Damarri
Mathis.
Damarri
Mathis.
Pittsburgh· 5'11"· 196 lb· 4.39s 40
"A press corner who spent five years at Pittsburgh learning to live on an island, then ran in the 4.3s in March and turned a patient evaluation into a Day 3 bet on traits."Pre-draft read
Mathis played boundary corner for Pitt and did it with his hands and his hips. He pressed at the line, got physical inside the first five yards and stayed attached down the sideline, trusting his long speed to carry him through the route rather than peeking for help.
The secondary trait was explosiveness. He was one of the twitchiest testers in the class and it showed in his transition out of a backpedal, letting him drive on comebacks and dig routes without gathering. He tackled willingly in run support from the edge and took on blocks instead of avoiding them. The signature was competitiveness at the catch point: he did not concede throws, which produced both breakups and flags.
Press-man defense that plays its outside corners on the line of scrimmage and asks them to travel with a receiver without bracket help.
Year 1: third outside corner and special teams contributor. Ceiling: full-time boundary starter in a man-heavy defense.
A pattern-match quarters defense that keeps its corners in off alignment and makes them read route combinations instead of the man in front of them.
Damarri Mathis senior highlights
His 2021 Pittsburgh tape, heavy on press reps and boundary coverage against ACC receivers.
Damarri Mathis rookie highlights
The 2022 Denver season in which he started eleven games as a fourth-round rookie.
Mathis came out of Pittsburgh as a fifth-year corner whose evaluation was a study in patience. He lettered as a true freshman, started ten games as a sophomore, lost an entire season to a preseason injury, and came back to start on an ACC championship defense. The football identity was press-man corner: aggressive, physical and comfortable on an island.
The production told a clean story. Eleven breakups and two interceptions in 2019, then 45 tackles, two interceptions and six breakups on the 2021 team, with a pick returned for a touchdown. Then came the testing. He ran in the 4.3s at the combine and posted a vertical over forty-three inches and an eleven-foot broad jump at his pro day, numbers that moved his name up boards in March. The flags were grabbiness downfield, a lost 2020 that cost development time, and a habit of playing through receivers rather than playing the ball.
Boards settled him in the third-to-fourth round range as a press corner with starter traits and technique to clean up. Denver, needing depth behind an expensive secondary, took him at 115 expecting a developmental outside corner and got a starter faster than planned.
- 01
Press technique
He was comfortable jamming at the line and re-routing receivers inside the five-yard window, which is the skill a man-heavy defense pays for.
- 02
Explosive testing
Forty times in the 4.3s plus a vertical past forty-three inches confirmed the twitch that showed in his transitions on tape.
- 03
Sideline coverage
He stayed attached down the boundary without needing safety help, trusting his speed rather than turning early to find the ball.
- 04
Willing run support
He took on blocks from the edge and tackled in space instead of avoiding contact, which kept him on the field on early downs.
- 05
Competitive resilience
He lost all of 2020 to a preseason injury and returned to start for an ACC champion, a durability and mentality box checked.
- 01
Grabby downfield
When a receiver got a step on him he reached rather than recovered, a habit that translates directly into penalties at the next level.
- 02
Ball location
He played the receiver's hands more than the football, which capped his interception totals despite consistently being in position.
- 03
Lost development year
The preseason injury that wiped out 2020 cost him a full season of reps against ACC competition at a technique-heavy position.
- 04
Zone processing
His experience was concentrated in man coverage, leaving open questions about pattern-matching and passing off routes in a spot-drop scheme.
— — — positional median (p50)
- 40 yd
- 4.39sp50
- Vertical
- —in
- Broad jump
- —in
- Three-cone
- —s
- Shuttle
- —s
- Bench
- —rep
| Yr | Team | G | Tkl | Sk | Int | PD | FF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | Pittsburgh | 9 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| 2018 | Pittsburgh | 14 | 18 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| 2019 | Pittsburgh | 13 | 23 | 0 | 2 | 11 | 0 |
| 2021 | Pittsburgh | 13 | 45 | 0 | 2 | 6 | 0 |
| Career | — | 49 | 88 | 0 | 5 | 19 | 0 |
2021 verified on cfbstats (Pittsburgh team 545, player 1088580), which credits 45 tackles where the school bio and draft services list 44; the cfbstats game log figure is used and the one-tackle gap is noted. 2017, 2018 and 2019 come from the official Pittsburgh bio because cfbstats does not publish those years for this player. 2020 is deliberately absent: he did not play in any game that season due to a preseason injury. Tackles for loss in 2017 and 2021, sacks in every season and fumble recoveries are not published by either source and are left unverified rather than counted as zero.
A dash means the figure is not published by a source we trust — never a zero we invented.
Broncos Day 3 corner who won a starting job early and then lost the runway to injuries.
Mid-round corner whose press comfort and athleticism turn into a long run of starting-caliber snaps.
Depth corner who bounces between rosters and practice squads on the back of special teams value.
Everything above is the pre-draft evaluation. This section is what actually happened — updated year over year.
Denver did not ease him in. Injuries in front of him opened the door and he started 11 of 16 games as a rookie in 2022, posting 65 combined tackles and seven passes defensed while playing almost seventy percent of the defensive snaps, the most anyone expected from a fourth-rounder that year. The role receded from there. A new coaching staff in 2023 moved him to a rotational job with six starts and 438 snaps, and 2024 was essentially lost: a preseason injured reserve stint, a mid-October activation, and only 80 defensive snaps across ten games. Denver let him go before the 2025 season, Carolina claimed him on waivers in August and placed him on injured reserve in September, and he signed with Cleveland in July 2026 before landing on injured reserve again in August.
In hindsight the pick returned its value early and then stalled for reasons that were half predictable and half not. The press traits played immediately and the penalty issues the evaluation flagged showed up in that rookie year. What actually broke the career arc was availability: three separate injured-reserve stints in four seasons kept him from ever consolidating the job he had already won.