Tale of the Tape: Analyzing Cordarrelle Patterson
“He needs to get open. Pretty simple. Sometimes it’s coverage based. Sometimes it’s his acceleration at the top of the route. Sometimes it’s the beginning of the route. It’s just a combination of all of them.”
Those were the words of Vikings head coach Mike Zimmer in mid-October in an interview with SiriusXM Radio, and the topic of the conversation was his dynamic and controversial wideout Cordarrelle Patterson. (Hat tip to Dan Hanzus of NFL.com for transcribing the quotes.)
Since then, it’s been a popular comment among fantasy analysts to say that Patterson is never open. And there’s certainly logic behind that statement that goes beyond a frustrated coach’s soundbite during an interview. There are plenty of flaws in Patterson’s game.
He’s a classic case of “better athlete than football player,” as the 6’2”, 216-pound Patterson runs a 4.4 40-yard dash and has a 37-inch vertical leap to go with a fairly explosive 128-inch broad jump. Yet he doesn’t translate all of that athleticism onto the field due to poor technique and fundamentals.
So when people say “Cordarrelle Patterson is never open,” they’re almost right. There is a nearly universal statement about the Minnesota wideout that includes those words. But a picture is worth a whole bunch of words, so let’s take a look at what I mean before we explore Patterson’s overall ability to get open.
On this play, Patterson is split out wide, and asked to run a post route. He runs lots of post routes. Lots, and lots, and lots of post routes. In fact, in the four games I’ve watched from Patterson, plus in reading the work of others who have broken down Patterson’s film, the post may be his most-run route.
The red line is the line that Patterson usually takes on a post. It’s not sharp, it’s not explosive, and it’s not going to get him open against man coverage. The yellow line would be an ideal post route, as a quick inside release would get the receiver leverage toward the middle of the field, which he would then use to separate with a sharp stem at the top of the route.
Here’s a look at that play in motion, and you can see that none of Patterson’s movements are sharp enough to get him away from his defender. It’s a poorly run route, and that’s pretty much a carbon copy of most of Patterson’s post routes that I watched on tape from this season.
So there is a statement you can make about the receiver that’s fairly universal: Cordarrelle Patterson cannot get open on a post route against man coverage. I watched over 100 of Patterson’s plays and failed to see him open on a single post against man coverage, which probably represents about 15-20% of his routes run.
But to carry over this “he can’t get open” notion to the rest of his game is silly. I can’t blame the Vikings for trying to get Patterson to run better routes and use his athleticism to get open on the post, but his failure in one aspect of the game doesn’t mean he’s a failure in others.
The former Tennessee wideout is a weak route runner. That shows up on his tape all of the time. Here’s another example, where Patterson stumbles on a dig, and that keeps a defender playing in off-man coverage within striking distance.
Yet somehow, on Sunday against the Buccaneers, Patterson set a career high with 12 targets, leading to six catches (two shy of a career high) and 86 receiving yards (the second-best single-game total in his career). The Buccaneers are an awful defense, and one that prefers to use zone defense, and that’s an area where Patterson can win on a regular basis.
But that performance came on the heels of a game against Buffalo, Football Outsiders’ fourth-best defense in the NFL, in which he was able to get open quite often as well. (Just not on post routes.)
Patterson is going to run a curl on this play, getting 12 yards downfield and breaking back toward the quarterback.
He faces physicality at the line of scrimmage, but is able to keep enough forward momentum to maintain the timing of the play.
He breaks free from the press, and gets inside leverage, which sets him up perfectly for an in-cutting route.
He then makes a sharp cut back to his quarterback, and is wide open, ready to catch the ball.
The example above shows Patterson’s strength, something that’s underrated about his game. Most speed receivers who require gimmick plays to get involved in the offense are short and small, and don’t have strength to get open against press coverage.
But for Patterson, the issue isn’t strength, but technique. He’s more than strong enough to hold off defenders and make plays in tight spots.
Here is Patterson against Logan Ryan of the Patriots, who played the Vikings’ wide receiver very well in their matchup this season. But on this play, Patterson was just too strong for the Rutgers product.
Patterson’s quick plant gets Ryan off of his shoulder for just a moment, long enough to receive a pass.
The Viking is able to hold off a challenge from Ryan at the catch point and secure the ball for a nice gain.
Ryan won the overall duel between the two on that afternoon, but this particular play shows that Patterson is more than capable of making a contested catch and shrugging off a defender at the point of the catch.
But the one area where Patterson consistently wins, but the area where he struggles to get involved in the current Minnesota offense, is his ability to get downfield against corners in man coverage.
Teddy Bridgewater currently ranks among the bottom 10 in the NFL in average depth of target according to Pro Football Focus, and they currently have Bridgewater with 17 deep passing attempts with only six completions on those attempts.
This nullifies a strength of Patterson’s game, which he put on display against Buffalo.
On this play, Patterson is faced with man coverage, and starts with a move to the outside…
But he quickly breaks inside and has the defender spinning to keep up. This gives the speedster a step on his man, and that step isn’t going to be made up with Patterson running free in the open field.
Patterson is in a perfect spot to haul in this deep throw, but the pass wasn’t there, and it goes down as an incompletion.
My general impression from watching Patterson was that he’s talented and strong enough to be thrown the ball in more situations than the Vikings currently call for, but that his weakness as a route runner does generally limit his upside as the Minnesota coaches continue to call plays for him to run routes against man coverage.
Against Tampa, Patterson showed that he was able to get open against a zone, and make highlight reel catches near the sideline. When presented with those opportunities, the second-year wideout will take advantage. But those situations don’t present themselves enough, and his coaches obviously want to see him succeed against man coverage more often, which is fully understandable.
That means that Patterson is a limited receiver until his route running improves, but there are any number of situations where the wide receiver can help the team, but is restricted by playcalling, quarterback play or offensive line protection. Patterson can get open on quite a few different routes (drives, hitches, curls, digs and fades), and is a threat in the run game (yet the Vikings under-use him in this regard).
Yet the story on this exciting talent will remain the same for the rest of the season. His poor technique will lead to plenty of wasted snaps, and the overall production of his offense will limit his upside. For that reason, he’s little more than a GPP play in weeks where a favorable matchup is on the schedule (especially a zone-heavy team).
But he’s one to watch moving forward, because the athleticism is there to facilitate a player with good route running. A player with his size and speed could terrorize defenses with a well-run post route, and that’s what Mike Zimmer and his staff are banging their heads against a wall trying to accomplish. If they’re successful, the return will be more than worth the investment.