Second-year expectations for Kyler Gordon with Chicago Bears
After looking into the rookie season stats of Chicago Bears cornerback Kyler Gordon, it was not great, but there is still hope for him. There are NFL players who had a rookie season with similar issues to bounce back and have a strong career. The question is, what did these players do in year two, and is that when signs of life came?
Second-year expectations for Kyler Gordon with Chicago Bears
We found that some of the best comparisons for Kyler Gordon are Donte Jackson, Rock Ya-Sin, Trevon Diggs, Byron Murphy, and Tyson Campbell. If Gordon had a career trajectory similar to these names after his rookie season, fans would be forgiving.
So, what did those players do in their second season?
Name | Tackles | Targets | Completions | Comp% | Yards | Y/T | TD | INT/PBU |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Donte Jackson | 40 | 59 | 36 | 61 | 612 | 10.4 | 5 | 8 |
Rock Ya-Sin | 45 | 67 | 45 | 67.2 | 594 | 8.9 | 2 | 7 |
Trevon Diggs | 52 | 103 | 54 | 52.4 | 907 | 8.8 | 4 | 21 |
Byron Murphy | 51 | 81 | 53 | 65.4 | 538 | 6.6 | 2 | 8 |
Tyson Campbell | 70 | 83 | 45 | 54.2 | 433 | 5.2 | 6 | 15 |
Average | 51.6 | 78.6 | 46.6 | 59.3 | 616.8 | 7.8 | 3.8 | 11.8 |
As a rookie, Kyler Gordon recorded 71 tackles, and that has not been a question for him. he was targeted 82 times, and teams are not going to ease up on him, so this should stay around the same. The issue is that he allowed 63 catches on those targets, and the completion rate was 76.8%.
The worst in terms of completions was Diggs, and Diggs had a 52.4% completion rate allowed. Needless to say, this would be one heck of an accomplishment for Gordon. Still, even Ya-Sin had the worst completion rate allowed, which was 67.2%. Even that would require Gordon to take a big step forward in year two.
The average of this group was 617 yards, and Gordon allowed 764 in his rookie season. If the completion rate can go down a bit, he could give up close to this on similar targets. Still, even that average is boosted by Diggs, and beyond having a much lower completion rate, he also had 21 passes defended. Kyler Gordon had just six last season.
If you take out Diggs, who is such an outlier, the rest of the group only allowed 544 yards, and the yards per target would drop to 7.5. That would be another step with Gordon giving up 9.3 yards per target. Still, it comes down to completion rate. The average yards per completion of this group is 13.2. If you take out Diggs, it Is 12.1. That is exactly the yards per completion that Gordon allowed.
The issue is not the yards, it is the completions. If he can limit the completions a bit, the yards per target will be just fine, and he will be in line with someone like Byron Murphy, another Washington cornerback who struggled as a rookie.
Lastly, Gordon allowed three touchdowns and had six passes defended. The touchdowns allowed is fine, but he must break up more passes. This, again, comes right back to helping limit the completion rate if he can add a few of these. A boost to closer to 11 would be huge for assisting this drop in.
Next. 5 best moves Ryan Poles made this offseason. 5 best moves Ryan Poles made this offseason. dark
So, overall, Kyler Gordon does have a bit of a way to go to improve from where he was last season. However, you have seen that other players have done it, and it is attainable that he can be on the same trajectory as these names with a few improvements in year two.