When the Jets drafted safety Calvin Pryor in the first round of May’s draft, the team talked about the impact he would have as a big hitter in the back end of a defense that hasn’t had good safety play during Rex Ryan’s time as head coach.
The Jets are now seven games into Pryor’s rookie season and they are waiting to see Pryor make that impact. Coach Rex Ryan said Thursday that Pryor missed an interception in the first game of the season and that the results have continued to be disappointing relative to the team’s expectations.
“Probably started with the first game when he dropped that pick-six. But, he hasn’t had the impact necessarily that I think all of us had expected, but quite honestly, our defense has been played a little differently than maybe we had anticipated,” Ryan said in comments distributed by the team. “So, I think we’ve had to make some of those adjustments along the way. It hasn’t gone according to plan so to speak.”
One of the problems seems to be the Jets’ lack of decent cornerback options, which leads them to play less man than Ryan likely anticipated. That leaves Pryor in a deeper role to provide help to those corners instead of being deployed closer to the line where his hitting can be more of a factor.
Ryan’s job security isn’t good, thanks in large part to those cornerbacks, so he may never gets a chance to use Pryor as intended in his defense.