Theres no doubt that Carey has made a tremendous turnaround under HH...I am impressed. At the U, he played both tackle positions as well as RG. He was better suited to playing tackle at that level. But he has done very well this offseason. The question is why didn't Wanny, Wise and co. see this last year and make it happen...Now, I'll be the first to admit that the big knock on Carey was that he was dumb as a rock...(single digits in the Wonderlic, as I recall)...but HH seems to have reached him. In fact, in the few games he got playing time in last year, he looked pretty good.
McIntosh, IMO, is still our best OL...The injury he had should have taken 9-11 months to recoup from and then more time for getting back into playing shape. The worst nightmare for an OL is bad ankles and he should be completely recovered. Perhaps HH knew what he could get from Big Mac and purposely left him "in the wings" while Carey got valuable time at LT...
Then, as CK pointed out, we ended up with a real weak link at RT...he knew Carey could play the position and Big Mac had never played the right side in his career. That also puts our best guys in the lineup...
I'm still concerned about McKinney, but he has improved the last 2 games. Hadnot was a surprise last year, and should improve this year...the question is going to be can JJ and McK open holes on the left side for the RBs...
If we can get the OL to play together for 4-5 games without having to move guys around (poor play or injuries), they could be greatly improved from last year towards the latter part of the year...but they'll need some time to develop the continuity first...