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What Renardo Green Needs to Show During OTAs

Green clearly is a press-man specialist, which is a value skill for a cornerback.

Grant Cohn

Sep 5, 2023; Orlando, Florida, USA; Florida State Seminoles defensive back Renardo Green (8)
Sep 5, 2023; Orlando, Florida, USA; Florida State Seminoles defensive back Renardo Green (8) / Alicia Devine-USA TODAY Sports
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Renardo Green was the star of 49ers rookie minicamp.

He never got targeted, and when he faced first-round pick Ricky Pearsall, Green blanketed him, particularly when playing press man-to-man coverage. Green clearly is a press-man specialist, which is a value skill for a cornerback. But in OTAs, Green will need to show that he can do more than play press.

The 49ers defense plays lots of coverages, not just press. They play off-man coverage, too, and they play zone more than they play man. And when defensive backs are in zone coverage, they have their eyes on the quarterback, not the receiver, which means they're in better position to intercept passes.

But in five seasons at Florida State, Green intercepted just one pass, and he intercepted it in his fifth and final season. That's concerning. Most top-level cornerbacks can cover AND catch the ball when it's thrown near them. If Green can cover but can't take away the ball from the opposition, he never will be elite.

This is why the 49ers should draft cornerbacks earlier than they usually do. Green was the final pick in Round 2, and the first second-round pick the 49ers have spent on a cornerback in 20 years, which is good. But even at the end of Round 2, it's not easy to find a cornerback who can intercept passes and cover man to man. Those guys are usually gone after the first 45 picks. As opposed to good wide receivers, who are a dime a dozen in the draft.

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Grant Cohn
GRANT COHN

Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.

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