How will Patriots employ Darrelle Revis? – Sports – The Boston Globe

It’s a good question and I think there’s some interesting elements in this article but I think it’s missing the forest for the trees.

I’ve said before this offseason that Revis might not necessarily just man-up the #1 WRs. Using Browner at the line and McCourty over the top certainly makes sense against bigger #1 WRs. And what #2 would Revis not completely eliminate from the game?

But here’s the thing – the Pats want to run a healthy mix of coverage. They’re not going to be the Seahawks. They’re going to multiple from game to game and even snap to snap.

So where Revis is lining up right now, in the first 10 days of training camp doesn’t mean much. Why? Because it’s not hard to learn man-to-man coverage. There’s your guy, go cover him.

In the early days of camp, the team is learning the defense, and the hard defense to run is zone. Getting down communication with the rest of the secondary, recognizing route combinations and learning how to work together.

Nobody’s learning much if Revis was just following Edelman around all training camp.

So I think we’ll see it all this year, Revis staying on a side, Revis following the #1 around, probably even Browner following the #1 around.

Once again it’s a recurring theme of this talented defense. We don’t know exactly what to expect and neither do opponents. It’s just the way BB likes it.