JKool

Here is a link to an interesting way to rate OLines. Unfortunately, what you\'ll find here is only a mid-season grade:

http://www.fftoday.com/articles/wald..._mid_oline.htm

Our line was ranked 21st. That\'s not good.

saintswhodi

Not good, but also not LAST Kool. And if that is mid-season, the point at which we most complained about the O-line was EARLY in the season. So if we were THAT bad in the beginning of the year and we were still 21st, I guarantee we prob ended the year better. Sends to lend more credence to the argument the line was not as bad as people wanna make it out to be. Thanks for helping to dispell that myth also.

JKool

Well, Whodi, I certainly agree that they weren\'t worst in the league, but being last isn\'t the only way they can be bad. They are bad

I have two things to say about this thogh:

(1) Remember those STL and MIN lines that you claimed were as bad or worse than a ours? STL is ranked 6th and MIN is ranked 16th. You can draw your own conclusions from this.

(2) Just as with turnovers, aggregate turnovers are a sign that something is bad, but there is a second dimension that matters here - when and where they occured. Thus, we might say that the times our OLine made its mistakes matters. Third down false starts, holding on our big runs, etc. My point: an aggregate statistical score (like the one I posted - being 21st) only tell part of the story.

I agree that this stat has implications for those who think our line was THAT bad, but it certainly wasn\'t a good line by any stretch of the imagination. In fact, as it is scored, we\'re a mere 7.5 points ahead of the worst ranked line and we\'re a full 10 points behind the 3rd best line and almost 15 behind the 1st. The scores fell between 73 and 95, thus each point represents a significant difference.

Anyway, I\'m not sure that this says much, but it indicates the line was not even in the top 60%. That too me sounds like a poor offensive line.

As for the idea that we came together later in the year, I\'m not sure I buy that. Sure the line played slightly better then, but they were still a sore spot (mostly our Defense improved IMO), and for our rank to improve, it has to be the case that the other teams OLines didn\'t also improve over the last four games.

"... I was beating them with my eyes the whole game..." - Aaron Brooks

JKool

PS - I don\'t remember anyone saying they were the worst OL in the league.

saintswhodi

Um, the claim to worst o-line in the league was made several times. That was the whole point for me making post after post about teams that were worse.

Also. if you read what it said for St.Louis and Minny, here. i\'ll post it so noone needs to click the link again.

for St. Louis. And for Minny:

So I think that takes absolutely nothing away from my arguments of their lines being as bad as ours. As a matter of fact, had Deuce not gotten hurt our line probably would have rated higher as well. So as I felt before, this claim of how terrible our line was is definitely unfounded. Just like the claim on the D(last in yards about 15th in points, what\'s more important) and about the drops.




[Edited on 5/2/2005 by saintswhodi]

JKool

My bad then. I didn\'t see it anywhere here, and I didn\'t recall anyone making the claim. I\'ll take your word for it, but I think that might be an overly literal reading of what they said.

(2) I did read what it said about the other lines. Either you think this ranking is ok, in which case we are 21st and MIN is 16 and STL 6, or you think this ranking is wrong, in which case it doesn\'t support ANY view. I don\'t think you can have both. I\'m currently leaning toward it isn\'t a good ranking.

(3) I don\'t understand what you are saying about the Defense.

(4) It is my view that our line ranks in the bottom half to bottom third in the league. Is that an unreasonable statement? If it isn\'t, then our line is a serious problem.

(5) It is also my view that the play of our OLine was terribly inconsistent (with the exception of Riley who was just poor almost all the time). Aggregate stats will mask that. Is this view unreasonable?

(6) If the OLine is playing poorly, which appears to me to be a fair assumption, does that or does that not affect the play of our skilled players? If it does, then just as a great set of skilled players can increase how an OLine looks, a poor OLine will decrease how good the skilled players look. If it does not, then the claim made about MIN seems to invalidate these rankings (since the play of the skilled players should not be used to evaluate OLines).

(7) I\'m not sure what is at issue here, since the common consensus of people who saw many games and are knowledgeable about football think that our OTs are an area of primary need. Is that false or incorrect in some way?

"... I was beating them with my eyes the whole game..." - Aaron Brooks

saintswhodi

Again, you are getting off of the meaning of what people have been posting here. Just like Frenzy said,

The point is being made that yes the line was not good, but people are making it seem like they killed the team. We KNOW OT needs to be upgraded, and I have made several posts to that affect. The point was that we were not as bad as people made it seem, which was worst in the league. We weren\'t, and like I said, had there been a final ranking I am about certain we would be higher than 21. I would rather be 21 out of 32 than 32 right? Noone is saying that is good and we should do nothing, what we are saying is people should stop trying to make it seem like they doomed the team into oblivion.

And forgive me for digressing, but why is Aaron Brooks at the College Players skills challenge and being allowed to hold a mic?

saintswhodi

Oh, and sorry about that defense thing. I was typing here and reading a post from another forum and totally had a brain fart. I was gonna make a point about the D, but that wasn\'t it. My bad.

GumboBC

I don\'t know the formula to use in derterming who has the worst offensive line. But I don\'t recall seeing any team who had a worse offensive line than ours.


I suppose some other teams had pitiful offensive lines too. But, ours was not only bad, it was awful.

I can\'t tell you how many times I screamed when one of our offensive linemen jumped offsides. Or had a holding penalty. Or let his man come clean to the QB. Or got Deuce killed in the backfield. Or didn\'t pick up a blitz.

And then Le Charles Bentley really had his problems early on snapping the damn ball.

All in all, it was a disaster. It was horrible.

[Edited on 5/2/2005 by GumboBC]

saintswhodi

Does the previous post show you where we are coming from Kool?