The Offensive Line Thread

[Morneblade]

6 hours ago, KDawg said:

PFF rankings mean literally zero.

 

You have something better?

 

So you think Lauvao is a decent player?

 

 

[Gallen5862]

OT Ereck Flowers was cut by the NY Giants. Should the Redskins see if they can get the former first round pick as a reclaimation project?

[wolfsire]

I think strength and conditioning needs to improve. Our O-line looked like women trying to block men this past monday night. 

[mojo]

I wouldn’t argue if we looked at trading Trent in the offseason.  Yes, he’s still an elite tackle but we are a long way from being a true contender and he is older and injured every year.  A team on the cusp would be willing to give us a solid haul for him and maybe it’s time we try recouping picks for players on the decline instead of giving away picks for them.

[RandyHolt]

Why can't develop interior OL for ****. Chase aside...  Callahan has done good things here but feel like we have plateaued under his guidance.  I suspect his best value to the team may be via Jay trusting someone to delegate to, and get input from in running the offense.

[KDawg]

14 hours ago, megared said:

 

Disagree.  If you're going to say that you literally need to know every player's assignment on every play I'd agree.  But if you're analyzing hundreds of plays for a given guy, the trend of whether they are winning/losing does tell a story about how good they are comparatively to other players at the same position.   And if that's the criteria you're sticking to, even coaches can't watch players of other teams and grade them either.   

 

Although we really don't need them to know that Trent and Schreff are our best linemen.  And that our LG and C positions are the weak link.  

 

Analyzing hundreds and hundreds of plays is part of putting out a great product. Their grading system, on its face, is okay. But in all actuality they don't mean a whole heck of a lot. 5 plays that they assign blame to someone who shouldn't have it skews their ranking quite a bit. 

 

Williams and Scherff are our two best. The rest are what they are. You don't need PFF to show that.

 

9 hours ago, Morneblade said:

 

You have something better?

 

So you think Lauvao is a decent player?

 

 

 

Yes, I have something better: I coached football for 13 years... 12 of the 13 as an offensive line/TE coach at the HS and college level.

 

I think Lauvao is better than most think he is. But I'm not arguing he's some kind of savior. I think you guys are missing a key piece in this conversation when I say Lauvao being out is hurting us.

 

Offensive line play is NOT just about individual player skill. I'd argue the offensive line is the spot on the field that is most contingent on cohesion. There's not a single spot on the field that working together matters more than the offensive line.

 

Like Lauvao or not, he's played with the majority of that line for a few years now. Next to Trent for a few years now. 

 

When he went down, it forced an offensive line change. Some guys can come right in and not miss much of a beat... Others struggle. But when he went down it left a HUGE void in the line. Not because he's an all-pro. But because of the fact he's played along side those guys for years now. And he was the starting LG through camp as well. 

 

When he went down, I was an advocate of putting one of our backups at LG and keeping Roullier at center to keep some continuity on the line. 80% is better than 60%. In moving Roullier it showed us a few things: 1) we didn't want to move Trent inside for some reason. 2) The team has no confidence in anyone else at playing LG. 3) We're very thin at the offensive line.

 

Now the team isn't just dealing with a change in left guard, but in center as well. The argument can be made that Roullier was on the line already so him moving a spot over isn't entirely different. I'd wholeheartedly disagree with that statement. Yes, he has some game experience with those guys (which is valuable) but LG is not the same as center no matter how you slice it. And Bergstrom at center changes a whole lot of dynamics up front. Missed protections aren't always indicative of the person who looks to be the culprit. Scherff missed bad on the one sack. That may have been on him. Generally speaking you should be protecting your inside gap first. But there's a chance that he thought the protection was going the other way and he was protecting outside in. Who do you assign blame to in that situation if you're grading them? I have no idea what protection was called or what was communicated. Scherff may have missed. Or Bergstrom may have borked the communication on the protection call. There's no way to know that.

 

But since Lauvao has gone down I've seen a line that looks much more confused. Sure, that could be a coincidence, but it jives with what I've seen for the last few years with Lauvao in there (when the other starters are healthy). They play better when their guards are in tact. In a way, those two guards are more important than any position for continuity because they are the "middle man" on the line. Center is important, too, but good guards can cover a poor center a bit, in my opinion. 

 

Basically, your tackles need to be the most skilled linemen. Your guards need to be the most consistent and smart. Your center needs to be aware of line calls and defensive fronts.

 

To sum it up... TL;DR:

 

Lauvao is decent. Lauvao's impact isn't necessarily based on skill, but rather cohesion. Bergstrom isn't very good. Not sure if the issues from LG > C > RG are communication or poor decisions due to a lack of knowing the scheme/calls. 

[JoggingGod]

Callahan is so overrated. He gets credit for developing first round talents. Whoop de doo, Zack Martin and Brandon Scherff, two top OL prospects, are good. What about how Moses is struggling mightily right now and how our other OL acquisitions have busted. 

[megared]

3 hours ago, KDawg said:

 

Analyzing hundreds and hundreds of plays is part of putting out a great product. Their grading system, on its face, is okay. But in all actuality they don't mean a whole heck of a lot. 5 plays that they assign blame to someone who shouldn't have it skews their ranking quite a bit. 

 

Williams and Scherff are our two best. The rest are what they are. You don't need PFF to show that.

 

Sure it does...from that you can draw comparative analysis. 

 

Player	Position	Team	Score	Unit         Rank	Ind  Rank	Avg Pos Score
Trent Williams	LT	Redskins	78.7	8	5	64.7
Chase Roullier	LG	Redskins	57.8	8	21	64.9
Ton Bergstrom	C	Redskins	55.1	8	26	68.4
Brandon Scherff	RG	Redskins	75.3	8	6	60.4
Morgan Moses	RT	Redskins	70.5	8	9	64.1

 

There's nothing else out there comparable to the level of information you can get on linemen.  More specific, just how bad are Roullier and Bergstrom?  This gives us a better idea.

[CTskin]

@KDawg Although I disagree with your opinion about PFF, you couldn't have been any more dead on in your previous post. A couple of times there were obvious miscommunications or misunderstandings between Bergstrom and Roullier. As bad as Bergstrom was at LG, we need to move him back. I know that Ty is a bit too tall for interior line, but he seems to have lost a step and should give it a shot. He's a house, he can't be worse than Bergstrom.

 

Still, what we're seeing is what I believe to be a reflection on Callahan. If I were DC for the Panthers, it would not take a whole lot of tape watching to figure out that our OL is absolutely duped by stunts. Teams only need to send four to get consistent pressures/sacks. It's getting to be tough to watch as our "great OL with a great OL coach" is constantly worked by a 4-man rush and then on the other side our "Alabama Wall and apparently sub-par Kerrigan and Smith" get zero pressure when they rush 4 against poor OLs. We're either vastly overrating our own talent or it's the coaching to blame. Manusky needs to get creative and aggressive. He's never doing anything to confuse opposing offenses, always so vanilla... and somehow even in this bland scheme our guys are the ones getting confused.

[Morneblade]

3 hours ago, KDawg said:

 

Analyzing hundreds and hundreds of plays is part of putting out a great product. Their grading system, on its face, is okay. But in all actuality they don't mean a whole heck of a lot. 5 plays that they assign blame to someone who shouldn't have it skews their ranking quite a bit. 

 

Williams and Scherff are our two best. The rest are what they are. You don't need PFF to show that.

 

 

Yes, I have something better: I coached football for 13 years... 12 of the 13 as an offensive line/TE coach at the HS and college level.

 

I think Lauvao is better than most think he is. But I'm not arguing he's some kind of savior. I think you guys are missing a key piece in this conversation when I say Lauvao being out is hurting us.

 

Offensive line play is NOT just about individual player skill. I'd argue the offensive line is the spot on the field that is most contingent on cohesion. There's not a single spot on the field that working together matters more than the offensive line.

 

Like Lauvao or not, he's played with the majority of that line for a few years now. Next to Trent for a few years now. 

 

When he went down, it forced an offensive line change. Some guys can come right in and not miss much of a beat... Others struggle. But when he went down it left a HUGE void in the line. Not because he's an all-pro. But because of the fact he's played along side those guys for years now. And he was the starting LG through camp as well. 

 

When he went down, I was an advocate of putting one of our backups at LG and keeping Roullier at center to keep some continuity on the line. 80% is better than 60%. In moving Roullier it showed us a few things: 1) we didn't want to move Trent inside for some reason. 2) The team has no confidence in anyone else at playing LG. 3) We're very thin at the offensive line.

 

Now the team isn't just dealing with a change in left guard, but in center as well. The argument can be made that Roullier was on the line already so him moving a spot over isn't entirely different. I'd wholeheartedly disagree with that statement. Yes, he has some game experience with those guys (which is valuable) but LG is not the same as center no matter how you slice it. And Bergstrom at center changes a whole lot of dynamics up front. Missed protections aren't always indicative of the person who looks to be the culprit. Scherff missed bad on the one sack. That may have been on him. Generally speaking you should be protecting your inside gap first. But there's a chance that he thought the protection was going the other way and he was protecting outside in. Who do you assign blame to in that situation if you're grading them? I have no idea what protection was called or what was communicated. Scherff may have missed. Or Bergstrom may have borked the communication on the protection call. There's no way to know that.

 

But since Lauvao has gone down I've seen a line that looks much more confused. Sure, that could be a coincidence, but it jives with what I've seen for the last few years with Lauvao in there (when the other starters are healthy). They play better when their guards are in tact. In a way, those two guards are more important than any position for continuity because they are the "middle man" on the line. Center is important, too, but good guards can cover a poor center a bit, in my opinion. 

 

Basically, your tackles need to be the most skilled linemen. Your guards need to be the most consistent and smart. Your center needs to be aware of line calls and defensive fronts.

 

To sum it up... TL;DR:

 

Lauvao is decent. Lauvao's impact isn't necessarily based on skill, but rather cohesion. Bergstrom isn't very good. Not sure if the issues from LG > C > RG are communication or poor decisions due to a lack of knowing the scheme/calls. 

 

 

Well, that's one way to completely avoid the question.

 

First let me say, that OF COURSE the OL relies on cohesion, and when you mess with that it affects the whole line. I completely, agree, understand and completely disagree with the move that put Roullier at G and Bergstrom at C.

 

But, that does not mean that Lauvao doesn't suck. He's terrible in pass pro, and not a lot better in run blocking. And, to your point about cohesion on the OL, he's always ****ing hurt. So, by deciding to go with Lauvao, you are automatically going to have a cohesion issue, because he's going down at some point. It's not a "if", it's a "when". And rather than building cohesion with another player that might not actually get hurt, this hurts our OL. Not even looking at the fact that he's really bad when he is in there.

 

But going back to just whether or not he's a good player, regardless of the fact that he can't stay healthy, and will always ruin the cohesion of the OL with his injuries, he sucks. He should not be here. Move on, and never look back from that guy.

[KDawg]

I think you're completely misreading my analysis on Lauvao. He's decent. NFL caliber. I disagree with your assessment of his run blocking. I am much more inclined to agree with your assessment on pass pro.

 

And I wholeheartedly agree with your assessment of him being always injured and thus creating a hole on the line.In the OP, I actually said we needed a new LG. Why? Because Lauvao isn't cutting it if not for anything else it's due to his absence.

 

Re-signing him was a mistake in the sense that it made him the de facto LG. Which is fine... if he was healthy. But he took snaps at LG when someone... almost anyone else... could have taken snaps there and began to develop that cohesion with the OL. 

 

I don't know if I could have made that more clear. Not sure why you feel like I avoided anything there.

[Morneblade]

4 minutes ago, KDawg said:

I think you're completely misreading my analysis on Lauvao. He's decent. NFL caliber. I disagree with your assessment of his run blocking. I am much more inclined to agree with your assessment on pass pro.

 

And I wholeheartedly agree with your assessment of him being always injured and thus creating a hole on the line.In the OP, I actually said we needed a new LG. Why? Because Lauvao isn't cutting it if not for anything else it's due to his absence.

 

Re-signing him was a mistake in the sense that it made him the de facto LG. Which is fine... if he was healthy. But he took snaps at LG when someone... almost anyone else... could have taken snaps there and began to develop that cohesion with the OL. 

 

I don't know if I could have made that more clear. Not sure why you feel like I avoided anything there.

 

I guess because you're supporting a guy that does the worst think you can do for a OL, create confusion by being absent. Most of your comment was on OL needing to be a unit, and Lauvao hasn't started all 16 games since 2012. So, your linchpin argument for having him gets thrown out the window just because of that. And none of that was in your post.

 

I've been here long enough to know your coaching background, and for the most part, we are lock, stock and barrel on the importance of the OL, and have been for years.

 

That and we disagree about just how good a healthy Lauvao actually is. I think we can easily upgrade with a guy that is a little below average. Not average, not good, but just slightly below average.

[KDawg]

1 minute ago, Morneblade said:

 

I guess because you're supporting a guy that does the worst think you can do for a OL, create confusion by being absent. Most of your comment was on OL needing to be a unit, and Lauvao hasn't started all 16 games since 2012. So, your linchpin argument for having him gets thrown out the window just because of that. And none of that was in your post.

 

I've been here long enough to know your coaching background, and for the most part, we are lock, stock and barrel on the importance of the OL, and have been for years.

 

That and we disagree about just how good a healthy Lauvao actually is. I think we can easily upgrade with a guy that is a little below average. Not average, not good, but just slightly below average.

 

 

People get on Lauvao around here because of his skills as well as his injury history. People say he's not a good offensive linemen due to his skill not necessarily his absence. That doesn't mean that some folks don't point to his absence as well... but most dog on him because they think he's a bad football player. i'm not saying you, but in general. 

 

I continue to disagree with that.

 

But, that point is lost simply due to the fact the guy just isn't available. 

 

And Moses and Williams are doing better in that regard, but they're both constantly banged up as well, so they're falling in a similar... albeit to a lesser degree... situation as Lauvao. 

 

I'm not sure my argument was ever that we needed to have him. It was that we needed to have him because the team went and signed him. Keep in mind that's not agreeing with the move. It's just reality.

[carex]

1 hour ago, JoggingGod said:

Callahan is so overrated. He gets credit for developing first round talents. Whoop de doo, Zack Martin and Brandon Scherff, two top OL prospects, are good. What about how Moses is struggling mightily right now and how our other OL acquisitions have busted. 

 

Chase is doing okay.  Moses wasn't thought of as going to make it before him.  And Lauvao was basically already fully formed by the time he got here

[Morneblade]

2 minutes ago, KDawg said:

 

 

People get on Lauvao around here because of his skills as well as his injury history. People say he's not a good offensive linemen due to his skill not necessarily his absence. That doesn't mean that some folks don't point to his absence as well... but most dog on him because they think he's a bad football player. i'm not saying you, but in general. 

 

I continue to disagree with that.

 

But, that point is lost simply due to the fact the guy just isn't available. 

 

And Moses and Williams are doing better in that regard, but they're both constantly banged up as well, so they're falling in a similar... albeit to a lesser degree... situation as Lauvao. 

 

I'm not sure my argument was ever that we needed to have him. It was that we needed to have him because the team went and signed him. Keep in mind that's not agreeing with the move. It's just reality.

 

Ok, I get it. I think we could have done better (and maybe still can) in FA, but once he was signed, he needs to be available all 16 weeks. And moving 2 positions is worse than moving 1. I'm on board with that. Same page?

[KDawg]

1 minute ago, Morneblade said:

 

Ok, I get it. I think we could have done better (and maybe still can) in FA, but once he was signed, he needs to be available all 16 weeks. And moving 2 positions is worse than moving 1. I'm on board with that. Same page?

100%.

 

Except... (LOL)

 

We definitely could have done better in FA. Just signing anyone now may not be the help we need due to the cohesion factor... but better now than in five weeks. Gives them some time.

[Wildbunny]

1 hour ago, JoggingGod said:

Callahan is so overrated. He gets credit for developing first round talents. Whoop de doo, Zack Martin and Brandon Scherff, two top OL prospects, are good. What about how Moses is struggling mightily right now and how our other OL acquisitions have busted. 

 

Moses was drafted in 2014 and at this time he was definately not good.

Callahan turned him into good/great.

His problem right now, is the same as Williams: injuries.

 

Which others OL acquisitions that have busted lately? The only guy I have here is Kouandjio who was a 4th round pick. We had Austin Reiter stolen from our PS to the Browns and sound promising before injury. Catalina & Dunn on the roster are both UDFA, so they are hardly busts even if they aren't great right now. Christian is a rookie, same thing. Bergstrom? That's your serviceable, or so, vet OL that you can plug wherever you want so you don't have to insert Chris Thompson on the starting OL.

 

Now, I'm not absolving Callahan in anything, but I'm wondering if that Asst HC title hasn't taking him away to what he's good at, leaving Paul Rauscher as the only one really in charge of OL. Guy is supposed to have input into the running game. Well, mostly it's been disappointing since the beginning. I would suggest to sent Callahan back to what he does best, and only that. And if je doesn't want it. Thanks for the memories mate, but he still did a great work around here the first years.

 

27 minutes ago, KDawg said:

We definitely could have done better in FA. Just signing anyone now may not be the help we need due to the cohesion factor... but better now than in five weeks. Gives them some time.

 

I'm wondering if that frustration we heard about Jay and FA approach from the FO comes from here. I mean, for a few months, our only LG was Kouandjio, who we cut last year from the 53...

Even after that, there were guys released were we didn't even gave a call... That's mind boggling...

[Why am I Mr. Pink?]

https://www.colts.com/news/evan-boehm-brings-experience-versatility-to-colts-offensive-live

 

Colts just signed G Evan Boehm from the Rams PS. He was a late cut by Cards, signed by Rams to PS.

 

Young, has some talent (4th R), started a good bit of games and has played G and C so he can swing.

[Darrell Green Fan]

I was a big Chase guy, mostly because I thought Long sucked and we could do better. But we have to admit that he's not that good either, regardless of which spot he plays.  And as we all knew there was zero depth on the interior of the OL, one injury to a guy who is always injured. in comes Bergstrom, and the whole house of cards collapses.  

[Renegade7]

On 10/10/2018 at 6:00 PM, Koolblue13 said:

How much of our bad line play and even worse running plays are we putting on the shoulders of our Oline coach?

A point no-one has talked about yet.  It's tough because I do believe injuries have taken their toll on what had the potential to b a very good line.  Having backups that get just too is dumb.

 

Trent should be moved to LG and our LT of the future should be drafted this offseason and play LT.  I'm not walking away from Moses yet, not do I want to create another hole without a clear replacement.  I originally wanted to use th first round pick on a LG.  I think this should be Trent last season at LT don't change my mind.  

 

How awesome would it be t have a future franchise LT play right next to our current franchise LT?

[Morneblade]

4 hours ago, Darrell Green Fan said:

I was a big Chase guy, mostly because I thought Long sucked and we could do better. But we have to admit that he's not that good either, regardless of which spot he plays.  And as we all knew there was zero depth on the interior of the OL, one injury to a guy who is always injured. in comes Bergstrom, and the whole house of cards collapses.  

 

Chase has been fine. He's better at C right now because that's where he's been playing, and while he might not be a world breaker, but is more than serviceable. Lack of depth, and moving 2 guys on the OL when 1 guy goes done are real issues though.

[Renegade7]

9 hours ago, megared said:

 

Sure it does...from that you can draw comparative analysis. 

 

Player	Position	Team	Score	Unit         Rank	Ind  Rank	Avg Pos Score
Trent Williams	LT	Redskins	78.7	8	5	64.7
Chase Roullier	LG	Redskins	57.8	8	21	64.9
Ton Bergstrom	C	Redskins	55.1	8	26	68.4
Brandon Scherff	RG	Redskins	75.3	8	6	60.4
Morgan Moses	RT	Redskins	70.5	8	9	64.1

 

There's nothing else out there comparable to the level of information you can get on linemen.  More specific, just how bad are Roullier and Bergstrom?  This gives us a better idea.

 

When you have a center and guard that bad, it literally sucks the air out of your offense, no other way around it. That's what I was trying to say after the saints game, when you got pressure coming up the middle on you like that it makes everything look bad.

[megared]

33 minutes ago, Renegade7 said:

 

When you have a center and guard that bad, it literally sucks the air out of your offense, no other way around it. That's what I was trying to say after the saints game, when you got pressure coming up the middle on you like that it makes everything look bad.

 

Even worse...someone reasonable would assume our run game is ineffective because the coaches avoid running the ball in those guys gaps, making our run game predictable. You'd be wrong...Not the Redskins...we carry 39% of our runs in those two gaps (LG, C, RG) with a end result of a 31st ranking.  The only places we're slightly above average are inside (12th place ranking) and outside of Moses (14th place).  But for some inexplicable reason, we don't run to either of those places, combined as much as we focus runs to the weakest part of our line.  And we're completely below average running to the inside (25th) or outside (24th) of Trent.  

 

Football Outsiders: O-Line Stats

[Malapropismic Depository]

23 hours ago, wolfsire said:

 Our O-line looked like women trying to block men this past monday night. 

 

With the pink shoes and all, they got a little caught up with October's "Save the Tatas" festivities, is my best guess.

[Renegade7]

3 hours ago, megared said:

 

Even worse...someone reasonable would assume our run game is ineffective because the coaches avoid running the ball in those guys gaps, making our run game predictable. You'd be wrong...Not the Redskins...we carry 39% of our runs in those two gaps (LG, C, RG) with a end result of a 31st ranking.  The only places we're slightly above average are inside (12th place ranking) and outside of Moses (14th place).  But for some inexplicable reason, we don't run to either of those places, combined as much as we focus runs to the weakest part of our line.  And we're completely below average running to the inside (25th) or outside (24th) of Trent.  

 

Football Outsiders: O-Line Stats

 

I hate to say this, but I bet Jay is calling plays like that thinking the defense won't expect them to do that.  Who cares if it's unexpected if it doesn't work?  I've never heard of someone bringing a spoon to a knife fight, but I'm sure somewhere it happened and they died. 

 

On 10/11/2018 at 11:53 PM, wolfsire said:

I think strength and conditioning needs to improve. Our O-line looked like women trying to block men this past monday night. 

1 hour ago, Malapropismic Depository said:

 

With the pink shoes and all, they got a little caught up with October's "Save the Tatas" festivities, is my best guess.

 

The women's football team in DC has been more successful then the Redskins lately