When it became apparent that cornerback Bryce Callahan (foot) wouldn’t be healthy for at least the first few weeks of the season, the Broncos named Isaac Yiadom a starter at cornerback across from Chris Harris.
Yiadom struggled in coverage and he was eventually benched in favor of De’Vante Bausby, who played well before suffering a cervical sprain against the Chargers. After Bausby left Sunday’s game, he was replaced by Yiadom.
Yiadom played so poorly that he was benched yet again in favor of Davontae Harris, the team’s fifth-string cornerback who played in just three regular season games before arriving in Denver earlier this year.
The Broncos appear to have a depth problem at cornerback but there may not be any notable players available who could improve the secondary. During his press conference Monday, coach Vic Fangio seemed to indicate that the team will have to make things work with players already on the roster.
“We’ll look, but we’ve got Davontae who played yesterday and we still have Ike [Yiadom], so we’ll see,” Fangio said when asked if the team might add another cornerback. “I’m sure we’ll look, but not a lot available right now.”
Fangio believes Harris will perform better against the Titans in Week 6 after a full week of practice. It sounds like Harris might have a chance to jump Yiadom on the depth chart with Bausby sidelined.
“Hopefully, if we decided to play him some more this week, he’ll get more practice time on the field than whereas the last few weeks ‘Baus’ and ‘Ike’ have been getting the bulk of the practice time there,” Fangio said. “We’ll amp his practice time more.”
One possible solution for the Broncos would be to move Duke Dawson to cornerback and have Kareem Jackson play nickelback. But Fangio would prefer to keep Dawson at nickel and have Jackson continue playing at safety, where he excelled in Los Angeles.
“We’re hoping he can come along, because if he does, it allows us to play Kareem at safety, which is where I would prefer to play Kareem,” Fangio said on Sunday. “Hopefully he can keep coming along. I don’t think he played a [completely] clean game today, but he was out there a lot and we played really good defense. He deserves his credit.”
Right now, Denver’s secondary depth chart appears to be Justin Simmons and Jackson at safety, C. Harris and D. Harris at cornerback and Dawson at nickelback. Callahan would be a much-welcomed addition if he’s able to get healthy at some point this season.
