Good Gawd Our Offensive line sucks!

Rewatching the game, and everyone from left guard to right tackle are saying "Ole!" as soon as the ball is hiked! Bailey is the worst culprit letting Calais Campbell run right up the middle at Russell. 6'7" Calais Campbell.

Then poor Marshawn is getting met in the backfield by defensive linemen that are coming through untouched!

This shit has been going on far too long and I lay this at the feet of Tom Cable. He's getting paid a lot of money to whiff on draft picks and put together shitty offensive lines.

Russell Wilson and Marshawn Lynch are getting brutalized and have been since Russell got here! 7 sacks! 7! That doesn't count the times he was hit or threw an incomplete pass because there were people in his grill!

And poor Marshawn, no wonder his back hurts! He is literally carrying this team, and carrying 320 pound defensive players on his back.

For all the "fire coach X" threads I see around here, it al starts with the offensive line. It doesn't matter what play you call if the offensive line is doing it's best imitation of Dutch Windmills.

He's had long enough, and spent enough money and draft picks that we should have one of the better lines in the NFL. The Patriots take a bunch of scrubs, shuffle them around and now Tom Brady can stand there all day and throw the ball.

We all saw what happened to Brady early in the year when his offensive line couldn't block squat. And the Patriots have a running game! They are averaging 113 yards per game, and their RB doesn't get hit until he's past the LOS. Do you know how many sacks they allowed against the former number one defense? Zero.

So why, after 3 years, 1st round picks, 2nd round picks, 4th round picks, and millions of dollars is Russell still getting hammered and Lynch getting trucked in the backfield?

The thing that really gets my goat though, is that Russell's career is getting shorter and shorter with each hit that he takes from 300 pound plus defensive linemen who are at full speed because no one blocked them.

When is it going to change? When we fire Cable, that's when.

7-3, sitting in the 6 spot.
19-3 win over the team with the best record in the league.

I'll go ahead and enjoy the win

Yes we won but that doesn't have anything to do with the OP. We are winning in spite of the Oline. It has more to do with RWs magic and Lynch's ability to run after contact. I am not sure if it is coaching, the talent or the scheme but there is something seriously wrong with the protections and to run blocking assignments.

This year has been the worst when it comes to free runners and one of these times RW is going to get hammered. When he is getting carted off the field I doubt we'll care whether or not we won the game or what our record is..

Tom Cables mystic is wearing thin IMO. if we had any other RB besides Lynch we'd be in major trouble with no run game and no ability to pass

Britt probably had his roughest game of the year as did Bailey. I think having Lem back in there with his familiarity of the offense and lines calls could help a little bit.

I expect to see Carp starting this week, and possibly Lem too. We can't run the ball that badly on Thursday (Wilson aside).

How dare Bailey let Calais Campbell come up the middle, we all know what a slouch that 6'7 monster is. It kills me to see posts like this. The offensive line was not very good on Sunday but they were up against a very good defense and all of them outside of Okung are almost rookies. I watched the game again tonight and I saw a 10 yard run by Marshawn late in the game where they completely blew Arizona off the line. It will come, we just need to have a little more patience! It is a sad place where we are disappointed in a 19-3 win (where we took a knee inside the 5 at the end of the game) against the #1 team in football at this point. Yes, maybe it should have been a blow out but this team still played a very good game. Were you at the stadium during the Mora years? When was the last time you watched a Seahawk game where we didn't at least have a shot for the win in the 4th quarter? it has been a few years. How about looking at the positives, the product this organization is giving us the last few years is the best in football.

SoulfishHawk":3jfx9il5 said:

7-3, sitting in the 6 spot.
19-3 win over the team with the best record in the league.

I'll go ahead and enjoy the win

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Hate to burst your bubble but we have 4 losses not 3. And yes our line suuuuuuuuucks!!!!

Russell Okung played his best game of the season. Playing all 61 snaps, he didn't allow a single pressure in the game. He also didn't have a penalty -- hasn't committed one since week six. And PFF gave him his best run blocking grade since the 2012 season.

Britt, Lewis, Bailey, and Sweezy all had bad games. Bailey allowed his first QB hit and sack of his short career. And Lewis looked completely overwhelmed at the point of attack.

Strangely, Garry Gilliam did not play a snap after playing well the last couple games. Tukuafu played just nine snaps, his lowest number of the season.

seabowl":2mphf5ut said:

SoulfishHawk":2mphf5ut said:

7-3, sitting in the 6 spot.
19-3 win over the team with the best record in the league.

I'll go ahead and enjoy the win

Click to expand...

Hate to burst your bubble but we have 4 losses not 3. And yes our line suuuuuuuuucks!!!!

Click to expand...

Yeah, they aren't world beaters, but it's insane how much better they get with Unger in there targeting them properly. If we could EVER keep the same five people for more than a couple of games, we might actually have some consistency in that area. You could finally see the run game waking up in the 4 quarter. Unger could have figured that out much, much earlier, but that was a positive sign.

I'd still rather see LJP start, with Unger out for injury.

Yep, the OLine sucks. They all should have worn capes on Sunday, Russell thankfully somehow survived 6 sacks or was it 7?
Funny though, the OLine sucked last season too, and the team won the Lombardi. Hmmmm?

It has become clear to me that the protection of Russell is less important to the team than we would like. AZ plays very solid D and blitzed a lot, the Hawks took advantage some and yet RW got rubbed with prejudice a few more times than he should have been. This is nothing new and at some point he will get hurt because of the crappy protection. What was doubly bad on Sunday was the OLine which is really better suited for running was up against one of the best running D's in the NFL , so they were quite leaky and weren't very effective run blocking either.

The only good thing that can be said about them is they got better in the 4th Q. I still wonder how good RW could be with these WRs if he had some time to look around instead of always having to throw on the run or when scrambling away from instant pressure?

I was happy with the W but still believe the OLine is the reason why the whole O is struggling somewhat in the passing game.

The O-line did struggle early, but some of those sacks were on RW being cautious. I believe the gameplan was to do everything to avoid turnovers. That's how Arizona has built a 9-1 record. Carroll knew that you have to make the Cardinals O earn every yard and judging from the results it was a great plan.

The O-line must be addressed in the offseason, however. Having Wilson get hit on every down isn't going to make a very long career for him.

Wait a darn minute here...................don't you know the real problem is Wilson holding the ball too long?
:sarcasm_off:



I'm only being partially sarcastic here. But it does get tiresome at times reading all about the problems in pass pro being anything and everything but the offensive line. Yes, Russ holds the ball too long at times, yes the WRs don't get open far too often, yes Bevell's concepts/formation calls sometimes suck, but the o-line IS below average as well. Russ' ability to escape/dodge pass rushers and Beast's ability to break tackles make this line look better than it is, pure and simple. For those of you that constantly point to everything but the o-line, it's time to start being fair and looking at the whole picture. The o-line IS below average.

Sounds like Bailey had a rough game. In fairness to him, having a 4th string C next to him ain't gonna help against a guy like Campbell (who is a REALLY good player).

I notice that not a lot of people are considering the impact of having a fourth-string center in there. Rob Rang mentioned that fourth-string C Patrick Lewis is needing help with the line calls and is forcing our guards to pinch inside for pass protection, leaving the tackles on an island. Lewis is pretty terrible. Centers are the ones making the line calls and Unger is obviously far and away better.

Even then, I remember a number of plays where Russell Wilson had quite a while to throw. He still didn't find anyone.

Additionally, you're seeing one of the fastest, most athletic, most aggressively blitzing defensive lines in the NFL (if not THE most), and they get away with it relentlessly because they know Russell Wilson has no weapons to punish the blitz over the middle and couldn't see them consistently even if he had them. I don't know why more teams don't do this.

All that said, on the drives when it was bad, it was the worst look for our offensive line since the Rams game.

But it hasn't been this bad all season.

And we're the ones who won a Super Bowl last year. Brady, for all his offensive line prowess, hasn't won one in a decade.

Bailey might be the worst lineman we've had in a long time.

For some reason he kept letting his man go through unblocked and trying to get to a LB?........and half the time it wasn't even on screens. So I'm confused at that blocking tactic.

But yeah, SF now has a healthy D-line, so they're going to do exactly what Arizona did, stuff the box to stop Lynch and force Russell to throw........not news to us cause this is what they always do. So Russell's going to have to make some plays downfield.

I'll start blaming Cable when we get the same result from the same offensive line.
It's not like he always gets Okung, Carp, Unger, Sweezy, and Britt for every game (Or whatever the starters were in past years).

Losing Unger matters. A lot.

Basis4day":k9i6qz48 said:

I'll start blaming Cable when we get the same result from the same offensive line.
It's not like he always gets Okung, Carp, Unger, Sweezy, and Britt for every game (Or whatever the starters were in past years).

Losing Unger matters. A lot.

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Just a question...Isn't it Cable's job to prepare each lineman to play? So the next man up should be ready to play if the starters are unable to go. Aren't these guys the ones that Cable wanted - he is, after all, the assistant coach and I'm sure has influence on who they bring in. I don't give him a pass for that.

I do agree that not having Unger is a big loss. Hopefully LJP is ready to go against the 49ers and that should help out since he is familiar with the calls, etc.

Reading through this topic it occurs to me that I don't think I have enough information to make an opinion, so I did a little research.

Field Gulls published a piece on it that might be helpful to this discussion.

http://www.fieldgulls.com/football-brea ... -tom-cable

hawkfan68":171wud0x said:

Basis4day":171wud0x said:

I'll start blaming Cable when we get the same result from the same offensive line.
It's not like he always gets Okung, Carp, Unger, Sweezy, and Britt for every game (Or whatever the starters were in past years).

Losing Unger matters. A lot.

Click to expand...

Just a question...Isn't it Cable's job to prepare each lineman to play? So the next man up should be ready to play if the starters are unable to go. Aren't these guys the ones that Cable wanted - he is, after all, the assistant coach and I'm sure has influence on who they bring in. I don't give him a pass for that..

Click to expand...

There's a reason the starters are the starters, and backups and practice squad players are backups and practice squad players...........talent and experience.

"Next man up" is just a feel good buzzword phrase that everyone uses. It doesn't equate to the next man up having the skills and experience to replace the starter without their being a drop off. I don't care if the ghost of Vince Lombardi is coaching him.

Blitzer88":3bhiclt0 said:

Britt probably had his roughest game of the year as did Bailey. I think having Lem back in there with his familiarity of the offense and lines calls could help a little bit.

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He has been garbage all season

Sgt. Largent":3oo42aye said:

hawkfan68":3oo42aye said:

Basis4day":3oo42aye said:

I'll start blaming Cable when we get the same result from the same offensive line.
It's not like he always gets Okung, Carp, Unger, Sweezy, and Britt for every game (Or whatever the starters were in past years).

Losing Unger matters. A lot.

Click to expand...

Just a question...Isn't it Cable's job to prepare each lineman to play? So the next man up should be ready to play if the starters are unable to go. Aren't these guys the ones that Cable wanted - he is, after all, the assistant coach and I'm sure has influence on who they bring in. I don't give him a pass for that..

Click to expand...

There's a reason the starters are the starters, and backups and practice squad players are backups and practice squad players...........talent and experience.

"Next man up" is just a feel good buzzword phrase that everyone uses. It doesn't equate to the next man up having the skills and experience to replace the starter without their being a drop off. I don't care if the ghost of Vince Lombardi is coaching him.

Click to expand...

Agreed. Backups can't be expected to as good as starters. However, the issue is that many of starters are below average or not very consistent. They also make quite a bit of rookie like errors (false starts, etc). This is the biggest issue I have is that there is a lack of improvement across the board.

Thanks, HH82 for that link. Looking at the type for ZBS (per the definition given for ideal player), I don't believe the personnel is a fit for that scheme. Does Carpenter fit the mold of an ideal ZBS lineman?
It also seems to me that a lot of thinking is involved in ZBS. Thus I can see why there is a lot of confusion among the younger players (Britt, Lewis, Bailey, etc). Is this guy covered, where am I going next, etc? It explains why defenders may be coming in unabated quite a bit. It seems complex system. Cable has been here 3 years and blocking hasn't been adequate during his tenure here. Lynch and Wilson are exceptional athletes that cover up a lot of issues associated with the Oline. The difference is instant when Lynch is not in there, Turbin and Michael can't run effectively behind the line. Forsett couldn't either when he was here in 2011. Look at him now behind the Ravens line. He's got much better blocking. Think what Lynch or Wilson could do behind that Ravens' OL.