How are you feeling about the offensive line?

Submitted by wolverine1987 on

I'm interested to hear the level of worry/satisfaction/happiness about where the line is this year heading into the last quarter of the schedule. For myself, I am still concerned--from my seat against Rutgers watching it live, while the pass protection was excellent, I saw very few holes opened in the running game. I'm not aware that Rutgers has a particularly good d-line, so the prospect of our line going against OSU, with the best d-line we'll face, is concerning.

How about you?

tjohn7

November 9th, 2015 at 11:10 AM ^

I feel pretty good, especially with how they performed against Sparty.  Obviously would love to have more open rushing lanes, but they've limited the pressure Rudock has been under.  Hopefully they can really gel these next 2 weeks before a monstrous test against OSU.

jblaze

November 9th, 2015 at 11:10 AM ^

it will be because Rudock has a career day and Harbaugh pulls some rabits out of a hat. We never had a chance straight up man-balling it against their line (in fact very few teams could).

alum96

November 9th, 2015 at 12:50 PM ^

I think their defense is also better than last year's.

Lee and Bosa are both 1st round talents.  Guys like Washington will be early draft picks.  They have a few other NFL players in there incl another LB.  Secondary has some holes but we couldnt exploit MSU's which is 100x worse - their front 7 is better than MSU's IMO.

That said a lot of this crap goes out the window on game day for a rivarly as we all know. 

JTrain

November 9th, 2015 at 11:10 AM ^

I had the same question. They definitely seem more than serviceable in a lot of aspects but not dominant. And not to hi-jack this thread...but could someone who really knows football rank our starting 5 OL from best to least...




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ypsituckyboy

November 9th, 2015 at 11:18 AM ^

Don't know football but I read Magnus a lot (and stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night):

1. Glasgow

2. Cole

3. Magnuson

4. Kalis

5. Braden

Cole is playing a bit out of position, though, and would probably be 1 if he played center this year. As it stands, Glasgow is better suited to his position and is ranked higher as a result.

raleighwood

November 9th, 2015 at 11:25 AM ^

I've heard several people mention the possibility of Cole moving inside next year.  Is there any basis for this?  I remember that Harbaugh tried him out at center during the early days but Cole didn't seem to be too excited about it (more like "I'll do whatever the team needs me to do").

My personal impression is that Cole was comfortable at LT and would prefer to stay there.  He may have to battle Newsome for the spot next year.

alum96

November 9th, 2015 at 12:53 PM ^

I think Dawkins is going to be too busy playing basketball to help the OL next year.  Also he is a bit underweight by ehh 80 lbs.

As for the Cole to center thing - due to his weight and size and then talk of him trying there some this spring.  Supposedly he and Kugler both had trouble with getting snaps consistently back.  I understand Cole with the issues as he is not a center his whole life but hearing that about Kugler was troubling.

But who knows - best case scenario is Kugler figures it out and we can keep Cole at tackle or move him to a guard spot and Newsome takes over a tackle.  If Cole goes to center next year it means Kugler is not a starter next year and you need to find guys at other positions.  I'd also like to see someone push Magnuson.

reshp1

November 9th, 2015 at 12:06 PM ^

I'd put Braden up a spot, maybe exen too. He's come a long way this year. I don't recall him leaning and reaching recently like he was doing a lot last year. Drevno's got him playing over his feet much better and he's not getting shed as a result and can finally put his physical attributes to good use.

HateSparty

November 9th, 2015 at 12:12 PM ^

Kalis is th eworst of the five.  He missed a couple obvious run blitzes.  I don't remember where it was in th egame, first half or so and there was a guy up in his gap and he doubled down on the nose and the blitzer flew threw and stopped a third down play.  Ended up punting.  Just looked bad and a simple read for him.

MichiganTeacher

November 9th, 2015 at 12:31 PM ^

Agree. Kalis has been the worst of those five.

Remember him getting literally thrown backwards in the air by Utah? Like you do with your kid in the swimming pool for fun? I mean, it really did look like that.

Anyway, he's improved. But he's still the worst because his magnitude of errors * frequency is highest. At least that's how I see it. IIRC he was at fault on the Peppers -10 run Saturday.

OL on left is far better than on right. Mags... I don't know. But I do know that Cole + Braden >>>>> Kalis + Mags, and it isn't because of Mags being that bad.

Overall, though, the line, including Kalis, is way, way better than a year ago. And compared to two years ago... that wasn't an OL two years ago, it was a hologram. Pretty sure.

UM Fan from Sydney

November 9th, 2015 at 11:11 AM ^

I am very concerned for the PSU and OSU games, but thankfully we have a better defensive line than both of those teams, so both of those will likely be low scoring games.

Maize in Cincy

November 9th, 2015 at 11:12 AM ^

The run game has definitely been a disappointment.  When a team knows the QB can't throw a deep ball that makes a big difference.  They have really struggled on short yardage situations too.  Not sure if it's blocking or just that the 10-11 guys in the box formation isn't working.  Getting Peppers on the field should definitely help going forward.

big10football

November 9th, 2015 at 11:13 AM ^

I think one of the major problems with the running game this year has been our inability to hit deep balls.  If we could capitalize on half or so of our opportunities to hit big plays over the top, it would pull defenders out of the box and open up the running game more. Other than that, i think the O-line has been fine.  I feel like they are being asked to learn a lot this year, and will improve over time. 

The Mad Hatter

November 9th, 2015 at 11:15 AM ^

Not good or great, but fine.  Here's to hoping that they (and Rudock) play their very best on the 28th.

I'm not all that worried about Indiana or PSU.  IU has no defense and Frankin was out-coached by Brady Hoke.

iskey

November 9th, 2015 at 11:16 AM ^

against Rutgers brought back some memories of the last few years under Hoke. I don't know if Rutgers completely sold out to stop the run or what, but it didn't look good to my untrained eye until late in the game.

LSAClassOf2000

November 9th, 2015 at 11:36 AM ^

That's more or less what it was, in my own opinion - Rutgers was basically looking for a run on what seemed like almost every play, even downs that probably could have been managed either way. Rutgers' LBs were responsible for about a third of all their tackles, and most of the time - or so it seemed - they were stopping our RBs for anywhere from 3 to 6 yards. They also did the quasi-Narduzzi backfield and had safeties in near the line on most plays as well. 

Fortunately, if you are an undynamic Rutgers defense, you leave yourself wide open for all of the screens when you do that. 

pdgoblue25

November 9th, 2015 at 11:21 AM ^

The problem is we have an average line with slow RBs, not a good combo.  I would feel a lot better if we had Drake Johnson minus at least one knee injury.

It's like the Ohio State game in 2012, Denard was so great that he was able to cover for a lot of shit.  Everyone in the stadium knew we were running when Denard was in the game and he still ripped off a 70 yard TD.

It's going to take something like that from Peppers in The Game this year since he's our best athlete.  Either a punt return, or some sort of dynamic TD with him on offense.

I dumped the Dope

November 9th, 2015 at 12:18 PM ^

as you've probably seen.  He's been so effective, he's doubly efficient even as a decoy...recall the big gainer to Chesson on a sweep-then-reverse where the entire D was keying on Peppers.

OL, the more I think about it, the more I am happy that Rudock generally has what I consider to be a good amount of time to analyze and throw.  Gardner of seasons past had no time and all it did was to encourage additional defensive aggression, loading the box, etc.

Going forward, put Peppers (and Chesson) on the wings and let them fly the field if the safeties are too close, even if its an arm punt every once in awhile, let them go up and get it at times, Peppers has shown some nice hops when he leapt up to karate chop down that pass over the big tight end.  Get a step on a seam route with a nice throw and its 6.

ak47

November 9th, 2015 at 11:20 AM ^

I'd imagine our run game will continue to struggle the rest of the year until Rudock can make a secondary pay for putting their safeties in the box.  Winning the psu and osu game could pretty easily come down to whether rudock can hit chesson one of the couple times he gets open for a bomb.  If he does that against msu or utah we probably win those games and it will be true for the other good teams we play too. 

PSU's secondary isn't super terrifying so our wr's should still be able to get open against them, I'm not really entirely sure how me move the ball against osu yet.

SF Wolverine

November 9th, 2015 at 11:22 AM ^

they've done a very good job keeping Jake clean this year; if he has slightly better vision/ability to hit people in stride, we are at least one win better, and might be undefeated.  O-line has to get a lot of credit for that.

Rush blocking, not quite so much, although a fair evaluation of that is hard because of the well-documented inability of our back to hits holes that do exist.

readyourguard

November 9th, 2015 at 11:24 AM ^

Fear Level: 9

Not opening up holes against Rutgers was disheartening.  I was actually a little disappointed Saturday, despite winning by 33 points.  I felt like the screen passes bailed us out.  On one hand, that's not very comforting.  On the other, hey, the coaches found a way to successfully move the ball so who am I to complain?

 

ak47

November 9th, 2015 at 11:28 AM ^

The screens worked so well because of the way Rutgers was selling out to stop the run.  They slant their d line like crazy, have linebackers and safeties filling immediatley, there weren't reading and reacting they were just attacking.  That makes a traditional run up the middle pretty hard but opens up the edge and screen game.  I don't really care how we get our yards as long as we get them.  Rutgers played a stupid defense predicated entirely on stopping runs up the middle and the result was we scored 49 points and pulled our starters in the 4th.

readyourguard

November 9th, 2015 at 11:45 AM ^

The formula of slanting the line and selling out on the run has worked against us.  I suspect the remaining teams on the schedule will do the same.  The difference is, they're lines (PSU and OSU) are superior to Rutgers, and their DBs won't be freshmen. 

 

I'm glad we exploited Rutgers' D.  It's something we could never do under Hoke.  The problem is, what happens when we face better teams and the screens are better defended?

BigCat14

November 9th, 2015 at 3:34 PM ^

The problem is, what happens when we face better teams and the screens are better defended?  

 

IMO I do not think we give up another special teams TD?  the score looks even more favorable for us without that.  I believe a Harbaugh led team will shore those mistakes up and our special teams will play tough.  Which means long fields against our stout D.  We may not score as many as 49?  In each remaining game however good or bad the opponent may be I believe we score more than the other team in atLEAST 2/3 games.  

OSU game comes down to playmakers and which D/special teams can stop the others!  I believe our line will be enough to win the remaining games on our schedule.  The O line and Rudock make people nervous.  Good, not great, RBs & WRs plus Peppers and a great D give me and many fans an excited feeling of we have a legit chance to win!  

 

Go Blue!

ehatch

November 9th, 2015 at 11:25 AM ^

I'm OK with the offensive line play.  The bigger problems are the inability to hit the deep ball to push the safeties farther back, and the running backs not hitting holes.  

BigCat14

November 9th, 2015 at 3:44 PM ^

I think the poster above your comment was nMkaczor?  He mentioned that our O line is serviceable enough to give our playmakers a chance.  Which I upvoted because I agree.  Then I read your post and said to myself this guys is right as well.  The recruiting prowess, the physical tools and the overall maturity of the group should have translated to somewhat 'dominance'.  However, I wonder if even with the above mentioned specifics that they were so poorly coached that this is like a freshman year in a new system?  With this being the main reason that they are not as dominant as many believe they should be?  

 

Go Blue!

 

 

Filipiak1

November 9th, 2015 at 11:28 AM ^

Pass protection is pretty good. Run block is not much better than last year. Rushing stats are purely because of Harbaugh's refusal to not rush for positive yards. We will rush 100 times for 100yds.

jmblue

November 9th, 2015 at 11:34 AM ^

Our run blocking isn't bad.  The problems have been twofold: 1) our RBs don't have great vision and often fail to let the blockers set up the play and 2) opposing defenses are very frequently cheating up their safeties to outnumber our blockers.  Rutgers did this essentially the entire game.  The way to get that to stop is to beat them with the passing game.  

 

mrkid

November 9th, 2015 at 11:29 AM ^

Running game is a concern for me. The OL is solid in pass protection, on screen plays, etc but the running game is very frustrating to me.

I do think its a combination of RB/OL in the running game though. RBs not having any vision and OL not opening holes at times. I wish we could see Drake for an entire game because he has bursts where it seems to work.

That being said, I think Harbaugh is so efficient in using the talent level he has to where he can put the OL in the best position to succeed by calling plays that don't stretch beyong their abilities. It felt like coaches in the past kept depending on players to play beyond their abilities.