Should defenses fear Percy Harvin?

[Prime Time]

Defenses should be bracing for a full dose of Percy Harvin
Posted by Mike Florio on August 25, 2014, 8:20 PM EDT
http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.co...d-be-bracing-for-a-full-dose-of-percy-harvin/



Last year, the NFL got only a brief glimpse of receiver Percy Harvin before February. Then came the Super Bowl, and Harvin arguably would have been the game’s MVP if the defense hadn’t instantly dominated Denver.

This year, with Harvin as healthy as he’s been in years, Harvin could reprise the man-among-inanimate-objects routine on a regular basis.

“He’s a tremendous threat,” Carroll told reporters regarding Harvin on Monday. “You can feel his speed and that burst that he has, really challenges you. You don’t know if he going to go all the way so just the opportunity to give them that problem makes them stay up a little later, trying figuring out how to stop him. That’s good because it helps everything else. Really good players have always helped other guys play well. I think Percy’s factor could be one that really does help other guys also. It won’t always be his stats and numbers and that. And he’s fine about that. He’s got a great attitude about helping. . . .

“We don’t have any doubt, what we want to do and what he’s capable of doing. We are really, really excited about it.”

The Seahawks discovered at some point before Super Bowl XLVIII that Harvin’s explosiveness serves the offense particularly well by putting him in motion before the snap. If he gets the handoff, it’s off to the races, with Usain Bolt facing off against Tony Siragusa. If Harvin doesn’t get the ball, the defense nevertheless will have to adjust after the simultaneous pucker that comes from thinking Harvin will be zipping away.

Teams that can get within hitting distance of Harvin will defend him the way the Saints did — by hitting him as hard as possible in the hopes of rattling him or knocking him out of the game. (Bounties or not, a real incentive exists to put truly dominant players on the sidelines.) Which means that it will be wise for the Seahawks to be careful with how they use him.

This all assumes that defense can keep up with him. Based on what happened in the Super Bowl, there’s a chance that opposing defenses will spend most of their time running through the place where Harvin just was.

 

[mr.stlouis]

As much as they should fear Tavon...

 

[RamzFanz]

I fear him.

I hope he has another uterus injury.

 

[-X-]

Of course you should.

 

[Rams and Gators]

He'll be injured by the time we play them anyway.

 

[Mackeyser]

Here's the thing. I suffer daily migraines. So I can commiserate with a fellow migraine sufferer. They don't happen daily, necessarily, some last several days, but you all get the point. Not a day goes by without one. Thing is, even before they started being an every day deal, they just...came on. You try to nail down the triggers, you watch diet, stress, allergies... it's enough to make you freakin' paranoid. Every hippy friend and acquaintance you've ever known will give you every crazy idea and every supplement to try you can imagine.

Am I worried about him? Sure. he's a tremendous ball player.

Unfortunately for him, he's also a migraine sufferer and those give exactly zero F's who you are or what you have to do when they decide to show up and wreck your day (sort of like in-laws...) He's also had other injury issues. And... he's high maintenance. Now, maybe it just wasn't a fit in Minny, I dunno. I wasn't there. But enough people said enough things that...he's a duck.

If he's everything they hope him to be and none of the distraction or health risk, then he more than replaces Golden Taint. I just don't think he'll be that for the whole season.

Hey may be that for our first meeting, unfortunately. So, we'll just have to match them, rocket for rocket...