To say Lewis Cine‘s first two years as a Minnesota Viking went poorly would be an understatement. As a first-round pick coming in with high expectations, Cine suffered a gruesome leg injury four games into his rookie year and then failed to do anything to crack the starting lineup in his sophomore season. As a result, he has only played 10 total defensive snaps in his first two years.
Cine’s injury truncated his rookie year, and it likely set him behind last season when he had to learn a new defense under Brian Flores while regaining his strength. He has also had to compete with Cam Bynum and Josh Metellus‘s development into high-quality starters at safety. However, that isn’t a great excuse because he also saw less run at the position than Theo Jackson and Jay Ward last season.
Things have not gone well for Cine. The past two years must have been mentally taxing on him. Fans expect first-round picks to become stars. Vikings fans saw Cine’s name on draft night and immediately thought, I hope he’s our next Harrison Smith. Cine went from star in the Georgia defense on a National Championship team to buried on the depth chart with the Vikings. The disappointment has to be difficult to overcome.
Confidence is everything at the safety position. Safeties must take on larger blockers in the box. Sometimes, they have to cover receivers one-on-one, even though they aren’t cornerbacks. They’re often the last line of defense on deep passing plays. Safeties must diagnose the play quickly and correctly to get in position. If they’ve lost confidence, they’ll hesitate and be wrong no matter what they choose. If they’re playing tight because they’re struggling with injury or the transition to the NFL, it’s hard to play confidently.
I can’t speak with knowledge of Cine’s mindset. Still, it’s easy to imagine his confidence was shaken over his first two seasons. He’s always had the athletic ability to make it in the league, and his athletic profile was a big part of the reason he was exciting as a first-round pick. However, Cine must rebuild his confidence to turn his career around and make the team.
Cine began to regain his confidence against the Cleveland Browns in Minnesota’s second preseason game. He was all over the field making plays for the defense. He snagged an interception, notched a sack, and had 11 tackles. There was much to like about his performance, so let’s break down the tape.
Impressive speed
It’s no secret that Lewis Cine is fast; he had a 4.37-second 40-yard dash. He displayed that speed as a blitzer against the Browns, recording a hit and a sack.
Cine’s sack is an impressive play. He rotates down in the box after the OL gets set and moves towards the line of scrimmage at the snap, but he is still about four yards off the line when the ball is snapped. Still, Cine has the burst to make up that ground quickly, causing the QB to move off his spot before any of the curl routes even break.
Cine also made an impact coming from depth. On his QB hit, he started about eight yards off the line of scrimmage but was still fast enough that the LT, who was supposed to block him, couldn’t get a hand on him. The QB hits the top of his drop and throws the ball almost immediately because he had an open receiver, but Cine notably got a hit on the QB without getting flagged. That means that if anything had gone wrong on the route and the QB couldn’t throw to his first read, he would likely get a sack. That’s pretty much all you can ask for on a blitz.
physical play
Cine amassed several tackles in this game, and they generally weren’t cheap tackles that led to successful plays for the offense. One of his most impressive plays was the one below, where he took on a block from a TE and disengaged to make the tackle.
It’s great to see a play where Cine lines up in the box, takes on a block from Jordan Akins, and then disengages from the block to make the tackle. Akins has been a long-term role player in the NFL rather than a random low-level undrafted free agent and can hold his ground against that block. It’s a nice play for any safety and a particularly good sign for Cine, who has a slimmer frame. For Cine to improve, he must play with a physicality that is better than his size suggests.
Speed and the ability to play with intense physicality will lead to success in run defense. That can be seen in the play below, where Cine combines with Tyler Manoa for the tackle. Cine starts with a deeper alignment, about 11 yards off the ball when he’s on the screen pre-snap. He quickly fills downhill when he recognizes a run in his direction and ends up two yards off the line of scrimmage just as the RB crosses it. At that point, Cine breaks down and gets in on the tackle with Manoa, who also made a great play.
Cine’s physicality also manifested when making tackles. You can see the QB hit above, but the most jarring play was his powerful takedown of Tyler Huntley, which was correctly not called a penalty. It was great to see Cine make a hard, legal hit on the QB who was sliding in this instance:
Tackling confidence
The athleticism, recognition, and physicality above are great, but they don’t mean much if you can’t tackle. Cine struggled in that area last preseason, which likely contributed to him riding the bench. In this game, he flipped the script with several nice tackles.
If he’s going to play in the box, Cine needs to rally and tackle effectively. Underneath zones will be targeted in the quick game. In those cases, the defense’s goal is more to limit gains than prevent a completion entirely. In the play below, the Vikings are playing a little deeper because the Browns are in a two-minute drill, and Cine has flat responsibility.
You could see Cine’s confidence grow with each tackle he racked up. That culminated in the play below, where he was in man coverage on the RB, drove on the quick pass to the flat, and tackled him for no gain, bringing up a fourth down. You can see him celebrate with a fist to signal the fourth down and get a great reaction from his teammates on the sideline. Playing like that is exactly what he needs to do to make the team.
Because tackling has been an issue for him in the past, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the missed tackle that Cine did have in the game. It came on a play where Dallas Gant tipped a ball in the air, and a Browns receiver who was not the intended target ended up coming down with the tip. Cine’s coming from somewhat offscreen, but watch his path. You can see that he was initially going to the outside to cover the over route, before he bent his path back in to try to get the tipped ball. The receiver catches it and quickly pulls the ball away, where Cine aims towards where it is falling.
However, that’s not a typical missed tackle and is not the result of Cine’s bad angle or poor tackling form. Therefore, I’m not particularly concerned it exposes an underlying issue. Instead, it’s a nice play by the receiver and a fluke from a defensive perspective.
coverage questions
I’ve talked a lot about Cine’s recognition and tackling but not much about his coverage. Cine had an interception in this game, which came off Dallas Gant‘s tipped ball. It was great to see Cine track the ball and make the diving catch, but it also didn’t result from him necessarily blanketing a receiver or jumping a throwing lane.
Ultimately, it’s hard to come to a conclusion because the Browns didn’t test the Vikings deep much. Only six of Cleveland’s 37 attempts went longer than 10 yards, and only one went beyond 20 yards. He did fine in underneath coverage, as evidenced by the tackles above, but there wasn’t much for him as a deep middle or half safety.
Still, one play made me question if he understood his coverage responsibilities as well as you would hope. The Vikings appear to be in Cover 1 Robber in the play below. That means there is one deep safety. In this case, Bobby McCain is the one “hole” player in the middle of the field; Cine and the rest of the defense play man coverage. Cine moves back because the Vikings are trying to disguise it as two high initially. However, post-snap, you see McCain rotate to the deep middle. I believe Cine should correspondingly go to the middle of the field around the 50-yard line. Instead, he stays in basically the same spot until the ball is thrown.
Cine should go to the middle of the field because divider rules on defense dictate that man coverage players inside a certain landmark (usually a couple of yards inside the numbers) should play outside leverage on receivers to funnel routes inside to the hole player. Brian Asamoah could do a better job following his man on this play, but he’s at a disadvantage to the inside because he is supposed to play with outside leverage. If Cine runs to become the hole player at the snap, he likely ends up right about where the ball was thrown, and should have been able to disrupt the pass.
Here’s the play:
I’m confident the Vikings would ask Cine to execute this type of post-snap rotation. A couple of plays later, Cine played deep, and McCain was in the hole. The play below is a zone coverage, but you can see McCain move to the middle of the field immediately at the snaps while Cine moves deep.
If my suspicions are correct, Cine may still be working on understanding coverage roles. Hopefully, he can shore up this understanding because he needs to do well here to become someone the Vikings can play.
conclusion
Ultimately, Cine did a lot of good in this game. He played fast, was physical taking on blocks, and gained confidence in his run/pass recognition and tackling. He also made a great catch to get an INT.
Cine isn’t a finished product by any means. However, after falling into irrelevance after the Vikings took him in the first round, this game is something to build on.
Lewis Cine regained some of his confidence against the Cleveland Browns. Hopefully, this trend can continue, leading to Cine making the roster and eventually becoming an impactful player for the Vikings.
