Anybody concerned about the Offensive Line

Sadly, you probably know more than Pat Meyer. He keeps trying to fit square pegs into round holes, and we've seen the unfortunate results of this

 

To add to that we only have 1 wide receiver worth a damn. Austin may provide a spark here and there, but one good hit on the little fellow and he'll be out for the season

 

herbig was recruited as a center out of HS for college. they played him at guard in college. some center. if you watch him in our first preseason game his blocking was quite good from the center spot. it's not like he has never done it as a center. we have 3 crucial guys hurt on this line already. you can't just lump it all together against meyer.

fans have to understand that with a new OC and new coaches at many positions, it takes time for the coaches to gel and also relate that to the players to gel. this isn't a one week process, no matter how much you want it to be. we can all say another coach would be better but we would just have a different name trying to go through this same process. throw a lot of new players in that equation and it is even harder to do, let alone do quickly.

heck most NFL qb's could be good behind perfect blocking conditions. most RB's can run behind perfect blocking conditions. it's a process and that process takes time. injuries change things quickly. younger players play balls out in the preseason, vet players play to make it to the beginning of the season. don't take everything that happens in the preseason to task as what will transpire when the games start to count. it will change.

 

You can’t evaluate the QB when your offensive line is that bad. We made repeated changes to the offensive line the with no results to show for it. The common denominator is Meyer and Tomlin. I just don’t understand Tomlin’s stubbornness to change in some areas. Meyer did not have a a great resume when we brought him over from a middling franchise like Carolina and he has had multiple years to right this ship. Its getting ridiculous. We are going to have to start Fields because Wilson can’t play behind a line like this. The sad thing is we will waste a year of evaluation on Najee, Wilson, Fields, Pickens, Friermuth and Arthur Smith because this of the poor offensive line play. I said it at the beginning of this thread... look at how Baltimore handles things. They put Rosengarten in right away at one position. Those guys know how to coach up and develop offensive lines. Look at San Francisco with significantly less pedigree on the offensive line with the exception of Trent Williams and they are one of the best blocking teams in football. Why not pluck some coaching talent from them to coach up our offensive line?

 

said it on Monday , will state it again.

yes, concerned (very)

 

Broderick Jones came to us very raw with alot of upside. The bottom line is you draft a player like that and it really becomes all about your coaches developing him and positioning him to succeed. If you don’t you end up cutting him in three years and teams like SF or the Chiefs pick him up on the cheap and turn him into a solid if not good player through proper coaching. At the very least they should have brought in an additional offensive line coach and kept Meyer on a short leash. He hasn’t really done anything why does he get the benefit of the doubt and all of these new toys without any accountability. Its going to hurt the whole team this year. If I am Aiyuk after seeing that debacle I am definitely not coming to Pittsburgh. Heck if I am Pickens and Najee and Wilson I am very angry at Tomlin right now. He is going to cost them millions if not their career at least in the case of Wilson.

It makes absolutely zero sense for Jones to even be playing right tackle right now.

 

I do feel like Fautanu will actually progress better than Jones because he is significantly less raw than Jones is, provided Meyer doesn’t mess him up.

 

Tomlin value of position flexibility is becoming a detriment - maybe? Maybe it sounds good on paper, but if you are always looking for a reason to shift guys, then maybe it keeps things in too much of a flux.

Maybe put the true back-up at the position in at a spot instead of shifting a starter (or who should be starting) out of his position and create two line changes.

 

If only we drafted Rattler and made him QB1 .

 

Preseason games aren't really an indication of what we have at the QB position, remember how good Pickett looked last year in the preseason.

 

It's been the main problem for the last few years! I don't want to say "I told ya so" but, I did! The biggest problem is Tomlin though. As long as we allow mediocrity, things will be mediocre....at best!

BTW, another WR is not going to save this team either!

Fire Tomlin! Completely retool the staff and the O Line (with quality guys)! You're best hire as a position coach should always be your OL Coach IMO.

Ready for a sub par .500 season?

 

Nailed IT!

 

Nicely stated. Just two seasons ago the Steelers made the directional change to a zone blocking scheme. It can take multiple seasons for the OL to learn the nuances of this scheme. And that is considering that the players on the line stay the same. Now throw in new players coming in, fringe position players, raw talent, switching up positions, and finally, injuries, and you end up with what we are witnessing.

Jones' fundamentals are just lacking. I don't care which side he is playing on, but when you get backed up five yards into a QB by a bull rush, or tossed aside like a ragdoll, you aren't playing sound technique.

 

Totally disagree on Pickett! The O Line was the biggest on field issue. It is a systemic issue. A QB cannot have success without a successful running game. A terrible O Line (which we have) is detrimental to the running and pass protection (passing game success). KP has talent. He left on the wrong note but he was not THE problem. Tomlin is the main problem. He's a; dated, pretender, that has zero community building skills (have you seen some of the crap he says to fans?).

There is not a coordinator in the league that just doesn't care about performing in the preseason or reg. season, especially a new one trying to earn a rep. If they do have that attitude, they should be fired asap! Not saying that preseason games have bearing on the regular season but..... development is the key. Week 2 is also the best week of improvement usually for most teams. Steelers took a few steps back this week.

I think I've said this every season for the last 3 to 4 of them but:

Continuing to try and do what is not working or has not worked yet, is the definition of INSANITY!

 

Good and great team are able to develop very quickly(the chiefs won the super bowl last year a huge part of their defense who had one of the youngest defense in the NFL)....bad and average team take a lot of time to develop and in some cases, the time never comes....

 

Not true. Wilson has been under center on 25% of his career snaps. This is about the NFL average for QBs.

 

The Chiefs won the SB because they have a future HOF at QB. Don't overthink things.

 

The chiefs were second on defense last year and they were great in the playoffs.....At one point,their offense had 4 quarter in a row without a TD between 2 games(the last 2 vs ravens and the first 2 quarter vs 49ers and they had only 3 points in those 4 quarters)but they still won both game because the defense were able to keep the score down...The defense were their strongest unit last year since their receiving core was just awful

 

Meanwhile, in bird country, KP went 11 for 13, 67 yards, and 4 sacks (on 4 drives).

Training camp notes talk about the same issues he had here. Some of their fans want him demoted to 3rd string or cut outright……

The QB play last year was maybe the worst I have ever seen.

 

defense won for them last year for sure.

Got HOT in Jan then, too - the offense, altho even vs. the RATS, did not do too much - was mostly D.

they sucked on O most of the season.....

 

Noone said i wanted him to be qb 1…he could’ve sat for a year or two behind starter… the proper way of developing a qb… nice try Richard

 

Funny how people have such short memories.

 

Pickett has talent for sure. He wouldn't have been a first round pick if he did have a lot of talent. He never progressed and it wasn't because his OL or his HC. It was because he never learned how to stay in the pocket and deliver a ball. He wanted to continue to bail out and dump it off because that is what he was comfortable with. He struggled reading zone defense and pretty routinely missed guys that were open.

I will agree with the point that Tomlin has been more of a detriment than a help in a lot of ways recently. He has a losing record in the playoffs now and seems wholly unprepared to win in the post season no matter if we are underdogs or favorites. We've lost big in both scenarios.

I will also agree that the coaches want their players to look sharp in the preseason. They also know that it doesn't have any bearing on the regular season, but its all about improvement and development.

I think this is the first year that we've really changed it up. New QB's, new OC, trying to trade for a WR, starting the young guys early.... There will be growing pains, but I expect us to be better for it in the long run.

 

What am I not remembering? Did they offer him a borderline insulting offer? I’m remembering what seemed like snub at every milestone and taking him back at last option for as cheap as they could grind him down to.

Now, if he wasn’t in house and obviously developing from the last time we saw him with the 1’s, in real game action, and a semblance of a game plan he was better than last season Ben, and all of Pickett and Tribisky.

Maybe you are saying the Buffalo game? Where they delayed the game, in horrible conditions, against a very tough opponent on the road in a notoriously rambunctuous stadium and TWO “offensive coordinators” still trying to figure out a game plan to his newly discovered strengths (despite being in the locker room for YEARS). Yeah, I remember all of that.

Please remind me of what I forgot.

 

I agree on the another wr comment. I think that would be the worst thing they could do. They are acting like they are one player away. They should have really invested in the OL coaching to support the QB’s and Arthur Smith. I don’t understand it. You invest all of these draft picks and money through free agency in the Offensive Line yet you don’t upgrade the coaching at all. Its like buying a Porches and not putting it in the garage.

 

If you are committing to a difficult block scheme such as the zone then why not invest in more coaching then? The 49er’s have like five offensive line coaches. It is their largest coaching room on their coaching tree. It still makes no sense.