Dolphins second-year man Sean Smith has reclaimed the starting cornerback job he lost to former first-round pick Jason Allen a few weeks ago. When the Miami Herald’s Armando Salguero asked Smith if he was starting this week, Smith replied, "I'm back; I can't wait to get out there and make some plays."
Apparently, this personnel change is more about Smith’s performance in practice than Allen’s performance in games. Allen has been decent – he leads the team with three interceptions – though, as Pittsburgh’s Mike Wallace proved last week, the converted safety can, at times, be vulnerable in single coverage.
Smith does not have the most fluid hips, which gives him problem against quick-breaking receivers. However, he is tall, long-armed and, when all is going well, physical.
Smith’s promotion comes the same week Miami faces Cincinnati’s Chad Ochocinco and Terrell Owens. Expect Smith, with his physical style, to match up against the 6’3” Owens. Ochocinco generally draws the opposing team’s top corner (in Miami’s case, Vontae Davis). In fact, Ocho already talked with the South Florida media this week about facing Davis.
“Regardless of how long I’ve been playing, what I’ve done in the past, by going against a corner like this, it lets me know where I am, as far as still being an elite receiver,” Ochocinco said. “When you watch Vontae play, and you see someone like himself put himself in position every time to at least make a play on the ball, that puts you in that upper echelon of cornerbacks, and that’s what I see in him. So I’m looking forward to that and really gauging myself, and it will tell me where my game is.”
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