What's the O-Line's Issue?

[dolfan4good]

I have to believe that the "alternating" of McKinney at the guard and center position has got to hurt the consistency of the line as well... as Olines need to gel and know that the guy next to them is on the same page.

 

[DeDolfan]

Originally posted by K-Rob
Keep in mind that I'm not too well versed in the mechanics or technicalities of football, I just have a simple question. What EXACTLY is the issue with the Fins O-Line? I mean, is it bad technique, bad schemes, bad coaching or are they simply not strong enough? The reason I ask this is because of those 4, 3 are correctable right? Obviously they aren't going to get any stronger but technique can be corrected and schemes can be adjusted. Any comments?

Actually, all 4 you mentioned are very correctable. Technique is coachable, sort of like learning to gain leverage to your advantage. Kids will try to do it by brute strength alone where as the older and wiser will use leverage to their advantage. Not to mean that brute strength doesn't help tho.
Bad schemes is very fixable, again by the coaches. To be sucessful in this league [as a coach] you need to always stay a step ahead of the competition. the line worked well last year with these schemes and not this yr simply because the competition has caught up with it and learned to defend it. Thus we haven't stayed that step ahead.

Bad coaching speaks for itself and better coaching would go along way in fixing the first 2 things.

Strength is fixable in the sense thru more rigorous strength training and I don't know how much more rigorous it could be except maybe 24/7 during the off season but that's not very likely tho.

Alot of folks claim we have the same line as last year. I disagree with that. [Almost] the same ppl maybe but far from the same line. Center and the right side perhaps but not the left side. Nails tore his achilles and no way am I convinced that he's anywhere near 100% plus during the off season, he wasn't able to maintain any king of serious strength training to speak of and he promptly plused up about 30-50 lbs from last year. So he needs a healthy off season to pump iron like a mad bitch to get back where he needs to be. he simply can not pull and run lead blocks like he could last year. And then, of course, dixon is done and the rook was thrown to the wolves basically. he did ok aginst the punks of the league but really is struggling against the better dEs to say the least. Right now, against the best DEs he's faced, he just doesn't have that necessary foot speed to block the speed rushers. That is not a technique I think can very well be coached just like blazing sprint speed can't. That's something you either have or you don't, just like good basic instincts. I don't think it's strength that hurts him as much as the foot speed. While he can stand to bulk up a bit in overall strength, i don't know how much that would actually help him cut the corner off of guys like freeney and kearse that he's already faced and was schooled by. maybe he'll learn from this with more experience and hopefully he will. But my gut feeling on him is that he'll be better used inside somewhere. But, I have been known to be wrong before tho !!

 

[DeDolfan]

Originally posted by A/C Dorsal
stacking the line is preventing the pass and the run. If Wade and Dixon were in form, we would still be weak at center and the other 2 spots. this situation is sad. there is no hope for actually being good offensively this year. did i say that? sorry.

of course everyone knows that the fan base evaporates when they suck, so they won't suck for too long.

We could actually be better O wise this year. I've harped about it on other threads already and one way to do it that we've not done yet at all. That's by really spreading the D out, 4 wide. by not doing so says alot about our WR corp. But we could use Minor in the mix....... say, CC, Minor wide L, mcK and mcM wide R. Now unless the D is really nuts, it'll create 1 on 1 blocking and Ricky will find a mess of room to run. but if they cheat up with either safety, then whoever is QBing will have to exploit the hell out of the 1 on 1 matchups and make them pay dearly. but we ain't seen that and i see no reason to expect to tho.