Dallas Cowboys 7-Round Mock Draft: Upgrade the attack

Michael Ojemudia, CB, Iowa

The first corner comes off the board and it’s at pick 146…

For a team in pretty dire need of secondary help this makes very little sense. However, the improvements we made on the offensive side of the ball in this draft are currently making our strengths even stronger.

Ojemudia played in Iowa’s zone heavy defense. Already used to playing a lot in Cover 3 and Quarters style defenses, Ojemudia’s skill set would translate quite well to what the Cowboys have done and what they want to do as a team.

From the piece mentioned before, Miller discusses the Cowboys previous “single-high” scheme and the new Quarters coverage Al Harris and Maurice Linguist will teach. Ojemudia played in a healthy mix of Quarters as well as Cover 3 at Iowa. In both coverages, the cornerback is dropping into some form of a deep zone along the sideline. (Not always but it is a common occurrence)

This generally requires cornerbacks to pattern match while bailing as opposed to spot dropping. This is something cornerbacks aren’t doing as often in the college game as you might think. Ojemudia’s understanding of where to lineup in zones and how to pass off assignments in zone coverage has helped him accumulate six picks and 15 pass deflections over his four years in Iowa City. He is confident at reading the quarterbacks eyes and makes plays on the ball. Here he talks with Cover 1 about the complex Iowa scheme and how it meshed with his game.

But if he is so good in zone coverage, why is he available in the fourth round? The biggest reason might be some athletic deficiencies. Ojemudia possesses good size at 6’1″, 200 pounds but compared to other taller and bigger corners, Ojemudia doesn’t look that fast on tape. This is really apparent when playing in man coverage.

If the receiver wins the release off of the line, Ojemudia struggles to recover. He loses focus on his balance and gets out of his break rather slowly. When other corners have the closing speed to make up for the ground lost, Ojemudia just doesn’t have that. This is fairly significant especially considering his hips appear quite flexible.

So in the fourth round, the Cowboys net a really good zone coverage corner with some athletic deficiencies. That is quite the change in tune after drafting players like Anthony Brown, Chidobe Awuzie, and Jourdan Lewis who are athletes in their truest form.

That might not be so bad though; all last season we wanted players with good ball skills and Ojemudia would fill that role very nicely.