Soul_Survivor88
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Great piece from @AdamKilgoreWP on the NFL's O-line crisis and how it's leading to early offensive struggles
Other articles and observations...
Atrocious offensive line play, in many ways, harms the viewing experience more than terrible quarterback play. A cruddy quarterback behind an adequate line will make bad decisions and poor throws and fail to score points, but those mistakes occur within the flow of an otherwise pleasant game. An adequate quarterback behind a horrible line doesn’t even have the chance to initiate what fans would recognize as football. He’s just engulfed by chaos.
The drop in quality line play has already reshaped NFL offenses, in subtle fashion. Last year, quarterbacks averaged 8.25 yards per throw in the air, the shortest average pass in the past decade, at least. Running backs and slot receivers are catching more passes than at any point in recent memory. Quarterbacks and coordinators have little choice — with less time to throw, dump-offs and checkdowns are the best, safest options.
The drop in quality line play has already reshaped NFL offenses, in subtle fashion. Last year, quarterbacks averaged 8.25 yards per throw in the air, the shortest average pass in the past decade, at least. Running backs and slot receivers are catching more passes than at any point in recent memory. Quarterbacks and coordinators have little choice — with less time to throw, dump-offs and checkdowns are the best, safest options.
The NFL is fundamentally changing, for the worse. It could use more and better quarterbacks. It more badly needs better linemen to protect them, to give them a chance and to make the sport palatable.
Other articles and observations...
All these players come from the collegiate system, which over the years has become far more wide open, quick moving, and almost a different game entirely. While you still get some teams that run the “pro style” offense with a variety of techniques and formations, most are wide open shotgun offenses with linemen in two-point stances most of the time and working with a two-second clock in mind in protections. In the NFL there’s no such leeway. Every team works under center, requiring new mechanics, angles and instincts that a blocker simply hasn’t had to work with before.
The transition from the college to the pros is stark for every player with the exception of maybe running backs, but for offensive linemen it can mean learning to play effectively an entirely different game.
You’ll never get colleges going back to a two-back, run-dominant offense because unless you are Alabama or Wisconsin you can’t consistently recruit 300-pound monsters for a mauling offensive line. And so to get any offense to work with a light offensive line you have to spread it out and get rid of the ball quickly.
It’s a style of offense that Seattle tried to play, but against an NFL defense it was hard work for anyone to take short catches and turn them into long gains, and when Russell Wilson did try to hold onto the ball Mike Daniels and the rest were on him.
There is no clear answer to the problems the likes of Houston, Seattle, and the Giants are facing. With the draft becoming more pot luck than science on the offensive line and the college system continuing to ill-prepare a lot of linemen for the NFL it is hard to see where they can really take the strides they need. For all the talented ball carriers those sides have, their offenses stalled over and over again because they couldn’t make the blocks they needed to, and it is going to scupper their season.
The transition from the college to the pros is stark for every player with the exception of maybe running backs, but for offensive linemen it can mean learning to play effectively an entirely different game.
You’ll never get colleges going back to a two-back, run-dominant offense because unless you are Alabama or Wisconsin you can’t consistently recruit 300-pound monsters for a mauling offensive line. And so to get any offense to work with a light offensive line you have to spread it out and get rid of the ball quickly.
It’s a style of offense that Seattle tried to play, but against an NFL defense it was hard work for anyone to take short catches and turn them into long gains, and when Russell Wilson did try to hold onto the ball Mike Daniels and the rest were on him.
There is no clear answer to the problems the likes of Houston, Seattle, and the Giants are facing. With the draft becoming more pot luck than science on the offensive line and the college system continuing to ill-prepare a lot of linemen for the NFL it is hard to see where they can really take the strides they need. For all the talented ball carriers those sides have, their offenses stalled over and over again because they couldn’t make the blocks they needed to, and it is going to scupper their season.
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