Cleveland Browns: Top 10 remaining NFL free agents and if they fit
By Chad Porto
No. 7 – Eric Reid (SAF)
While some people will view Eric Reid with a bit of controversy, the fact is he had his best season to date with the Carolina Panthers. While the rest of the Panthers’ defense was not up to par as it has been in the past, Reid did make sure to show up every single week. He had 130 tackles, 97 of which were solo and had four sacks; all of which were career highs. Unlike say the NBA where you can have great stats that are deemed “hollow”, that’s much harder to do in the NFL. Stats are stats usually.
Sure, you can go into a deeper analysis of stats, and expand into the advanced stuff, but generally speaking bad players on defense don’t get 100 tackles. They absolutely don’t as a safety. The stats may not paint a picture of Reid as an absolute force to be reckoned with, as it more accurately depicts a front seven that couldn’t do their job but the fact that he has so many tackles means he was stopping guys from getting further down the field.
His career-high in sacks and tackles-for-a-loss also show that he’s really good at getting depth against linemen, and could be a problem in blitz packages.
While the Cleveland Browns reworked their secondary with Grant Delpit, Andrew Sendejo, and Karl Joseph, they aren’t as good as Reid. At least they aren’t as consistent as Reid is. Sendejo fell off a bit due to injury but may return to form with the Browns. Delpit’s a rookie and is an unknown quantity and Joseph was a first-round pick that the Raiders opted not to bring back despite having a fifth-year option available to them.
Does he fit?
Long story short, yes. Reid is an upgrade over every safety the team has, his contract would be the only reason to not bring him.