re: 3 reasons for optimism (Offensive Line)

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mwade91383

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How do you think we will be in pass protection?

A lot of your post was related to running the ball. But, I'm as concerned about pass protection as I am about running it.

We'll still have a fighting chance if we are a below average running team. If we can't pass protect, we're done.

I mean there’s virtually no chance pass blocking is as good as it was last year (Campbell & Jones) but it looked pretty darn good in the bowl.

Also working in our favor:
-Elite pass catching options that will get open a lot. Ball out fast.
-Bauer Sharp is a great blocker, TG looks the part too (added weight).
-Year 2 of Nuss knowing the system, him getting better at everything will make OLs job easier. Burrow turned his OL into a Joe Moore winner, which it probably wasn’t.
-run game balance improvement (hopefully). If D doesn’t force us to throw constantly they can’t just pin ears back and get after us.
-Adams & Davis are also really talented (this should prob be #1 but I’m scatterbrained)

We’ve been pretty darn good at pass blocking these past few years so I guess part of me is taking it for granted, but you’re right, we shouldn’t.


TL;DR, I think our OL is better than it’s currently getting credit for and we’ll all be pleasantly surprised. In both run & pass blocking. Geaux Tigers!

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it looked pretty darn good in the bowl.

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I think we win by double digits if our OL plays as well as it did in the bowl game.

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We’ve been pretty darn good at pass blocking these past few years so I guess part of me is taking it for granted, but you’re right, we shouldn’t.

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I’m concerned.

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I didn’t include that is it isn’t OL specific,

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The OL providing time for the vertical game to develop is critical, so I’d say it’s pretty specific. You don’t protect, you have no vertical game. The best defense against a dangerous vertical game is a pressure rush.

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You dont remember a single read option from last year because we never ran one.

Our fan base ladies and gentleman.

We ran zone reads.

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If the QB hands it off every time then yes, which he did. I can’t tell by looking at that play whether the QB had the option of keeping it or not. Apparently he did not. If he kept it a few times he’d still be running.

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I don’t think so. I remember an awful lot of Read Options in which Nuss handed the ball off every friggin time, and the back got between -1 and 1 yard.

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What we don’t necessarily know for certain is how many of those were RPOs vs Zone Reads. There were times where you would see Nuss fake a run to the edge which makes the play call obvious, but that definitely wasn’t the case all the time. On such plays where he stayed in the pocket after the give, it’s more likely that it was an RPO where Nuss read run over the short pass route.

I would like to see him get more comfortable pulling and throwing those short routes, even if they aren’t wide arse open when the mesh happens. There has to be more variety there for the run to work better.

This is another area where a better vertical passing game could make a HUGE difference. If secondaries have to spread out more to respect the deep threats we have, that will open up more space for these shorter routes that we would be hitting on RPO plays.

BK just said the o-line is going to be good.

the only way the running game is going to improve is with a commitment to calling more run plays.

I’m probably overdramatizing it but it seems like every time we throw incomplete on 1st, we ran up the gut on 2nd. Not too creative.