"The Needle" - Cameron Dantzler

Buckley’s word on cornerbacks is damn near gospel. He set a Florida State record for interceptions while playing the position, then was the No. 5 overall pick in the 1992 NFL Draft. He played 14 years in the league, won a Super Bowl, then transitioned to coaching where he began at his alma mater and helped turn Xavier Rhodes into the star the Vikings drafted. Then he helped groom Jaire Alexander into the Packers’ shutdown corner who will line up against Adam Thielen in two weeks.

And, more recently, he recruited and coached a scrawny kid nicknamed “Needle” who showed up to college barely 150 pounds. Four years later, Dantzler is in line for plenty of playing time as a rookie after his first two weeks of practices with the Vikings made as big an impression as any first-year player.

So that was the surprise first brought up to Buckley. That Dantzler was making such an impact that he’s quickly climbing the depth chart.

“Well, he did the same thing in college,” Buckley said.

Receivers at Mississippi State thought they had a mismatch those early days because of Dantzler’s size. Needle, they joked, was a well-earned nickname. But they rarely came down with the ball. Dantzler outplayed other corners and soon was competing with upperclassmen. A broken ankle was the only reason he had to redshirt as a true freshman.

“But he was moving up the depth chart and I was like, ‘Oh my god, this young man is going to be pretty darn good,’” Buckley said.

Dantzler’s freshman year went fine, but it was as a sophomore, once he’d put on muscle and bulked up, that Dantzler really began to shine. And as a junior, Buckley and Mississippi State assigned him to the opposition’s best player.

That’s what put him on the Vikings’ radar. They like to carefully study how a prospect does in his toughest matchups. They drafted center Garrett Bradbury in the first round in 2019 because of how well he fared against Clemson. So when the Vikings first looked at Dantzler, they wanted to see how he’d do against LSU’s vaunted offense and specifically star wide receiver Ja’Marr Chase — the No. 4 prospect for the 2021 NFL Draft, according to The Athletic’s Dane Brugler.

That day, Chase only had 48 receiving yards. It was the only SEC regular-season game that Chase didn’t have at least 120 yards.

“I think the best corner in college football the last two years was Cameron,” Buckley said.

That’s why he expected Dantzler would be a first-round pick. Others he talked to in college football thought the same. Teams also liked that Dantzler was young, still just 21.

Before the scouting combine, Buckley went to watch Dantzler train. He knew that despite an impressive resume, teams still want to see prospects run fast in the 40-yard dash. He timed Dantzler’s 10-yard dash and 20-yard dash to see how he was getting off the blocks.

“They were matching 40-yard 4.4s and 4.5s,” Buckley said, referring to the seconds it would take to complete. “So when I left, I felt really good. At worst, I thought he was going to run a 4.5. That was at worst.”

Instead, Dantzler ran the 40-yard dash in 4.64 seconds. Who knows what actually happened. Dantzler didn’t want to talk about it — “I can’t dwell on the past,” he said. His agent said in the spring that Dantzler suffered a hamstring injury. He pulled out of other events at the scouting combine due to a quad injury. Maybe it was just an off day. Or maybe he just plays fast in pads. It’s all unclear. His agent also claimed he ran 4.38 at his self-made Pro Day, then sent out a video of that run to teams, including the Vikings.

That was enough to persuade Minnesota that Dantzler’s college plays could be trusted. They picked him in the third round, No. 89 overall.

“The only thing we didn’t like about him was his 40 time at the combine,” head coach Mike Zimmer said. “We thought he was a good player, he went out there and played well. Then when he ran a good time at his Pro Day, we got more intrigued by him. But, you know, he’s got great length and size, long arms. He’s been a pleasant surprise as far as the discipline that he plays with and understanding what we’re trying to do concept-wise, whether it be technique or zone coverage or man-to-man.”

He earned the praise of Thielen in practices after one pass breakup prompted the wide receiver to tell Zimmer that the Vikings got a good one in No. 27. And Dantzler made one of the best plays of training camp by soaring for an interception of Kirk Cousins.

Still, there’s plenty to improve upon. Mike Hughes and Holton Hill will almost certainly be two of the three corners in the Vikings’ nickel defense. Dantzler still has to outplay Gladney in the final few practices to earn that final spot.

“The speed of the game is very fast, way different from college,” Dantzler said. “They have better quarterbacks that can read keys, veteran receivers that run great routes, offensive linemen who are in great shape and they can come out and block the corner. Me just getting adjusted to the new game speed has been very exciting for me being out there and being able to run around.”

But it still bothers Buckley that Dantzler had the lower expectations that come with being a third-round pick and the contract that’s not quite as lucrative. Buckley insisted that Dantzler was one of the best corners in college. That his emergence in Vikings training camp should be no surprise.

The only surprise, he said, is that teams waited so long to draft him.

“He had a bad 40 time at the combine and then he goes from a first-round corner to a third-round corner which I think is bad scouting,” Buckley said. “The tape doesn’t lie. That should be the bottom line.”