Richard Sherman won an NFC title, then immediately got into it with Darrelle Revis online

Richard Sherman and Darrelle Revis are two of the best cornerbacks to take the field this millennium. They also don’t like each other very much.

Revis called out the 49ers cornerback after he got beat on a Davante Adams deep route late in a 37-20 NFC title game win over the Packers. That led a triumphant Sherman to respond after he’d marched back to the San Francisco locker room. Moments later, we had shutdown cornerback beef.

It all started here:

Revis’s criticism was rooted in the fact Sherman plays exclusively on the left side of the field (the quarterback’s right). He does not follow an opponent’s top wideout across the formation — he’s anchored to his sideline and latches onto whichever target is unlucky enough to roam into his territory. This is a strategy that works for Sherman and the 49ers, but it’s one that’s drawn criticism before. Deion Sanders had a similar message for Sherman back in 2014.

“First of all, I know this position. When you look up, ‘cornerback,’ you see me. There’s a picture of me. When I start talking about cornerbacks, there’s Darrelle Revis; Champ Bailey; (Antonio) Cromartie from the Jets; Joe Haden; and, of course, Patrick Peterson. They play both sides. They play every receiver.

“But with Sherman, I said, ‘Let me take a look at this guy who is only playing left corner and making all this noise. And what I found out was, he’s not as athletic as Patrick Peterson; he’s not quick and doesn’t come out of breaks like Champ Bailey. But the guy is smart. He studies his butt off. And the reason I know that is the anticipation I saw him make on a couple of plays comes from studying, not from skill. But he’s got a tremendous amount of skill as well.”

That meant Sherman had already heard this complaint from a legendary cornerback. He was also intimately familiar with Revis’s trash talk. The two top corners spent much of 2013 publicly disliking each other.

As such, he was prepared to fire back to a tweet he hadn’t even been tagged in.

Sherman is an elite cornerback at age 31. He was Pro Football Focus’s top-rated corner of 2019 and named the organization’s top cornerback of the decade. NFL’s Next Gen Stats paint him in a less flattering light, rating him 19th in man coverage among CBs and 45th in zone coverage. Either way, he’s been a crucial part of San Francisco’s turnaround from the No. 2 overall pick last spring to the Super Bowl eight months later.

Revis’s ninth season in the NFL was pretty good, though — as he pointed out in his response to the Niners’ defensive back Sunday night.

Revis spent 2015 with the Jets, which also happens to be the first year SIS’s advanced stats took root. Their data suggests he allowed just 30 completions on 74 targets (6.1 yards per target) and gave up three passing touchdowns to his five INTs. He had a 46.7 passer rating allowed in his ninth season as a pro. Sherman’s passer rating allowed in his ninth season, per SIS, was 55.8 — though he was thrown at only 3.3 times per game to Revis’s 5.3.

Moments later, Sherman realized the real flaw in Revis’s opening salvo. He fired back as needed.

He wasn’t content to stand down after this grammar burn. Sherman’s next response took a shot at one of Revis’s relative strengths.

This was an odd counterpunch from Sherman. Revis had three interceptions in 10 postseason games (0.33 per game). The 49ers’ corner picked off Aaron Rodgers’ desperation deep ball late in the fourth quarter Sunday to give him four in 14 playoff appearances (0.29 per game). Revis also has one Super Bowl ring — the same number as Sherman, who’ll have another chance to win one at Super Bowl 54 — and won his at the expense of Sherman’s Seahawks in 2015.

This was the point where Revis excused himself from the conversation by praising Sherman’s play, then chiding him for not doing enough on the field.

Then, after bowing out of the exchange, Revis dropped his most regrettable tweet of the night.

Ummm ... 26 percent fresh. Gross. Sherman took one last shot at Revis in response to an earlier tweet:

Then spent the rest of his night pumping up his teammates and soaking up some Super Bowl hype.

No one? Revis fired a shot by picking out a rare instance of Sherman getting beat — not by some scrub, but by a wideout who’d dismantled the Seahawks in the Divisional Round a week before. He did so late in a game the 49ers were winning by multiple touchdowns. It was a weird flex.

Sherman pounced back with some inaccurate insults about the former All-Pro’s credentials. Really, the only unimpeachable blow here was Sherman casting a +1 grammar burn on his retired counterpart.

They were both very good and will likely each get their own Hall of Fame busts. Isn’t that enough?

Dammit. Let’s stack up credentials:

All-Pro honors

Pro Bowl honors

Career interceptions

Career passes defensed

Super Bowl victories

Career earnings to date

Revis used a higher draft slot and a healthier jump into free agency to out-earn Sherman, who will make a shade under $9 million next season before incentives. He also knocked down more passes than Sherman, but was also targeted more often — something that makes the former Seahawk’s higher interception rate all the more impressive. And while Sherman holds the lead in Super Bowl appearances, Revis helped get Mark Sanchez to back-to-back AFC title games, which has to be worth something.

All things considered, both were game-breaking cornerbacks. Revis was better at shadowing opponents’ WR1s, but saw more passes thrown his way (and got burned more often) as a result. Sherman has been a lockdown corner throughout his career and may be the best player in NFL history when it comes to turning targets into turnovers. He’s also often had a stronger supporting cast (hello, Legion of Boom) that allowed him to settle in on the left sideline rather than remain glued to opponents’ top options.

I dunno, man. Turns out they’re both great.