Eli Apple, CB, New Orleans Saints
A reuccuring theme with this piece is this: Former first round selections looking to finally put it together in the NFL. Eli Apple is another such player. Drafted tenth overall by the New York Giants in the 2016 NFL Draft, Apple never really made it work in the Big Apple (pun intended). He started 11 games as a rookie in 2016, including the last ten games of the season, and notched one interception and seven pass breakups.
He entered the 2017 campaign slotted as the team’s starting cornerback opposite Janoris Jenkins. But the season quickly went south. He was benched for the bulk of the Giants’ Week 5 loss to the Los Angeles Chargers, and disciplinary reasons were cited. After struggling against the San Francisco 49ers in Week 10, he was a healthy scratch the next four weeks. While on the sideline during New York’s Week 14 loss to their rivals the Dallas Cowboys, Apple was firing off some Tweets during the game, which led to more discipline from the team. The situation got so precarious that Giants’ safety Landon Collins called him a “cancer” and argued that Apple should not even be on the roster in 2018.
Collins got his wish. Prior to the trading deadline in 2018, Apple was shipped to the New Orleans Saints for a fourth round pick in 2019 and a seventh round pick in 2020.
While in New Orleans, Apple has been more of a model citizen and solid cornerback option. He was almost perfect as a press coverage corner in 2019. According to charting data from Pro Football Focus, Apple’s 0.87 yards allowed per coverage snap in press during the 2019 season was 13th-best in the NFL. He has the size and length to be a true press cornerback in the NFL and with 4.4 speed, he can be the boundary type corner a defense builds its secondary around. He only turns 25 in training camp, so a team that is looking to build a press coverage defense and is willing to look past some of his red flags from his time in New York could be finding quite the diamond in the rough.