Run blocking was really poor

[Northhawk]

3. Agree on the run blocking, but Marshawn is making it harder. At the end of many games we love him for it, but Lynch has stopped powering through the open gap for a guaranteed gain of 3+, and is now trying to make his own holes by running laterally. Add that to poor run blocking, where defenders are getting into the backfield in under 2 seconds and he's getting stuffed behind the LoS on half his run plays.

I love Beastmode but I noticed the same thing the last several games. He has missed some glaring holes. Might be easier to spot from the comfort of our couches but I was getting worried about it when he seemed to tail-off in 2nd half of the season.

It's like RW -- they don't seem to be confident in the O-line. Not sure I blame them.

Lovin' the moment but there's always room for improvement and I hope they will address our oline in the offseason.

 

[ManBunts]

C'mon people, are we really complaining about this? An entire season of doubts, you'd think after winning the Super Bowl you'd let them go for now. They had 8 in the box every time. Their whole defensive game plan was "Stop Lynch". It's not Unger's fault, it's not our OC's. There's a point at which you have to stop blaming people and give credit to the other team.

Besides, if we didn't have a solid o-line our passing game wouldn't have done nearly as well as it did. If we didn't have a creative OC we wouldn't have run the outside sweep, twice, or tried the flea flicker. Yeah it failed this time, but not the first time. So for all the complaints about the O-line, they got the job done and got it done well.

Maybe you're full, but after all these years I want MORE Super Bowls. I'm already wondering how we can improve this team. I"m sure P&J are too.

Not full at all. This group is so young and so talented I think we can do this again and again and again and again...and I don't disagree that there are things to be made better, but to attempt to lay this all on our o-line I think is a poor analysis.

 

[HawKnPeppa]

Harvin didn't seem to have any trouble running against the Broncs.

That was all off misdirection plays, plus by the team he was done screaming past the scrum the Broncos defenders had no clue what the hell happened.

'Screaming' past the scrum? That would suggest Percy is FAST when somebody on this board already told us that he is only 'QUICK.' Blazing around the end on 2 fly sweeps 'quick,' and pulling away from all pursuit 'quick' on his way to the end zone on that return. How 'quick' was that?! How dare you disagree with combine numbers! He's not faster than Tate! :lol: :lol: :lol: :roll:

 

[Tokadub]

I'm gonna have to re-watch the game very soon but of course I noticed our run game up the middle went no where, and in previous games our pass protection has seemed non-existent.

I think our offensive line is hands down our biggest weakness so hopefully Schneider and Carroll can work some magic at that position. I've never been overly impressed with Unger or Okung to be honest despite them being pro bowlers. Just have never really seen that kind of dominance from them, certainly not this year with the injuries. Everyone seems kinda just good not great type guys and we have a few that seem straight up bad but every once in awhile i will see a nice play from them which sorta redeems them.

But anyways, it was probably just the broncos don't have great pass rushers but I was loving how well we protected Wilson! Zero sacks and 0 turnovers in Super Bowl are you kidding me?! We are first team to do that in Super Bowl!

Personally I would take that kinda pass protection every time if I had to choose between Wilson able to perform his best or our running game struggle. But then again I've always thought our recievers were incredibly underrated due to our offensive game plan and Wilson likes to spread the ball to everyone keeps them all motivated and sharp I think. I even said last year we don't need to get any more receivers our guys are very good... Never thought we could get Harvin though when I made that comment he's perfect for our style when healthy and really compliments us. But really we could of probably won Super Bowl without Harvin AND no Sidney Rice... Talk about pedestrian right haha. Only game I'm not sure if we win without Harvin was vs. the Saints, I think we would though.

But anyways I think we need big improvement at o-line for run blocking but even more importantly pass protection.

I was really happy with our offense as a whole but when I re-watch game I'll be sure to watch our offensive line extra close. Bevell really came through for us though, he seemed to actually recognize to exploit their secondary and to be unpredictable which failing to do so in the past was his biggest weakness in past losses, gotta give him and Russell props for showing up huge in the game. Even if our defense owned the game I've been waiting all year for us to show a game like this when our run is struggling.

 

[Zebulon Dak]

The O line was terrible. We only had 135 yds rushing at almost 5 yds per carry and gave up 0 sacks, the first team ever to do that in a Super Bowl. I say we replace them all.

 

[zhawk]

Haha if the run blocking was better and we had a competent OC we would have won 122 - 8. Speaking of that 8 our corners need to get better, plain and simple.

:sarcasm_on:

this! :13:

 

[Throwdown]

The O line was terrible. We only had 135 yds rushing at almost 5 yds per carry and gave up 0 sacks, the first team ever to do that in a Super Bowl. I say we replace them all.

Lol I'd say Zeb's had enough

 

[Blitzer88]

Really Unger was the most glaring weakness in our run blocking to me. I thought the others did alright, it was just whoever Unger was assigned to block always just seem to blow him backwards and into Marshawn thus causing major problems in the backfield.

 

[BASF]

First, the Denver defense is very good at run defense. DVOA allows for the situational football that some have brought up about the score making teams abandon the run:

Denver vs the run -14.4%; Niners (who everyone marvels that Marshawn keeps going over 100 yards against) vs the run -8.1%

Second, we have been extremely good all season about running early to set stuff up late. It is an aspect of football that gets very little love from media and fans. Pete has touched on it in several of his press conferences. They run stuff to see how the defense responds to it, then make the adjustments at halftime and come out and attack the way the defense played the stuff earlier. Most people attribute this to the defense getting tired (which is part of it), but watching the plays and the formations closely you can see that there are small variations that make for larger gains later.

Third, the combination blocks were not there in the first half since the Broncos were run blitzing on quite a few plays early, thus taking away the ability to combo block.

 

[SoulfishHawk]

43-8

 

[hangumhi]

It will be interesting to see if any other corps take on their own identity like the LOB. I would like the o'line to have more tenacity and swag. Breno was vastly subdued this season which really helped keep his penalties in check but I liked his attitude better last year...A bit of a passed off maniac.

 

[Basis4day]

I think many posters are missing the fact that the team just finished 19 football games. No player is truly "healthy" this late in the season and quite a few Lineman missed games this year because of injury. Do you really think they're truly healed when they get cleared to play? Far from it. Your right guard is in his second year at the position and your LT delayed surgery on his toe and is getting it taken care of in the offseason. The goal of the O-Line changed pretty clearly when the Hawks had a significant lead and started to kill the clock. Now add Lynch having 300 carries this season and played in the Superbowl that had a pretty good run Defense and sold out to stop him. Lynch BTW, had over 100 yards against both the Saints and the Niners in the postseason.

 

[Lords of Scythia]

I don't know who was making the calls, but Unger was 1 on 1 with Knighton alot and got blown up every time.

Then they kept switching Carp and Mq and you could tell it messed with chemistry b/c guys blew assignments right and left. Double teaming one guy and letting another blow right by.

Okung was bad, getting thrown in the ground by a LB, pushed back in to Russell by 91, lunging and falling on his face.

MkieRob want much better, ran right through a hole, and right past a guy that tackled Lynch.

There were no names in the backfield way too much.

Don't get me wrong, I'm excited by the win, but watching it over again,Marshawn 19 runs for less than 40 yards? Denver is NOT that good.

I'm beginning to think maybe Cable is getting too cute with the offensive line blocking schemes and the only thing saving him is Marshawns tree trunk legs.

Watching this game, and the nfccg, blocks the guys chose when away from the LOS were dumbfounding. On a Percy run, Zach blocks a LB and let's the DB get by for the tackle. On a Russell scramble in the nfccg, Unger lets a LB go and chases a DT, result, RW gets blown up. No DT is going to catch Russell, but SFs LBs are another story.

I think there is a lot of work to be done with the offensive line before next year if Russell Wilson and Marshawn Lynch are going to have any kind of long term success. RW took a beating mid-year, i don't ever want to see that again.

To reiterate, i couldn't be happier about being SuperB Owl Champions! But I don't want a repeat of the poor line play I saw this year because I don't want to go back to the pre-Russell Wilson era.

Okung still has issues from his toe surgery. The Seahawks are looking into another surgery.

 

[3Girls'HawkDad]

We didn't do a good job on the flea flicker

 

[iigakusei]

We didn't do a good job on the flea flicker

Bevell Sucks.

 

[ivotuk]

The O line was terrible. We only had 135 yds rushing at almost 5 yds per carry and gave up 0 sacks, the first team ever to do that in a Super Bowl. I say we replace them all.

While the stats you quote are true, they don't accurately reflect run blocking. Jim Mora and Greg Knapp in Atlanta led the league in rushing. It means nothing except that other people besides your main running back are getting yards.

Percy Harvin and Russell Wilson got most of those yards rushing outside. The run blocking was poor, Marshawn had 15 carries for a measly 39 yards, or 2.6 ypc. Unger kept getting blown up by Pot Roast and he had no help which was puzzling considering Knighton's success at run stuffing this year. And Trevathan, was all over the place, making linemen look silly, but he's been doing that all year.

After rewatching the game I saw that other players on the line did poorly also, as I noted in the original post. So you can't judge run blocking based on a single stat.

And you can't base the future on one game that will be 4 months old by the time they play again. This year has had it's ups and downs in the running game and I believe we need improvement there to succeed in winning the NFCW again next year.

If we do nothing about the run blocking, it will be someone else hosting the playoffs in the NFCW.

 

[3Girls'HawkDad]

When Kam picked off the ball, he didn't return it for a touchdown