When Picasso says hey, you should see this guy paint, you listen. And when Jerry Rice starts talking about cornerbacks–especially if he’s willing to say who the NFL’s current “shutdown cornerbacks” are–you listen. Because the masters know their territory. When Rice talks cornerbacks he has two models in mind–the best guys he played against during his illustrious (to put it mildly) 20-year career. Those guys are named Deion Sanders and Darrell Green. If you need to know more about them, just take a ride to Canton, Ohio and visit the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Who are its future members? “[Patrick] Peterson from Arizona, [Richard] Sherman from the Seattle Seahawks, [Darrelle] Revis,” Rice says in The Post Game. “You look at these guys and they feel like they’re shutdown corners,” Rice says. Peterson, Sherman and Revis are the corners who Jerry Rice would most like to go up against. And consequently it’s those guys that most receivers don’t want to go up against.
