The Oline

[MKnight82]

The Oline has looked like garbage through the first 3 weeks. I think this has been exasperated by moving to Wentz, who tends to stay in the pocket for a long time vs. a scrambler like Heinicke, but its also due to the lack of investment via draft picks. How did we get here? 

2019 Washington Oline depth chart: 

LT: Trent Williams, Donald Penn

LG: Ereck Flowers, Tony Bergstrom

OC: Chase Roullier, Ross Pierschbacher

RG: Brandon Scherff, Wes Martin

RT: Morgan Moses, Geron Christian

 

- Trent Williams had that weird head cancer scare and didn't play the majority of this season, we signed Donald Penn who actually started for us. Ereck Flowers played 99.6% of all snaps at LG this season. This was Chase Roullier's 2nd season as the entrenched starter at Center, and Brandon Scherff had his typical random injuries only making in on the field for 68.3% of all snap counts. Then there was Morgan Moses who was at this point a 5th year starter at RT. Pierschbacher, Martin and Christian were all mid round pick depth by the former regime. This is the last year of Gruden and Bruce, its basically what Rivera inherited when he came in. 

 

2020 Washington Oline depth chart: 

LT: Cornelius Lucas, Geron Christian

LG: Wes Schweitzer, Saahdiq Charles

OC: Chase Roullier, Keith Ismael

RG: Brandon Scherff, Wes Martin

RT: Morgan Moses, David Sharpe

 

- One of the first moves the new regime made was trading All Pro LT Trent Williams (possibly the best olineman in football) to the 49ers for a 5th round pick and future 3rd (which became Center Keith Ismael and CB Benjamin St-Juste). Keith Ismael is no longer on our roster, and is ironically with the 49ers. To start the year they decide to let Geron Christian have a shot to prove he can start (which makes sense, he was a 3rd round investment by the team), but he sucked, got injured and then really his career never recovers. Surprisingly they sign Cornelius Lucas to a super cheap deal and he proves to be somewhat solid, and honestly a steal cap wise for a starting LT. Christian ends up getting injured and we swap a 6th for a 7th with the Raiders for David Sharpe, who in his limited snaps also looked surprisingly solid. At LG, we don't even offer Ereck Flowers a contract and he leaves for the Dolphins in free agency, despite the fact that he played relatively well the year before and played almost every snap. In order to make up for this, the front office has to sign FA Wes Schweitzer and spend a 4th round pick on Saahdiq Charles. Schweitzer has been solid, but is probably best in a reserve role, and Charles has never shown enough to be a starter anywhere on the line. The rest of the line was basically inherited with little changes. The big takeaways from this season is that they dumped Trent Williams for pennies on the dollar and created an unnecessary need by not retaining Flowers and then having to spend multiple resources patching up what holes they had created (which is a reoccurring theme with this FO). 

 

2021 Washington Oline depth chart: 

LT: Charles Leno, Cornelius Lucas

LG: Ereck Flowers, Wes Schweitzer

OC: Chase Roullier, Keith Ismael

RG: Brandon Scherff, Tyler Larsen

RT: Sam Cosmi, Saahdiq Charles

 

- So the FO decides to swap late round picks to the Dolphins to reacquire Ereck Flowers to start again at LG, which is very little to pay resource wise but a little puzzling when you remember they didn't even bother to make him a FA offer in 2020, and then outright cut him in 2022. So they identified that this guy was not worth keeping, but somehow brought him in to start the entire season for 2021. He proceeded to play 94% of all offensive snaps in 2021. Washington then drafts OT Sam Cosmi in the 2nd round, a guy known as more of a finesse pass blocker during the draft process, and everyone is like oh that's a great fit we just found our new starting LT. Well not so fast.  A month later the team cuts long term starting RT Morgan Moses and signs Charles Leno who was just cut by the Bears. This creates an unnecessary hole at RT, which means our new rookie has to move to RT. Call me old fashioned, but I like a big run mauler at RT, which isn't how I would describe Sam Cosmi. It is noted that the Jets decided not to retain Morgan Moses after he started 16 games for them last year, but I still question the decision to make Cosmi a full time RT. Leno for his part has been solid at LT, but I question whether Moses couldn't have been just as solid at RT for us and then kept Cosmi at his more natural LT position, the pairing of Cosmi/Moses vs Leno/Cosmi is just a better fit IMO. The rest of the line remained relatively the same. 

 

2022 Washington Oline depth chart: 

LT: Charles Leno, Cornelius Lucas

LG: Andrew Norwell, Chris Paul

OC: Chase Roullier, Nick Martin

RG: Trai Turner, Wes Schweitzer

RT: Sam Cosmi, Saahdiq Charles

 

- Other than Chase Roullier, this is the year Rivera has completely turned over the Oline from the previous regime. All other 9 olineman have been brought in by this current FO. That includes one 2nd round pick (Cosmi), one 4th round pick (Charles), one 7th round pick (Paul), and a bunch of journeyman FA signings.  Not 1 marquee FA signing, only 1 high draft pick (who's playing out of position). The big changes here are at Guard, where Andrew Norwell was signed to replace Flowers, and it was touted as bringing in a similar player at half the cost. This is despite the fact that Norwell had struggled with the Jaguars (he was the one of the most penalized Olineman in football last year) and turning 30 years old. Then there's Trai Turner, who's on his 4th team in 4 years and was just handed the starting RG spot. This decision was made after letting multiple time Pro Bowl Guard Brandon Scherff leave in free agency. 

 

So what's the conclusion of this? I would argue every starting spot on the offensive line other than Chase Roullier (who hasn't changed) is a downgrade from the 2019 oline Rivera inherited. We had two legitimate superstars in Trent Williams and Brandon Scherff who are now gone, a solid starter in Ereck Flowers who we've dumped twice now (and is still out there available if we want him) and a solid starter in Morgan Moses, who we replaced unnecessarily early to shoehorn a finesse LT prospect to play out of position. I do think our depth is probably superior to the 2019 squad, and they've done a decent job of finding good cheap value in free agency there, but we don't have those superstar talents to lift up the rest of the oline.  To get those players you have to spend premium draft picks on them. 

[aceinthehouse]

As much as we all want to blame the O-line right now, I don't think that's the main problem.

Is it a talent issue? Perhaps...

But Dallas just started 40 yr old Jason Peters who wasn't even in game shape & the cowboys made out alright.

 

Some want to blame Wentz for holding the ball too long. Ok...He just had a press conference admitting that he needs to get rid of the ball sooner. 

So is Wentz the issue? Perhaps

 

But me personally....I'm putting our putrid play square on the shoulders of our coaching. Offense, Defense..everything.

From Rivera's stupid 2-pt attempt vs the Lions, when he didn't need to do it.

To just flat out bad game management, time clock awareness & no urgency among the players to win.

Now, do we have issues along the O-Line, LBers, secondary, kicking, etc?

Absolutely...

But I feel this team came out defeated in the Eagles game, before it ever started. They were mentally unprepared, or afraid.

It is the coaches responsibility to not only create a good gameplan vs his opponents, but to have them mentally prepared to win no matter the circumstances.

I'm beginning to feel that Rivera or Del Rio do NOT inspire these players to give their all. 

Why that is, who knows?

But if we do get a new coach after the season, I would hope they would get a younger non re-read coach with energy.

Cause what I saw vs Philly, was pathetic.

Imo, this should be Rivera's/Del Rio's last season, unless he/they can miraculously turn it around.

What would be my requirement, for them to stay?

A winning season. 9-8 or better.

It doesn't have to be playoffs, but a winning record. Otherwise, they'd be gone.

 

[e16bball]

Very good recap of how we got to where we are. 

The way they’ve handled Ereck Flowers has absolutely got to sum up the point I was making in the other thread about lack of a coherent plan. Full-time starter, no FA offer, trade to get him back, full-time starter, cut. It’s enough to make your head spin. 

The scariest part about what we saw on Sunday is that one of the things I’ve been counting on to give us a chance moving forward on offense is John Matsko. He’s taken a lot of different pieces and made them work since he got here. Last year, he gets handed Leno (discarded by CHI), Flowers (discarded by MIA and by us), Roullier (plus several other centers), Scherff (12 games worth), and Cosmi (rookie in need of a lot of polishing) — and they end up as a pretty elite group overall. That’s really impressive coaching to turn those guys into a good, cohesive unit with basically 3 extremely new parts. 

My hope was perhaps that we might have the ability to get by with lesser OL talent — or at least lesser investment in OL talent — because of the quality of the coaching and the system. I know I’m stealing @naptownskinsfan’s shtick here, but that’s kinda what we Orioles fans are hoping we might have when it comes to starting pitching, in terms of the ability to get solid results from minimal investments. It’s a monstrous competitive advantage if you don’t have to spend big on a thing that most other teams have to invest in heavily. 

But seeing the OL play so far, it feels like it may have been hubris to have thought that our staff could cobble together any old guys into a solid OL unit. They’ve been far from solid, and the regression from Cosmi is the most concerning part of it all.

[IHatesnyder]

Charles Leno is overrated 

and has declined since he got that contract 

bears fans warned us … he should of been a one year deal. And we should had just drafted a tackle second round last year instead of Mathis .

[e16bball]

1 hour ago, IHatesnyder said:

Charles Leno is overrated 

and has declined since he got that contract 

bears fans warned us … he should of been a one year deal. And we should had just drafted a tackle second round last year instead of Mathis .

Just had the chance to watch the Philly game back again, and while I’m no great expert in OL play, it seemed to me that Leno was definitely the least of the problems on the OL. He had those couple false starts, and he did get beat for one sack, but he didn’t struggle quite as much as the rest. 

Behind him, I’d actually say Trai Turner probably had the least struggles — but they were largely using him to give help, the other guys were mostly blocking on an island against the 4-man rush.

Norwell struggled a good bit, but he was still better than Schweitzer and Cosmi. Wes just wasn’t able to hold up at center against those monsters they have in the interior DL — couldn’t snap it and then get out of his stance fast enough to anchor against the likes of Cox and Hargrave and Davis. And Cosmi was just awful. He got beaten by basically everyone. 
 

As for the draft, I’m not sure Round 2 was the spot for an OT. The position was really picked over at that point, with Petit-Frere from OSU being the first true OT taken after pick 48 (he went #69). What we need is a true LT, and its awfully tough to find one of those at that point in the draft — tends to be one of the two positions, along with QB, that you really need to take in the 1st round to get a good shot at a star. Once the Ekwonu/Neal/Cross trio went before our first pick, I would have been out on OT as well.

[Jeezy Fanatic]

#BringBackEreck

[IHatesnyder]

6 hours ago, e16bball said:

Just had the chance to watch the Philly game back again, and while I’m no great expert in OL play, it seemed to me that Leno was definitely the least of the problems on the OL. He had those couple false starts, and he did get beat for one sack, but he didn’t struggle quite as much as the rest. 

Behind him, I’d actually say Trai Turner probably had the least struggles — but they were largely using him to give help, the other guys were mostly blocking on an island against the 4-man rush.

Norwell struggled a good bit, but he was still better than Schweitzer and Cosmi. Wes just wasn’t able to hold up at center against those monsters they have in the interior DL — couldn’t snap it and then get out of his stance fast enough to anchor against the likes of Cox and Hargrave and Davis. And Cosmi was just awful. He got beaten by basically everyone. 
 

As for the draft, I’m not sure Round 2 was the spot for an OT. The position was really picked over at that point, with Petit-Frere from OSU being the first true OT taken after pick 48 (he went #69). What we need is a true LT, and its awfully tough to find one of those at that point in the draft — tends to be one of the two positions, along with QB, that you really need to take in the 1st round to get a good shot at a star. Once the Ekwonu/Neal/Cross trio went before our first pick, I would have been out on OT as well.

I like wentz but his reputation is holding on the the ball to long . But when the offensive line gives him time he makes people pay. 
I think he rebounds this game but OL has to step up along with turner .

Edited September 29, 2022 by IHatesnyder

[mar29020]

AT LEAST WE GOT SOME FORMER PANTHERS!!!

[offbyone]

1 hour ago, mar29020 said:

AT LEAST WE GOT SOME FORMER PANTHERS!!!

I think there is another former panther available at center, so that wouldn't surprise me.

Norwell and Turner are disasters right now, that is for sure.   I would really like to see Schweitzer back at RG.  He is fine as a spot center and might improve after some consistency at the position.  But having him start at center all season, I think that is a bad idea.  

By the way, with all the Ereck Flowers talk, correct me if I am wrong, is he not still available?  No one picked him up, correct?  

[e16bball]

10 hours ago, IHatesnyder said:

I like wentz but his reputation is holding on the the ball to long . But when the offensive line gives him time he makes people pay. 
I think he rebounds this game but OL has to step up along with turner .

Definitely. A couple of those sacks were on Wentz just not getting rid of the ball. And some of it seems like not being able to set protections or make adjustments at the line (stop me if you’ve heard that one before).

There’s a play early on, during that rash of sacks, where we kept both TEs in to block. Max protection. Playaction, only two receivers out in routes. They bring four, but only from Wentz’s right side, which is the opposite of where the TEs are lined up. Graham is the stand-up DE on the side with the two TEs, and he just drops off into shallow coverage. The right side of the OL is singled-up blocking, Turner against Cox (huge mismatch) and Reddick against Cosmi (mismatch on Sunday at least) — while the two TEs just stand there looking around and blocking air. Sometimes you just guess wrong, but it was an absolutely awful look. Two guys out in routes against 7 in coverage, and yet you’re still singled up on their two best pass-rushers. 

There’s one later where he absolutely could have gotten the ball out to Dotson on a quasi-checkdown and just holds it. That one was baffling. 

But in short, you’re right. A lot of blame to go around. They need to figure some things out in a hurry. 

[MikeT14]

11 hours ago, mar29020 said:

AT LEAST WE GOT SOME FORMER PANTHERS!!!

 

[butz65]

our O line sucks balls.  Next. 

[lavar703]

So the guy we cut Ereck Flowers for for benched for Saddiq Charles. This is how well Rivera is doing as GM. 

[MKnight82]

6 minutes ago, lavar703 said:

So the guy we cut Ereck Flowers for for benched for Saddiq Charles. This is how well Rivera is doing as GM. 

No Flowers started at LG.  Turner, who was benched, plays RG.  The guy we just benched replaced multiple pro bowl RG Brandon Scherff.

[TKellion]

What a freakin joke today.couldnt block a HS Dline lol.