LaAdrian Waddle to be Starting RT?

[BobDigital]

I think so. We will of course not know till game time but we have a lot of reason to think so.

This season he has been the first guy played when an injury has happened. He has been unable to stay healthy but when healthy he has preformed well.

After thee bye with both him and Flemming healthy he started and played the majority of the snaps. Cam needed to step in for him as he got hurt again (more of a aggravation I think). Now that he is completely off the injury report I suspect he will be the starter again.

Last week Flemming was the worst of the OL men by a good amount against the Jags. I think penciling him in as the guy to start to try to get to play the majority of snaps this game is a mistake. That being said I would be surprised if there isn't some sort of rotation at RT as Waddle seems unable to hold up for a full game right now.

 

[maineman209]

I think so. We will of course not know till game time but we have a lot of reason to think so.

This season he has been the first guy played when an injury has happened. He has been unable to stay healthy but when healthy he has preformed well.

After thee bye with both him and Flemming healthy he started and played the majority of the snaps. Cam needed to step in for him as he got hurt again (more of a aggravation I think). Now that he is completely off the injury report I suspect he will be the starter again.

Last week Flemming was the worst of the OL men by a good amount against the Jags. I think penciling him in as the guy to start to try to get to play the majority of snaps this game is a mistake. That being said I would be surprised if there isn't some sort of rotation at RT as Waddle seems unable to hold up for a full game right now.

Actually, Mason was nearly as bad in the AFCCG as Fleming. The Jags were attacking that end of the OL, primarily with Fowler. In the Divisional Round, it was the other end of the OL taking the brunt of the Titans' pressure while Mason and Waddle/Fleming were nearly clean (Fleming actually was clean in his 35 snaps in relief of Waddle).

The thing for me is that the success of the OL, in both run-blocking and pass-pro, depends on (sometimes nearly silent) communication and timing. And it takes a lot of reps working side-by-side to establish that. One of the issues in the SB that we don't talk about was Stephen Neal needing to be replaced by Russ Hochstein, who had only played a handful of snaps up to that point. And OL communication was a mess that entire game.

Anyway with both Waddle and Fleming having played well over 300 snaps in relief of Cannon this season, one would think that, communication-wise, they'd be nearly interchangeable. However, during the last five games of the regular season, Waddle played a grand total of 24 OL snaps, while Fleming played 331.

Waddle did start the Divisional Round game over Fleming and played 46 snaps before going out with his knee injury. Then, he was inactive for the AFCCG while Fleming played all 64 offensive snaps. This means that, since week-12 (10 weeks ago) Fleming has played 430 of the 500 OL snaps, while Waddle has played only 70.

It may happen that Waddle starts, but I'd have to think that this communication issue might be something that Scar takes into consideration when making that decision.

 

[maust]

Considering the front they were up against Fleming held up reasonably well in pass protection although the one sack he did give up was ugly. It's in the run game his problems really show up. The Pats didn't even try a single run off him in the AFCCG and only 3 off Mason. If you include the lone run off right end they only went to the right 4 times all game. You can bet Philly noticed that.