Moore's great claim to fame is breaking up a crucial pass after he was already beaten on it. Just bear that in mind, please, in any excitement about him.
Yeah...why should we be excited about a football player that looked good at times?
Your statement is true, besides the following big plays and comments:
per Pro Football Reference
1. He had double digit passes defended (10) passes defended in only 6 games started.
In comparison, Devin McCourty's Pro-Bowl year of 2010 netted him a total of 17. He started and played in 17 games.
McCourty had 12 this yr. Arrington had 13 this yr. Both played in almost every game (DMcC missed 2). Again...Moore had 10 in only 6 games started, including the playoffs.
2. Moore LED the team with passes defended in each and ALL of the 3 playoff games.
2 vs DEN
2 vs BAL
2 vs NYG
3. Moore broke up consecutive back to back passes to end the AFFCG (to end their drive and set up the game ending missed FG),
BOTH extremely important. Without this, we don't even go to the SB, as they would've scored to go up 27-23 with less than :10 seconds left. One was a diving attempt where he batted the ball away, and the play before was the one where he stripped the ball from Lee Evens.
4. Moore caused the fumble by himself, forcing Cruz to caugh up the ball in the Super Bowl. Sadly, there were 12 men on the play, and it was ruled no play. Again, he's showing big play capability, and it could've been the game changer.
5. He picked off 2 balls, and showed great ball hawking skills in the process in the BUF game. He was close to the ball and the WR both times, stepping inside the WR's catching motion on the one, and practically taking it right out of his hands on the second one.
6. He also scored a defensive TD on the 2nd INT in BUF, another big play. I'd say when you return an INT for a TD in your rookie year, it's considered a big play.
If you didn't see improved pass coverage from Sterling Moore, as opposed to the other CB's, let alone big play capabilities and potential, then I don't know what you were watching.
Sure, there were times when he was out of position, or allowed a completed pass. Then again, he was a rookie. I don't know what you have to do on this team to earn any kind of positive respect sometimes. No, he's not the 2nd coming of Darrelle Revis, but he showed a lot of moxy and pretty good coverage skills in the limited time that we saw him.
Here's another decent quote regarding Moore's playoff play that I found:
"Kyle Arrington was able to post a +3.2 rating, but no other defensive back who played at least 25% of the team’s snaps posted a positive rating. After only playing 52 snaps in the regular season Sterling Moore was able to post a +3.8 rating in the postseason, but I doubt the Patriots will trust him enough to just hand him the starting position." (PFF)
