Offensive line building theory

[Sgt Schultz]

31 minutes ago, stbugs said:

And amazingly the coaches left him 1 on 1 against the best pass rusher in the NFL. Remmers had no chance. It was if the coaches were out mowing the lawn instead of watching the AFC Championship. In case you missed it, Ware and Miller sacked Brady 3 times and hit him 11 times the game before we played them. Our coaches did nothing to combat the strength of the opponent.

We also didn’t have a great LT. He was decent, just like Remmers was decent all year until the SB. Ware had 2 sacks in the SB.

Heck, acting like Tolbert’s fumble didn’t play a part or Ginn’s tip to an interception or the punt coverage team just assuming the guy called fair catch or even Cotchery catching the ball cleanly so there is no review and the refs all had big impacts. There may not even be a strip sack TD if Cotchery just catches the ball cleanly two plays before.

Remmers was what he was and clearly not an all pro so expecting him to handle Miller on an island in as just plain stupid. Problem was that Rivera and Shula had no capacity to get that.

Definitely.  It was as more of a coaching failure than anything else.  They did not game plan for Miller and Ware after looking at the AFCC film, other than telling Remmers to "you need to win those battles."  Same story, line our 22 up against there 22 and may the better team win.  That's what Ron and company did.

Not to sidetrack this thread, but you are also right that while people focus on two or three plays in that game, there were probably upwards of ten that, had we been better on maybe two more of them, the outcome would have been different.  I mean, our defense gave up only 6 on anything resembling sustained drives.

I don't believe our OL was great in 2015.  I think they were largely average but somehow performed as a group above their talent level. 

We were middle-third at protecting a QB who got the ball out in about 2.5 seconds.  That is actually pretty bad.  If our offense is based around getting the ball out in 2.5 seconds, we need to push the upper-third to be effective.  Otherwise, being middle-third for 3 seconds would be more indicative of mediocre play.  It is hard to push the ball downfield at 2.5 seconds, and even if the QB is protected on the downfield throw, if the clock in his head is set at getting slaughtered by 2.55 seconds, he is not going to be very effective at it.

I would like to see us scratch the upper third or fourth of the league at a time to throw approaching 3 seconds and be able to control the line on 3rd or 4th and short situations.  We are nowhere near those benchmarks.  Darnold was just over 2.9 seconds in time to throw in 2018 and 19, so this is not optional.

We may need to take the same philosophy in drafting OL this year as Chicago does with voting: do it early and often.

[cmichd08]

23 hours ago, musicman said:

A great O-line can make an average QB look good. So if you have a good QB, a solid O-line can make him look great.

Time is key. Time to let receivers get open. Time to let big plays develop. Time to improvise until a receiver breaks open. Time to see the field. I hope we draft a LT, OG/C and a CB in the 1st 3 picks (not necessarily in that order).  With the guys we signed in FA, 1 or 2 have to have decent year. 

I like Darrisaw from VT and Humphrey from Oklahoma for the C/OG.

[Your GFs favorite huddler]

This a great theory until you get into the playoffs. The Chiefs were a completely different team when their guys went down. 
 

playoff defenses have a way of exposing average to below OLs when it counts. It happens every single year.
 

im of the opinion you should draft at least One OL in your first 4 picks every single year.  

[Wes21]

8 hours ago, jayboogieman said:

I get that. A lot of that problem was the previous regime ignoring the Oline or dumpster diving for players. Hopefully the new guys will do better.

I disagree. The Panthers have had guys that were below average, average, and maybe above average on the line. Those generally don't work out well for long, if they ever work out at all. You can't have all pro players at every position, but you can have good ones at the positions that matter most. The Oline is supposed to be part of that group of positions that matter most. Panther fans just haven't seen it treated as such in a decade or so.

A team should never dumpster dive for offensive lineman, because being below the point of competence has a tremendous negative impact.  But I will once again remind you that while the Panthers went 15-1 and were in the Super Bowl...the Cleveland Browns were 3-13 with the best LT, C and RT in the NFL.  And just for fun their LG was the 35th overall pick who became a pro bowler as well.