This has been a BAD free agency period

[Elephant]

I am one who cedes our line improved as the season went on after all the injuries, but we still need a RT more than just about any other position on our team, regardless of an athletic QB. We should not be satisfied with the line because we now have an athletic QB coming. We need to give whomever the kid is a chance. (Of course that is my opinion)

 

[Goaldeje]

El, I'm not arguing we stand pat. I agree completely. It just drives me nuts when people (cough, Ry, cough) keep saying our OLine was turrble, when really they were about average. I would like to be above average, and I think a RT is a giant step in that direction.

 

[Rymanofthenorth]

El, I'm not arguing we stand pat. I agree completely. It just drives me nuts when people (cough, Ry, cough) keep saying our OLine was turrble, when really they were about average. I would like to be above average, and I think a RT is a giant step in that direction.

The one aspect of the game that I watch very very closely is the trenches, I used to get into it quite a bit with Art on another forum because he always viewed our Oline with burgundy glasses.

If we go strictly by regular stats, we would think we are somewhat middle of the road, but in fact when we look deeper we see a very different story.

We couldn’t run to the left side at all, this is surprising because TW is supposedly a very good run blocker, but last season he wasn’t very good at all, we also had a bit of a revolving door with chester, Lick and even monty running at LG at different times, bottom line our left side was terrible in both regular run blocking and especially in short yardage situations. At Center, we werent much better as we looked atrocious against some of the better interior lines.

Shanny has this idea that he can fill Oline spots with low round guys and low end free agents, , that’s crap, in todays NFL you can get by with one perhaps two unheralded guys but we need to get some guys in here who can play well the majority of the time, not flashes.

Green bay, throws the ball a LOT, I wonder whats their percentages are because they would be a better indicator than sacks given up/ Rodgers put up some serious numbers and was rarely lit up, granted he is no Rexy but it wasn’t all on rexy.

Same with our Dline, they looked good at times but we are far too soft up the middle and offtackle, far too often we gave up key plays to kleep drives alive in key times, we need to firm up in the middle

 

[Neophyte]

Green bay, throws the ball a LOT, I wonder whats their percentages are because they would be a better indicator than sacks given up/ Rodgers put up some serious numbers and was rarely lit up, granted he is no Rexy but it wasn’t all on rexy.

As noted here, Rogers was sacked 41 times, same as Rex and Beck combined. Where Green Bay really did better then us is QB hits. 73 as compared to the Skins 108, something I credit Rogers for.

 

[Smoot Point]

Meh... I think we're doing okay. Our young OL performed decently toward the end of last year, and our starters performed well prior to Lichte going down. I have more confidence in our young OL than I do in our young WRs (though I do like Hank & Paul). I'll say part of the problem might have been QB play, WRs lack of separation, and getting our young RBs familiar with playing at this level.

That being said, I'm hoping they land Brandon Taylor of LSU if he is available in round 3(regardless of what they just did with Merriweather), re-sign 59, and then draft a few more young OL to compete. It would be nice to fix CB, but I'm not convinced we'll be able to improve upon what we have with what's left and affordable.

Looking forward to seeing a 22 like this:

QB - RG3 (not Rex)
RB - Helu
TE - Cooley
TE - Davis
WR - Garcon
WR - Hankerson

I know KS didn't do this much last year, but we've been dreaming of this since we drafted Davis... let's spread those tightends and run even... Helu is great in the open field. Let's force teams to react to us for a change. I'd like to see us run out of the 31 also. Or heck, with RG3, run out of the 50 (okay, hopefully not often)! If Rex Grossman III can put up 3100 yards in 13 games, imagine what this offense could look like with RG3 (or even Luck if we have to settle).

 

[Goaldeje]

Ryman, when you have time, I would be interested to hear why you are so down on the line. Given the injuries and suspension, I thought they played fairly well. Running Left End, according to footballoutsiders.com, we ranked 18th in the league, very middle of the road. Left Tackle, I grant you, was bad, at 25th. So the left side of our line left (haha, get it?) something to be desired, though there are a lot of circumstances we don't know in those stats (ie, field position, number of times the tight end was lined up to block, etc).

As a side note, Running center, right tackle and right end, we were ranked #2, #14, and #6, respectively, which I think is pretty damned good, in a vacuum.

As most of us have said, the line could be improved, and should be taken care of sometime this off season. But I don't think the line was the cluster**** of a situation you seem to think it was.

 

[Henry]

Rogers' sack percentage was 6.7.
Grossman's sack percentage was 5.2.

When Flynn was back there GB's percentage rose to 9.3.
With Beck ours rose to 10.8 (Holy crap, Beck!)

Overall, our QBs were sacked 6.5% of the time they dropped back, while GB's QBs were sacked 6.9% of the time.

And I think it's safe to say that their starter was better than our starter and their backup was better than our backup (and probably our starter.)

Running the ball, Green Bay averaged 3.9 yards a carry.
We averaged 4.0 yards a carry.

I found this all on pro-football-reference.com.

Football Outsiders, which does a far more comprehensive analysis of positional performance, rated our OL 10th in run-blocking and 15th in pass-blocking.

According to the site, we were 18th in running outside left, 25th in running left tackle, 2nd up the middle, 14th over the right tackle and 6th outside right. We were 18th in gaining first down on 3rd or 4th and short, and we were 19th in how many times our RB got stuffed behind the line. Certainly not stellar, but not terrible either.

Green Bay (since we're talking about them) was ranked 16th and 23rd, respectively, in run and pass blocking.

http://footballoutsiders.com/stats/ol

Of course, all that said, we absolutely positively do need to upgrade the line.

 

[Rymanofthenorth]

As noted here, Rogers was sacked 41 times, same as Rex and Beck combined. Where Green Bay really did better then us is QB hits. 73 as compared to the Skins 108, something I credit Rogers for.

on how many dropbacks was my point I would think Rodgers has far more drop backs simply because they were on the field more in sustained drives, although the QB hits stat is interesting as well.

 

[Rymanofthenorth]

Rogers' sack percentage was 6.7.
Grossman's sack percentage was 5.2.

When Flynn was back there GB's percentage rose to 9.3.
With Beck ours rose to 10.8 (Holy crap, Beck!)

Overall, our QBs were sacked 6.5% of the time they dropped back, while GB's QBs were sacked 6.9% of the time.

And I think it's safe to say that their starter was better than our starter and their backup was better than our backup (and probably our starter.)

Running the ball, Green Bay averaged 3.9 yards a carry.
We averaged 4.0 yards a carry.

I found this all on pro-football-reference.com.

Football Outsiders, which does a far more comprehensive analysis of positional performance, rated our OL 10th in run-blocking and 15th in pass-blocking.

According to the site, we were 18th in running outside left, 25th in running left tackle, 2nd up the middle, 14th over the right tackle and 6th outside right. We were 18th in gaining first down on 3rd or 4th and short, and we were 19th in how many times our RB got stuffed behind the line. Certainly not stellar, but not terrible either.

Green Bay (since we're talking about them) was ranked 16th and 23rd, respectively, in run and pass blocking.

http://footballoutsiders.com/stats/ol

Of course, all that said, we absolutely positively do need to upgrade the line.

now thats an interesting stat, I left a pm on another forum of stats nerds asking them how many times GB left its tackles in one on ones, something we thankfully stopped doing about game 4. I know our runs inside right were pretty solid, it seemed like that should be our bread and butter play but we tried running stretch runs far too often.

 

[Elephant]

. I know our runs inside right were pretty solid, it seemed like that should be our bread and butter play but we tried running stretch runs far too often.

Looking back, Hightower seemed to always try to hit the corner when he should have hit the narrow seem.

The young guys were able to hit those holes Hightower seemed to miss. Royster seemed to have more success between the tackles, but Helu ran the stretch with much more success.

I must admit, I am basing this off memory so I could be wrong. Just seems to be the way I remember it.

 

[Neophyte]

on how many dropbacks was my point I would think Rodgers has far more drop backs simply because they were on the field more in sustained drives, although the QB hits stat is interesting as well.

Green Bay had 552 pass attempts to Washington's 591 their QB's got sacked the same number of times as ours on 39 fewer attempts.

 

[Rymanofthenorth]

Green Bay had 552 pass attempts to Washington's 591 their QB's got sacked the same number of times as ours on 39 fewer attempts.

thanks Neo, I thought they would have had more dropbacks, them having a crippled LT probably didnt help them much but either way our Oline sucked, someone else sucking more doesnt make them suck less.

 

[redskins76]

skins fans ......alot of - and alot + ...we will be better then last year !

 

[Nobody]

Rogers' sack percentage was 6.7.
Grossman's sack percentage was 5.2.

When Flynn was back there GB's percentage rose to 9.3.
With Beck ours rose to 10.8 (Holy crap, Beck!)

Overall, our QBs were sacked 6.5% of the time they dropped back, while GB's QBs were sacked 6.9% of the time.

And I think it's safe to say that their starter was better than our starter and their backup was better than our backup (and probably our starter.)

Running the ball, Green Bay averaged 3.9 yards a carry.
We averaged 4.0 yards a carry.

I found this all on pro-football-reference.com.

Football Outsiders, which does a far more comprehensive analysis of positional performance, rated our OL 10th in run-blocking and 15th in pass-blocking.

According to the site, we were 18th in running outside left, 25th in running left tackle, 2nd up the middle, 14th over the right tackle and 6th outside right. We were 18th in gaining first down on 3rd or 4th and short, and we were 19th in how many times our RB got stuffed behind the line. Certainly not stellar, but not terrible either.

Green Bay (since we're talking about them) was ranked 16th and 23rd, respectively, in run and pass blocking.

http://footballoutsiders.com/stats/ol

Of course, all that said, we absolutely positively do need to upgrade the line.

It doesn't surprise me a bit. I've mentioned more than once that our O line needs an upgrade, but that the last half of the season when different guys were switching up the lineup, we started doing pretty damn solid.

Is there a way to break down the performance by game? I bet if you looked at the last 4 or 5 games of the season, our O line was probably top 5. As absurd as that sounds, they were a whole lot better as the season wore on.

 

[Nobody]

I did the breakdown, and our O line in the last 5 games of the season was not only greatly improved, they were damn near the best in the league. It was a patched together group of nothings that seemed to play great together.

The stats back it up too.......

In the last 5 games, our QBs dropped back 198 times, and only got sacked 9 times. That's good enough for a 4.5% sack percentage. That puts us second in the league during that time, trailing only Buffalo.

Also, we averaged 5.1 ypc from our backfield during those games, good enough for best in the league. Our end of season offensive line was something we shouldn't change if you want my honest opinion.

Hard to argue against those statistics.

 

[CarolinaSkin43]

As noted here, Rogers was sacked 41 times, same as Rex and Beck combined. Where Green Bay really did better then us is QB hits. 73 as compared to the Skins 108, something I credit Rogers for.

i was wondering how many sacks we gave up...wonder how that number compares to the nfl average for last year ?....

 

[Henry]

now thats an interesting stat, I left a pm on another forum of stats nerds asking them how many times GB left its tackles in one on ones, something we thankfully stopped doing about game 4. I know our runs inside right were pretty solid, it seemed like that should be our bread and butter play but we tried running stretch runs far too often.

... did you just call me a stats nerd?

Anyway, according to the same site we ran to the left 38% of the time and to the right only 31%. Also, we only ran up the middle 31%, which is far below average (50%). So for some reason we seriously favored the left side even though we were terrible running left. It's likely the nice runs to the right were due to the fact that we set them up by running left a lot. I don't really know.

I agree with you that there is a lot of room for improvement on our line. I wouldn't call it terrible. I expected terrible last year. What I saw was ... surprisingly not terrible. Maybe, as the stats seem to indicate, we schemed around the fact that our line was really bad. But I've seen worse is all I'm saying.

Also, I think the Green Bay comparison shows that solid QB play really does make a difference to a line. So hopefully with a (hopefully) upgrade at the QB spot our line play will improve.

Still, like you I've been screaming for linemen since Day One.

 

[Goaldeje]

I did the breakdown, and our O line in the last 5 games of the season was not only greatly improved, they were damn near the best in the league. It was a patched together group of nothings that seemed to play great together.

The stats back it up too.......

In the last 5 games, our QBs dropped back 198 times, and only got sacked 9 times. That's good enough for a 4.5% sack percentage. That puts us second in the league during that time, trailing only Buffalo.

Also, we averaged 5.1 ypc from our backfield during those games, good enough for best in the league. Our end of season offensive line was something we shouldn't change if you want my honest opinion.

Hard to argue against those statistics.

Nice work, Ex. I too thought once things got a little settled, the line improved dramatically, but had no idea it was that big of an improvement.

 

[Neophyte]

I did the breakdown, and our O line in the last 5 games of the season was not only greatly improved, they were damn near the best in the league. It was a patched together group of nothings that seemed to play great together.

The stats back it up too.......

In the last 5 games, our QBs dropped back 198 times, and only got sacked 9 times. That's good enough for a 4.5% sack percentage. That puts us second in the league during that time, trailing only Buffalo.

Also, we averaged 5.1 ypc from our backfield during those games, good enough for best in the league. Our end of season offensive line was something we shouldn't change if you want my honest opinion.

Hard to argue against those statistics.

I don't think the two stats, sacks percentage and ypc, are exclusive either. The running game was producing (and Kyle was sticking with it which he had not always done earlier in the season) which took pressure off the pass protection.

I think it also speaks really well for Smith who might just be a possible answer at RT, which might be why the FO and coaches aren't pushing the envelope for one of the FA RTs out there.

 

[CounterTrey]

I was going to ask who the Defenses were those last 5 games but I looked it up myself. Not bad, not bad at all. You might be on to something EX. I think our starting lineup is fine, it's the depth and our ability to fill in with quality backups when a man goes down that's haunted us for years. If we can get some actual quality depth on the O line, things would change dramatically, especially with some consistent, high level, smart play from the QB.