kidhawk":3g7dufae said:
Somehow I can't help but think this Nowak/Britt/Gilliam experiment has gone horribly wrong and we should have stuck with LJP, Baily & Britt all along. They wouldn't have been pro bowlers, but I have to believe they'd at least be average.
This is where I'm at.
I think it's true that OL play across the league is down. But that merely results in many teams with "NFL-awful" OL play.
We come up against OLs like STL and DET that are "NFL-awful". But that seems much better than what we are seeing with our line, which is making any old crappy defense look unstoppable. Instead of in the past, when we had more actual OL players, and we only looked this awful against a few teams with ferocious front 7s.
If they can't run block there is zero redeeming quality. PA is dead, and since that's our best chance at pass protection, pass protection dies with it.
It seems like a bad decision by both Pete and Cable. If you want to try this experiment with one guy ala Sweezy, you can suffer through some struggles to see if you have something there. Trying the experiment at multiple spots when your only anchor is Russell Okung is a disaster.
It's not just youth. STL started a bunch of newbies against our formidable defensive line and did not get outright dominated like our line has been dominated.