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2007 O-Line discussion

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A call for perspective:

Let me preface this by saying that I agree that the O-Line needs to improve. I agree that the way they have played up to now has not been good enough. The players themselves have said as much, so let's move on. Let's look at some of the contributing factors to the lackluster performance.




Beanie:
Beanie has come close to admitting it in so many words: He's been rusty. But even before the two big runs late last week, he seemed to be running with more of a purpose. Having Beanie run with more authority and confidence, finding the openings faster, will make the OL look better. It won't solve everything, but it will make the OL look better.​

Boeckman:
TB is a new starting QB for JT, and as such may not have as much rein to change the play as Troy Smith had last year. If he does have the freedom, he hasn't been as savvy, nor should we expect him to be right away. You can be that Boeckman will start getting us in to better plays soon. He may not be great at Washington in his first big road test. But I wouldn't put it past him.​

Cordle:


This is the big one IMHO. Exhibit A: He was player of the week this week. Think about it. After a game where we all end up talking feverishly about what's wrong with the offensive line, the Offensive Player of the Week was the guy making the line calls. I said it in his thread and I'll say it again here: The coaching staff probably gave him that award for the improvement he showed from the first half to the second.​

Going up against the weird 3-3-5 defense in his second ever start, Cordle clearly did not get all of the line calls right in the first half. But as Cordle improved, so did the run production. His ability to learn fast after so little experience is a very good sign.​

This week, the Bucks are going against a more traditional front 7. Cordle has already shown a great capacity for learning. Like Boeckman, this will be his first big road test. We know he learns fast; now we'll see how fast.​
In sum, IMHO what is wrong with the running game are things that are not only fixable; they may be fixed as we speak. But even if the first big road game proves too much for them, these Buckeyes are going to make us proud in the long run.

It's still a great time to be a Buckeye. Enjoy it.
 
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I want to have a disclaimer on this post because I know little or nothing about the OL position because I played Safety. Maybe someone can point out the mistakes in my thought process or logic if I am seriously delusional.

Jim Cordle is a first year starter at center. Center from my understanding calls out assignments and is basically the QB of the OL. Give Jim a couple more games to see if he can improve and get everything down...hes a youngster guys.

Ben Person is a first year starter. He looked ok and he seems to being learning under fire since hes a first year starter.

From my understanding it takes time to get a rhytm on the OL...It takes time to put it all together.

I'm a little disappointd with our OL but I'm not so sure that vanilla playcalling(by tressels design) isn't hurting them either. If the playbook opens and it still doesn't get better then I will get more concerned. I also take into consideration that three veteran WR's are hurt. All three have great potential and the playcalling IMO is the result of or partially the result of BOECKMAN BEING A ROOKIE AND THESE INJURIES.

I have faith in Tressel and hope to see consistent improvement. I think this week the playbook gets opened. I think a 3rd wr threat like Small will help the offense. IMO He was held out last week so he'd be closer to 100% for this week.
 
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Good call, DBB. A lot of us are not taking into account that Beanie sat most of the Spring with the ankle sprain, then missed a portion of the late-summer/fall practice period when he re-aggravated the ankle injury. I don't see Saine having the same problems Beanie is having, but further, after watching the YSU and Akron games again from the DVR, Beanie appeared hesitant to try and break tackles with his legs, as if he was conscious of the ankle injury and maybe it's still bothering him. I didn't see him driving for the extra yards and trying to pull away from shoelace grabs, he was just going down in the backfield from one-handed tackles, and we all know that's not Beanie.

It looked like Beanie found his confidence in the 4th quarter of the Akron game. Those runs were what we we've been waiting to see, and they happened because he used the stiff-arm and shed the first tackle by trusting his leg strength.

He admitted his head wasn't in the YSU game. Maybe he'd been thinking of self-preservation through the first seven quarters of the season.
 
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I was just thinking a moment ago and I had a very good reason why we could be struggling a bit on the offensive line.

I was thinking it's because this years offense is different than last years. Yeah, duh right? What I mean is last year we ran much more out of the shot gun and we were almost always running into nickle/dime defenses. This is much easier to do than running against 4-3's. Now sometimes we did line up in power I formations but even then we still had Troy as our QB and out wide Gonzo/Ginn kept the safties back.

Teams thus far this year have KNOWN that our running game is our key to success, and they've been stacking the line as a result. Until defenses fear Boeckman's passing ability I think we will struggle on offense. To take it a step furter when we drop back to pass we still have just as good pass pro as we did last year so I know its not necessarily that our offensive line is sucking it up. I think its just more the fact that teams feel they can sell out against our running game right now. Once Boeckman can get in a rythme (and he will) the offensive line will find it much more easier to run block.
 
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bukIpower;926520; said:
I was just thinking a moment ago and I had a very good reason why we could be struggling a bit on the offensive line.

I was thinking it's because this years offense is different than last years. Yeah, duh right? What I mean is last year we ran much more out of the shot gun and we were almost always running into nickle/dime defenses. This is much easier to do than running against 4-3's. Now sometimes we did line up in power I formations but even then we still had Troy as our QB and out wide Gonzo/Ginn kept the safties back.

Teams thus far this year have KNOWN that our running game is our key to success, and they've been stacking the line as a result. Until defenses fear Boeckman's passing ability I think we will struggle on offense. To take it a step furter when we drop back to pass we still have just as good pass pro as we did last year so I know its not necessarily that our offensive line is sucking it up. I think its just more the fact that teams feel they can sell out against our running game right now. Once Boeckman can get in a rythme (and he will) the offensive line will find it much more easier to run block.
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Absolutely. No matter how you dissect it, you have 5 OL...throw in the TE and FB to get 7 blockers. 5 max at the point of attack....

Defense throws 8 in the box and counts on fast flow.

Not very difficult to figure out who will usually win there.

Until Boeckman proves he can deliver the ball in time, on time, almost every time...count on getting the perception that the OL is subpar.
 
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there's a 14 page discussion on the scout board. Alum82 sounds very disgruntled...

anyway, i'm of the opinion that our supposed struggles (i say supposed because i think they are being overblown) are as much due to the fact that Beanie missed spring, most of the fall, and was really pretty rusty coming into the season. the OL certainly looked okay against YSU when Zoom and MoW were in the game, and it wasn't like they were running behind a different line. John Madden says that the RB makes the OL and not the other way around, and i suspect that there's some truth to that...

anyway, when you combine Beanie's rust, a new center who's really just getting his feet wet, and some of the most vanilla play calling possible, and when you're clearly focusing on building a comfort level for your new QB and WRs and not focusing on scheming ways to break long runs for your RBs, it's easy for the running game to look sub-par... i think that appearances can be very deceiving, and i think that we will see a very large improvement in the running game starting this week.
 
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Dryden;926622; said:
FYI, Jim Cordle was announced the offensive player of the week from the Akron game, and Ballard was the offensive lineman of the week, per JT's presser this afternoon.
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OT, but i was just reading the presser, well because of your post, and came across this regarding the punt:

REPORTER: Jim, you always say and I think Paul Brown said it first, about the punt being the most important play, is that because of the enormous yardage involved only or are there other factors? And also, I think (Dick) Vermeil was the first special teams coach, is that one of the things that happened in your experience that special teams are so much more important than they used to be?
COACH TRESSEL: I think it's become aware by people that it's important. J. C. Wilce, who was a great coach here, in his book, I think it was Page 51 points out, I showed it to a couple of guys, the punt is the most important play in football, so even prior to Paul Brown, Paul might have read his book, but I think it's for two reasons. One is because the amount of yardage as you mentioned, but two is the impact if you don't do it well, if you don't protect and it's blocked for a touchdown, that is unbelievable. If you don't cover well and they return it for a touchdown, you know, the momentum that that creates, if you're just fair at your coverage and they return it 17 yards and all of a sudden they're at mid field, that's huge. So the punt makes such a difference. I think what you're seeing, the change in collegiate football with kicking from the 30 would be an interesting study to see where the drive starts have been this year compared to last year. Well, if they've been at the 32, let's say, rather than the 26, or rather than the 24 as an average, all of a sudden now if you're not punting the ball well, where do you make up that yardage that's changed? But the special teams have always been huge. I just think football has been talked about more in the last 15 years than it was in the first 100, and some of those truths now have been advertised.
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great stuff if you ask me... does anyone think that the yahoos and boo birds on the other boards ever consider that coach Tressel pays enough attention to detail take stuff like this into account? yet they think he's 'satisfied with a mediocre offense'... give me a break

(sorry for the half-rant. i spent too much time on the scout board yesterday.)
 
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lvbuckeye;926689; said:
OT, but i was just reading the presser, well because of your post, and came across this regarding the punt:





great stuff if you ask me... does anyone think that the yahoos and boo birds on the other boards ever consider that coach Tressel pays enough attention to detail take stuff like this into account? yet they think he's 'satisfied with a mediocre offense'... give me a break

(sorry for the half-rant. i spent too much time on the scout board yesterday.)
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Intersting. I always though of the Field Goal as the most important play. It is the one play (except the Extra Point) that you know with certainty that you will get a chance to score.
 
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lvbuckeye;926594; said:
there's a 14 page discussion on the scout board. Alum82 sounds very disgruntled...

anyway, i'm of the opinion that our supposed struggles (i say supposed because i think they are being overblown) are as much due to the fact that Beanie missed spring, most of the fall, and was really pretty rusty coming into the season. the OL certainly looked okay against YSU when Zoom and MoW were in the game, and it wasn't like they were running behind a different line. John Madden says that the RB makes the OL and not the other way around, and i suspect that there's some truth to that...

anyway, when you combine Beanie's rust, a new center who's really just getting his feet wet, and some of the most vanilla play calling possible, and when you're clearly focusing on building a comfort level for your new QB and WRs and not focusing on scheming ways to break long runs for your RBs, it's easy for the running game to look sub-par... i think that appearances can be very deceiving, and i think that we will see a very large improvement in the running game starting this week.
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I kinda thought with Zone Blocking it was the other way around...the running back had to take the correct lane. With man on man blocking the running back choses the best opportunity. Either way, I suppose if the RB doesn't get the right hole they are all look bad.

Here's a question for O lineman. How does the center call assignments in Zone Blocking? I assumed as an O lineman if you were covered by a defender that was your assignment regardless...our is that how stunts blow up lines? If you are the center and you call out an assignment in the 1 hole then what if the defender just changes positions? Also, is there any benefit to zone blockers to be bigger or smaller?
 
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Great read that attempts to explain why it is not simply an OLine issue...

OZone

Football
Football Field Failure not Always What It Appears
By John Porentas

It was an ugly play by any measure.
Backed up on their own two-yard line by a punt by Akron in the first quarter last weekend, the Buckeyes needed to move the ball out of the shadow of their own goalpost. On first down they handed the ball to Beanie Wells who attempted to go over right guard, but the Zips got to him in the backfield, and that meant in the endzone. Despite Wells' best effort to reach the ball out over the goal line, he couldn't get it there, at least not before he touched down in the endzone. It was a safety, and the Zips led 2-0. Shocking, and ugly.

Cont...



There's probably another teaching point here too, but not for the guys on the field. For some, it's that football plays are complex, and not always exactly what they seem when they fail. For a few others, it's that that need to sound smart can often make you look really stupid.
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That's a great article, and shows a lot more than just the intricacies of a single play.
These guys have a great capacity to understand what's going on, what goes wrong, and how to fix it for the future. Furthermore, they're not throwing eachother under the bus -- which is very easy to find yourself doing, even when you're playing a game with no consequences/expectations.
 
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