NFL Draft Profile: CB Derek Stingley Jr

Breaking down LSU cornerback Derek Stingley Jr.

A name that has been linked somewhat frequently with the Washington Commanders at the 11th overall pick is LSU cornerback Derek Stingley Jr. The book on Stingley is that he had a phenomenal debut season in college football back in 2019, racking up six interceptions and 15 pass break ups as LSU won the National Championship. However, since that point he’s struggled to play up to those expectations while also battling injuries that have only allowed him to play 10 games over the last two seasons, including just three last season. 

The common belief is that if a team that drafts Stingley can get him back to his 2019 level of play, they’ll have a shutdown cornerback that will be the steal of the draft, but with the injuries and level of play dropping off in recent years, there’s a significant risk involved in doing so. This makes Stingley worthy of a closer look to see just what he could bring to the Washington Commanders and if he’s worth the risk.

The thing that stands out most when watching Stingley back in 2019 is his patience. Lots of young corners have a tendency to get a bit jumpy at the line of scrimmage and overreact to the first step the receiver takes, leaving them vulnerable to lots of different moves. But Stingley showed remarkable patience to hold his position and allow the receiver to declare his intention before then committing to his own movement.

Here against Georgia in 2019, we see Stingley isolated against a single receiver to the left of the formation. Off the snap, the receiver attempts to bait Stingley with a jab step inside before releasing outside. Here we can see Stingley’s patience as he doesn’t bite on the initial jab step inside. Instead, he keeps his feet relatively calm and waits for the receiver to properly declare his intentions. Once the receiver then commits to an outside release, Stingley opens up outside and gets his hands on the receiver to jam him. That jam allows Stingley to stay on top of the route and stick tight to the receiver as he looks to break off the route. He essentially takes away that target on the play.

Another stand out aspect is his length. Stingley has long arms that enable him to reach receivers and get his hands on them, as we saw in that clip. But that length also helps him with recovering on routes and playing the ball. All corners are going to get beat from time to time, but the ability to recover is critical. Stingley has the length that helps him recover better than a lot of corners.

Just like on the last play, here we see Stingley isolated on a receiver to the left of the formation. This time the receiver looks to run a fade in the red zone. Off the snap, Stingley plays a little too hard to the outside and gives the receiver a path to get by inside. The receiver starts to run away from him a bit, but Stingley has the speed to catch up and then shows off his length that helps him contest the catch. He’s able to stretch out his long arms to reach into the catch point and get his hand on the ball to knock it away from the receiver as he tries to secure the pass. 

Length is a huge asset for cornerbacks and something the Commanders have valued at the position in the past. Just last year they drafted Benjamin St-Juste in large part due to his length. But while the length is a big asset, it’s only an asset if used correctly. Stingley does use it well to help him press, but he also uses it to help him make plays on the ball. His ball skills are exceptional, which you would expect from a defender with six interceptions in their first season in college football.

On this play, Georgia work in a two-by-two formation with Stingley aligned over the outside receiver to the left. The receiver runs another fade route down the sideline. Stingley shows his patience again at the line of scrimmage, waiting for the receiver to declare his release and then showing him to the sideline once he releases outside. With the receiver being forced towards the sideline, Stingley feels secure enough in the route to turn and locate the football. The ball arrives very quickly at him, barely after he turned around in fact, but he has the ball skills to quickly locate the ball and secure the catch for the interception.

All of those key traits were still visible in 2021, though Stingley did only play three games.

On this play against UCLA in 2021, we see Stingley again isolated on a single receiver to the left of the formation. The receiver looks to run a corner-stop or swirl route, faking a corner route before breaking off back to the quarterback. Stingley is patient at the line of scrimmage and waits for the receiver to declare his inside release. Stingley then uses his length to get his hands on the receiver to jam him. The receiver quickly swipes away his inside hand, but Stingley immediately replaces it with his outside hand to help control the route. With his hand on the receiver, Stingley is able to stay tight and forces a mistake from the receiver. The receiver attempts to break free of Stingley’s contact as he makes his cut, but ends up falling instead, leaving Stingley to win the rep.

These are all very promising signs for Stingley and certainly there is plenty of potential for Stingley to develop into a top cornerback in the NFL. However, some of the hype surrounding his 2019 tape is a little bit overselling just how good he was. As I’ve already shown, there is a lot of potential with Stingley. The combination of length, athleticism, ball skills and patience is very promising indeed. But some draft analysts have suggested that his 2019 film was near perfect and he completely shut down every receiver he faced. That is simply not true. In fact, in the three games I watched from 2019, against Alabama, Georgia and Florida, there were receivers that got the better of him in each game. DeVonta Smith, now with the Eagles, got the better of him frequently in the Alabama game while Van Jefferson, a second-round pick of the Rams in 2020, gave him a tough battle too.

Here are two examples of Stingley getting beat on comeback routes. The first play of the clip sees Stingley work against DeVonta Smith, who manages to sell his route vertically before breaking off sharply and creating plenty of separation as he cuts back. The second play of the clip is of Van Jefferson, who gives a slightly different move. Jefferson has a little more of a stutter in the route, selling a fake break after the initial release before then working vertical and breaking off the route outside. Jefferson doesn’t quite create as much separation as Smith, and neither are thrown the ball, but both won their routes and could easily have been thrown to had the quarterbacks been working their way.

The pair of Smith and Jefferson also beat Stingley a couple times on slant routes.

This clip shows three examples of Stingley losing slant routes. The first two are from Van Jefferson. Jefferson uses a similar move on both occasions, with a hop step off the snap to gather himself and gain information before then taking a few steps outside to sell a vertical route and getting Stingley to open up. Jefferson then cuts sharply inside on both plays and runs open over the middle. The quarterback finds him on both plays, with the second resulting in a touchdown. On the third play of the clip, DeVonta Smith beats Stingley in a similar fashion. His route is a little smoother than Jeffersons, with less emphasis on the hop step and vertical jab step and more emphasis on pacing the route properly. Regardless, he breaks inside past Stingley with the same effectiveness and receives the ball for a first down conversion.

It’s fair to point out that Smith and Jefferson are both two very good receivers, especially for college receivers. But they’re both in the NFL, which is where Stingley is hoping to make it. If Stingley were to land in Washington, he’d have to face Smith twice a year as Smith is in the division. This isn’t to say that Stingley wouldn’t have learned from those experiences against those two receivers, but more to point out that he wasn’t quite as good in 2019 as some have made him out to be. There were flaws in his game even back then and he hasn’t had a full opportunity to fix them due to injuries over the past two seasons.

But I think for Washington, while Stingley is a talented corner, I’m not sure he fits the Commanders defense. Washington already has a lot of money invested in Kendall Fuller and Williams Jackson at corner, along with last year’s third-round pick in Benjamin St-Juste. All three are better on the outside, like Stingley, which would mean adding Stingley would force one of those three into the slot or out of the rotation altogether. 

On top of that, there’s a few issues with the scheme fit. Stingley very much fits in with the style of corner the Commanders invested in last year. Like Jackson and St-Juste, Stingley is a long, physical corner with press coverage ability. If Washington hopes to switch to a more of a man coverage defense, then Stingley works in theory, though it does leave the question of what to do with Fuller. But the Commanders played their best football last year as a heavy zone defense. Stingley actually showed some promise as a zone defender too, but with Fuller, Jackson and St-Juste and a zone-heavy scheme, the value of drafting a cornerback high just isn’t there. So while Stingley has a lot of potential, I’m personally not sure if he’s the right fit for the Commanders at 11.