Ever since Lewis Cine was taken with the 32nd pick in the 2022 NFL Draft, the pressure has been on the young safety to perform at a high level. Not only because he's a first-rounder, because of the players the Vikings passed to take Cine.
Vikings General Manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah traded down from 12 to 32, passing on a potential star receiver in Jameson Williams and the clear number one safety in the '22 draft, Kyle Hamilton.
Cine's rookie year was cut short by a horrific leg injury suffered in Week 4 in London, but there were signs of concern before that as Cine struggled to beat out Cam Bynum and Josh Metellus in training camp and the preseason and was relegated to special teams duty to begin the season. .
The rookie safety took just two defensive snaps, according to Pro Football Reference, compared to 34 special teams snaps before his season-ending injury.
Fast forward eight months and Cine is fully participating in offseason activities, seemingly fully recovered from his devastating injury. But, he still hasn't passed Bynum and Metellus on the depth chart.
"One thing I would always caution against is drawing too many conclusions from OTAs and minicamp," said Purple Insider's Matthew Coller. "We can't ever get the full picture of where players stand until a few weeks into camp when they've had pads on. So let's not write off Lewis right now. He went through a lot last year with that injury and doesn't have the experience of the other guys."
When asked in his weekly mailbag about Cine's struggles to break into the first team, Coller wrote, "He’s been a full-go since Day 1 of OTAs, so I can’t say that it’s related to the injury. It’s simply exactly what we saw last year. The other guys are very smart players and coaches are going to trust the guys who get it. If Cine is behind Bynum and Metellus at grasping their jobs and playing fast, they’re going to get the spots. However, there’s a long way to go. It wouldn’t make sense to write off the first-rounder yet. It’s not a good sign that he isn’t next to Harry but let’s see how it plays out."
Further padding the barrier Cine needs to break through is the development of Metellus, the fourth-year safety from Michigan who earned a role as a captain late last season.
"He's a safety, and he'll play some more this year, so I think you'll see the stuff that we've seen," said Adofo-Mensah in a recent interview with Peter Schrager. "He was a special teams stalwart last year, team-captain type. I was in the team meeting room later in the season after [Brian O'Neill] got hurt, [Metellus] was given team captain … You can feel when somebody's teammates really love them, really appreciate them and really want to follow them into battle, and he's one of those guys."
Metellus hauled in his first career interception in 2022 while also receiving an 80.7 coverage grade from Pro Football Focus.
"With that said, we can't ignore the fact that he was behind Bynum and Metellus last year too," Coller continued. "If he can't carve out a role or win the starting job by the end of camp, it's going to bring questions about whether he's going to ever be a significant par of this defense."
When Brian Flores was hired as the Vikings new defensive coordinator earlier this offseason, the general consensus was that this would be a better fit for Cine.
"It feels like that because his size/speed just screams 'downhill player,'" Coller wrote in his mailbag. "But playing multiple roles takes high IQ. That’s something Metellus has in spades. I’m not sure yet if we’re wrong about his skill set fitting — I thought Flores was the perfect DC to really find out whether Cine can be versatile. I still think that. If he can’t find his way on the field with Flores, we know what’s up. No blaming the DC."
There are 86 days until the season opener so there is no need to write the second-year safety off, but right now the arrow isn't pointing in the right direction.
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