, most players taken in and outside of the 1st round take a bit to train and are not ready to start.

Bill Parcels has Culliver as a third round pick along with curtis brown and shareece wright. I'd go with his evaluation over most other experts. When I saw that it made me feel a lot better about the pick. By the way, he also rated Aldon Smith as the second best rush olb behind miller.

Originally posted by RedWaltz24:

Originally posted by communist:

Originally posted by 9erfanAUS:

That's great that he's got athletic talent and I recognize that. But this just seems like Reggie Smith all over again. We needed a guy who could come in right away and I just don't see that happening with Culliver. Plus, we already drafted a safety who was in over his head in Mays.

-9fA

move in right away...you can be happy when a 1st-rounder can start from day one.

Agreed. I don't know what world these people live in where they think skilled positions drafted outside of round 1 should be starters on day 1. Outside of positions like running back, most players taken in and outside of the 1st round take a bit to train and are not ready to start.

Or the rookies that do play outside of rounds 1-2 have been identified as doing a certain limited things well, and the teams that draft them only to ask them to stick to their talent initially when they get on the field.

Originally posted by 5280High:

Originally posted by RedWaltz24:

Originally posted by communist:

Originally posted by 9erfanAUS:

That's great that he's got athletic talent and I recognize that. But this just seems like Reggie Smith all over again. We needed a guy who could come in right away and I just don't see that happening with Culliver. Plus, we already drafted a safety who was in over his head in Mays.

-9fA

move in right away...you can be happy when a 1st-rounder can start from day one.

Agreed. I don't know what world these people live in where they think skilled positions drafted outside of round 1 should be starters on day 1. Outside of positions like running back, most players taken in and outside of the 1st round take a bit to train and are not ready to start.

Or the rookies that do play outside of rounds 1-2 have been identified as doing a certain limited things well, and the teams that draft them only to ask them to stick to their talent initially when they get on the field.

..and this happens every year. We draft so-so guys and then talk ourselves into how they're going to be the next big thing.

Culliver will be nothing more than a special teams guy and a nickel corner at best.

-9fA

we'll see it...i dont think that baalke and fangio drafted him b/c of his special teams ability and his 7 games at CB for playing nickel and returning kicks and punts.

[ Edited by communist on Apr 30, 2011 at 08:29:03 ]

I don't really remember Culliver standing out during the 2 games I watched during the year. Johnny Patrick graded so much higher...only time will tell.

Originally posted by whatawegot:

Originally posted by TheBlueHell:
Culliver has speed and ZERO instinct. He's a terrible reach in the third round. His kickoff numbers are inflated considering he's one of the few people to ever return all four years, but SCAR's return game sucks and lacks any other decent options except for a little midget named Sherman.

Culliver never scored a TD on any returns in four years. Think about that.

He's also a nondescript defensive back with a questionable attitude

.

great post from the webzone niner scout. Who needs our scouts

Hey noob, I've been familiar with Culliver since he was a junior playing high school ball in North Carolina, and I'm pretty sure I've seen him play more than anyone here. I would love for him to succeed, but Culliver has been tantalizing people with his "potential" for years now without delivering. Taking him this early in the draft was a joke.

Originally posted by TheBlueHell:

Originally posted by whatawegot:

Originally posted by TheBlueHell:
Culliver has speed and ZERO instinct. He's a terrible reach in the third round. His kickoff numbers are inflated considering he's one of the few people to ever return all four years, but SCAR's return game sucks and lacks any other decent options except for a little midget named Sherman.

Culliver never scored a TD on any returns in four years. Think about that.

He's also a nondescript defensive back with a questionable attitude

.

great post from the webzone niner scout. Who needs our scouts

Hey noob, I've been familiar with Culliver since he was a junior playing high school ball in North Carolina, and I'm pretty sure I've seen him play more than anyone here. I would love for him to succeed, but Culliver has been tantalizing people with his "potential" for years now without delivering. Taking him this early in the draft was a joke.

Do you feel that he could be a better CB than S? Safeties generally need good instincts just like linebackers, whereas CBs need measurables and ball skills (like the moment when Nate Clements was stride for stride with Vincent Jackson but couldn't time his jump correctly).

The way Harbaugh has talked about him makes it seem as if his move to CB will give him a chance to capitalize on athletic ability comparable to Peterson's, regardless of his lack of production at safety.

I guess my other question would be about how good he was at covering receivers when he had to.

Players like Ulracher could play safety and be dominant and have that translate to linebacker especially because of instincts.

When I think of college players who went from safety to corner, I think of Nnamdi and Reggie Smith. Part of Smith's problem when he was drafted was his lack of speed, and we all know now that the experiment with putting him at CB failed. Culliver has the measurables, and I just know that Baalke is just going based on potential with picks like Anthony Davis, Smith, etc.

People need to understand that we can now not feel as nervous about drafting developmental players. Culliver, as everyone knows, is a physical beast, fast, big, has all the talents to be successful. What he lacks is things like technique and experience. Thats exactly what coaching is for, something we didn't have in the past. Both Baalke and Harbaugh understand the importance of coaching on a players performance, and it's great to know that they have the confidence in drafting players such as Smith and Kap and Culliver to successfully mold them into great players.

Originally posted by Eskendale:

Originally posted by TheBlueHell:

Originally posted by whatawegot:

Originally posted by TheBlueHell:
Culliver has speed and ZERO instinct. He's a terrible reach in the third round. His kickoff numbers are inflated considering he's one of the few people to ever return all four years, but SCAR's return game sucks and lacks any other decent options except for a little midget named Sherman.

Culliver never scored a TD on any returns in four years. Think about that.

He's also a nondescript defensive back with a questionable attitude

.

great post from the webzone niner scout. Who needs our scouts

Hey noob, I've been familiar with Culliver since he was a junior playing high school ball in North Carolina, and I'm pretty sure I've seen him play more than anyone here. I would love for him to succeed, but Culliver has been tantalizing people with his "potential" for years now without delivering. Taking him this early in the draft was a joke.

Do you feel that he could be a better CB than S? Safeties generally need good instincts just like linebackers, whereas CBs need measurables and ball skills (like the moment when Nate Clements was stride for stride with Vincent Jackson but couldn't time his jump correctly).

The way Harbaugh has talked about him makes it seem as if his move to CB will give him a chance to capitalize on athletic ability comparable to Peterson's, regardless of his lack of production at safety.

I guess my other question would be about how good he was at covering receivers when he had to.

Players like Ulracher could play safety and be dominant and have that translate to linebacker especially because of instincts.

When I think of college players who went from safety to corner, I think of Nnamdi and Reggie Smith. Part of Smith's problem when he was drafted was his lack of speed, and we all know now that the experiment with putting him at CB failed. Culliver has the measurables, and I just know that Baalke is just going based on potential with picks like Anthony Davis, Smith, etc.

You make a good point about needing better instincts to play safety, so that would certainly help Culliver in terms of playing CB since he doesn't have good instincts. He only played a handful of games at CB before getting hurt, but I can tell you that he's always had the reputation as being a great athlete and not a great player. Maybe our staff can wring something out of him, but I don't like using a third rounder on this kind of player.

Some people are trumpeting his return skills, but I can honestly say that nobody ever feared kicking the ball to him. Guys like C.J. Spiller and Jacoby Ford at Clemson scared people, but Culliver never seemed like anything special as a returner. He just made a lot of returns over his career beginning as a freshman and piled up some yardage. My best friend is a huge SCAR fan, and he called him "Mr. 35 Yard Line" when it came to his return game. Sure, if he could get us to the 35 yard line in the NFL, that'd be great, but with the change in the kicking rules and the fact that he isn't really a dynamic returner anyway, I think this was a huge reach.

http://www.garnetandblackattack.com/2011/3/27/2075670/south-carolina-gamecocks-in-the-nfl-draft-chris-culliver

Found a website with some posts concerning Culliver, mentioning the obvious weaknesses already pointed out on our board. One poster defends him, however:

"paying special attention to the game day open threads, and no where was Culliver singled out for criticism anywhere by anyone except for the two or three personal fouls he committed. He had an awful game against Tennessee where we, including myself, criticized him for several big gains, but he was playing that thing injured. Folks, if he was blowing coverages I would’ve been the first to mention it in an open thread. I pointed that stuff out all the time about many players, as did you all. Me, and others, praised Culliver for a few great plays. I just don’t see where all this negativity is coming from. Culliver didn’t have an All-SEC performance at corner this season, but I think you all are being a bit harsh. I personally thought he was the only member of the secondary, outside of Swearinger (also Allen if you count him), who was consistent enough to relax my nerves every time the ball hit air."

There is a reason why WRs like DeSean Jackson and Steve Smith are also great returners and vice versa, that is to say they possess great instincts that allow them to score; just as Ed Reed needs instincts as a ball-hawking safety, he is an extremely talented pun returner. Culliver's inability to score on his kick returns (one poster said he would just run into the opposition's wall instead of finding seams) reflects his poor choice of angles, his hesitancy when coming in as safety support for the pass, etc.

The same poster further defends Culliver, saying: "Culliver isn't about picks, he's about making highly athletic deflection. He’s not typically close enough to his man to get a pick, but he has great recovery ability to make the tip regardless. He had as many deflections as Gilmore last season, despite only playing half as many games. He led the team in that statistic in 2009."

http://gamecocksonline.cstv.com/blog/2010/08/catching-up-with-culliver.html

Culliver on why he sucked at safety: "There isn't that much difference. At corner you have to show much more coverage ability. At safety it is like two positions in one," says Culliver. "You are worrying about the coverage, and being able to come up in the run game. At corner it is much more about focusing in on that one receiver, and not allowing him to catch the ball."

The problems I see with Chris from most of these sites: He can't recognize routes or coverages, can't tackle, takes bad angles, isn't aggressive attacking the ball to make the pick, is poor in run support, and in general lacks situational instincts.

Nonetheless, I would think that if Chris had spent more than half a year at CB he might have done better with route recognition and just being a corner in general, but as implied by his own words above a safety has to juggle many hats while a corner can just focus on the craft of covering a receiver. I think this is what Baalke saw, the idea that his problems with covering are a lack of experience and time devoted to it while he was busy trying to be a safety. So in other words, the 49ers don't believe his failure as a safety proves that he can't be a cornerback, and just like the idea of you're innocent until proven guilty, they believe his inexperience at the position is actually a reason to be hopeful.