New York Jets’ 2019 season in review: Bless Austin

New York Jets young cornerback Bless Austin put forth a nice rookie campaign in 2019. Today, Michael Nania breaks it down. Career recap: The New York Jets took Bless Austin with the 196th overall pick in the sixth round of the 2019 Draft, while Mike Maccagnan was still at the helm. Austin, a native of Queens, was putting together a promising reel of tape at Rutgers before injuries derailed his career. His 2017 junior season was cut short after four games due to an ACL injury. Another knee injury occurring in the 2018 season opener limited his senior year to one game. Austin came into the draft as a lean, long corner who had shown legitimately exciting cover potential with the Scarlet Knights, but his medical red flags made him an extreme risk. Thus, he fell to the Jets as the ultimate dice-roll in Round 6. 2019 expectations: While the Jets were dealing with a crisis at the cornerback position throughout the 2019 offseason, opening the competition up to anybody with a pulse, Austin was unable to make a claim for a roster spot as he was still recovering from his previous injury. Austin began the season on the reserve/non-football injury list, meaning he was not eligible to practice with the team until Week 7 or be moved to the active roster until Week 10. Positives: It seemed that 2019 would essentially be a redshirt season for the rookie, but that did not turn out to be the case. Austin was promoted to the active roster as soon as he was eligible, backing up Nate Hairston and Arthur Maulet against the Giants in Week 10. After Hairston was torched to start the game, Austin took over for the remainder of the afternoon, and would become a core piece of the secondary from there on out. From Week 10 through the end of the season, Austin played 388 defensive snaps, fourth-most among all Jets defenders and tops among cornerbacks. Austin provided the Jets with the competency on the outside that they had been dying for. He finished the season with an overall Pro Football Focus grade of 71.4, which ranked 27th out of 119 qualified cornerbacks (300+ defensive snaps). In coverage, Austin stayed mostly quiet throughout his extended action. He was credited with allowing 1.0 yard per cover snap, second-best among Jets cornerbacks (behind Brian Poole) and 31st out of 112 qualified cornerbacks (200+ snaps in coverage). Gregg Williams did his best to hide the inexperienced cornerbacks on the outside, playing a lot of Cover-3 looks that took the pressure off of them to handle man-to-man matchups. Austin did a great job executing the responsibilities placed upon him. Playing the deep third on this play, Austin does not bite on the double move, and then fluidly flips his hips and runs with the receiver stride-for-stride upfield. Dwayne Haskins eyed Austin's man down for a good few seconds, ready to pull the trigger, but eventually decided not to take the shot, due much in part to the tightness of Austin's coverage. Haskins rolls out and throws the ball away under pressure. Here, Austin gets it done in man coverage. The Raiders go with a max protection and run a one-man route. Two tight ends, a fullback, and the running back hang in and block, while Tyrell Williams runs a post from the left side. Austin is responsible for Williams. He sticks tight to Williams' back hip and funnels him inside to the safety (Marcus Maye), closing any window for Derek Carr to make the throw. Jamal Adams and Brandon Copeland pick up the sack. Austin is aggressive coming downhill, coupling that mentality with his 85th-percentile arm length to make a lot of plays on the ball. Here, Austin flips outside and breaks hard on the out route, preventing the receiver from coming down in-bounds. An outstanding play by Austin here. On 3rd & 17, Austin opens up to the outside against Kelvin Harmon, playing the go route. Harmon breaks inside, and Austin recovers beautifully. He flips his hips back towards the inside, breaking directly to the catch point and using every inch of those long arms to record the breakup just shy of the marker. You often hear the term "fluid hips" mentioned as one of the most important traits that a cornerback needs to be successful. Austin flashed this skill brightly throughout his rookie season, including the three plays above and plenty more seen below. This play may have been Austin's best of the season. He shows great awareness to crash down on Hunter Renfrow's flat route, arriving at the perfect time to break up the pass and force a field goal attempt. Bone-shattering hit. As you saw glimpses of above, Austin has strong click-and-close ability, accelerating downhill quickly and showing the adaptability to finish in a variety of ways. Here, Austin passes off the corner route and pivots outside, driving and finishing low to cut down 260-pound C.J. Uzomah for a two-yard gain on first down. To boot, it is another good display of Austin's hip fluidity. More of the same. Austin comes down from his zone and goes low to drop 250-pound Foster Moreau for a three-yard first-down gain. Care for another tight end takedown? This time, it's Washington's Hale Hentges. Austin's coverage responsibilities did not allow for him to make a boatload of plays against the run, but he was an efficient contributor in that phase when called upon. Austin's PFF run-defense grade of 72.8 ranked 26th out of 119 qualified cornerbacks. He also was not credited with missing a single tackle against the run — his total of seven-run tackles without a miss was tied for the 11th-most among cornerbacks. The kid from Queens had got that New York hustle in him. Watch Austin here as he darts all the way across the field to save a Joe Mixon touchdown. On this 4th & 1 fullback dive by the Raiders, Marcus Maye gets the party started, but Alec Ingold gets enough forward momentum to put himself on the path to a conversion. Austin comes in late and saves the day, sticking his helmet into the ribs of Ingold to stop him just shy of the marker. Negatives: Austin had a rough finish to his rookie season after a hot start. From Weeks 10-13, Austin allowed just 77 yards on 21 targets, a measly average of 3.7 per target that ranked second-best over that span behind only Shaquill Griffin (2.8). Over the same span, Austin allowed the sixth-fewest yards per cover snap (0.55) out of 66 qualified cornerbacks. Things took a downturn for Austin over the season's final quarter. From Weeks 14-16, Austin yielded 160 yards on 13 targets, an abysmal average of 12.3 yards per target. Austin ranked 64th out of 73 qualified cornerbacks in yards allowed per cover snap (1.67) over that span. Austin had an egregious blunder against Pittsburgh in Week 16, leading to his benching over the remainder of that game and the entirety of the season finale in Buffalo. The Steelers had the ball at the Jets' 29-yard line with nine seconds left in the first half. All the defensive backfield needs to do is prevent anything over the top, but Austin messes up big time. He inexplicably lines up to the inside of Diontae Johnson, and then makes matters even worse by opening up to the outside. Johnson gets a free lane to a touchdown. Considering that Gregg Williams benched Austin for the rest of the season after that play, it seems fair to wonder whether Austin freelanced on that rep. Austin had been playing well, and there was nothing reported on the injury front, so the benching was a surprising move even after a play as bad as that one. It would take something big to warrant a move like that. Since it is hard to imagine any defensive coach would ask their cornerback to play that technique in that situation, it does seem likely that Austin went off-script and thus was given a harsh punishment by his famously stern coach. I still think it would have been better to let Austin play through the mistake, and at least give him the chance to return to the starting lineup in Buffalo, but I can see the logic behind Williams' decision. Whatever message Williams was trying to get across, Austin certainly received loud and clear. He will come into his second season with a huge chip on his shoulder after what went down in late December. Austin had a tough game against Miami in Week 14, allowing five catches on seven targets for 69 yards and three first downs. Isaiah Ford gave Austin trouble, beating him for 42 yards and three first downs over three targets. Here, Austin lines up in an unnatural position, covering man-to-man out of the slot. Predictably, he is no match for Ford, who wins easily on the slant. Austin drops too far down from his zone, allowing Ryan Fitzpatrick to loft the ball to Ford over the top. Even so, his top-notch length still brought him within a hair of deflecting the pass. While Austin made a good number of impressive tackles in the passing game, he did struggle with the occasional whiff. Austin was credited with four missed tackles in the passing game against his 17 tackles, a 19% missed tackle rate that ranked ninth-worst out of 120 qualified cornerbacks. On this play, Austin gets juked out by Adrian Peterson and allows him to squeak out some extra yardage up the sideline. 2020 Outlook: Just getting on the field made Austin's rookie season a success. Starting six games, staying healthy throughout all of them, and playing at an elite level in spurts? That was all sweet, sweet gravy. Austin has exciting potential. His length, awareness, acceleration, fluid hips, and downhill finishing ability all inspire the confidence that he could become a special player in the league. On this Jets team, Austin will get every opportunity to recapture his role as a starter on the outside. And that will be the primary goal for him going into the summer — to get that starting job back. I believe Austin has the potential to become a great corner, but all the Jets need from him is competency. If Austin can develop into an average starting outside cornerback, he would be a tremendous value at the spot he was drafted. Even if he merely proves to be a good backup, that would be a win. Set for cap hits of just $625K, $715K, and $805K over the next three seasons, anything positive that Austin provides is valuable. Health is a key factor for Austin. He was able to escape 2019 unscathed, a phenomenal way to kick off his professional career after what he went through over his final two college seasons. Can he continue to stay on the field? Or will his medical red flags resurface? It has been a long time since the Jets have watched one of their Day 3 draft picks develop into a star — or even just a multi-year solid starter. Watch out for Austin to break the curse.