Husker offensive line play 'just average' vs. Oregon

[BigRedBuster]

One thing we will have to get used to with a true pocket passer like Lee.  He is going to hang in the pocket and not have happy feet like TA had.  This is going to be mostly good.  He will be able to deliver the ball to more options.  You do run a chance though on a play like the last play where he gets caught there.

 

[Husker from Kansas]

The WR had broken free and he needed to get the ball out.  If he steps up and releases the ball a few seconds later, the window of opportunity could have been gone.  

Correct, but he also has time to read the field and have another receiver break open, or just throw the ball away. Of course it's easy for me to say this (hindsight 20/20 and all) but I think Lee was trying to make a play and young QB's need to realize that more often than not it's better to throw it away and live to play another down 

 

[ColoradoHusk]

One thing we will have to get used to with a true pocket passer like Lee.  He is going to hang in the pocket and not have happy feet like TA had.  This is going to be mostly good.  He will be able to deliver the ball to more options.  You do run a chance though on a play like the last play where he gets caught there.

There is definitely a give and take with having a statue like Lee.  While he is going to stay in the pocket longer, he is still going to be effected by the pass rush, which we saw against Oregon.  I didn't think Lee handled the pressure very well.  It could be an issue that has gone back to his days at Tulane, and he could grow and improve.  We will have to see if he does.  The one thing that the statue QB does it makes it a lot easier for the D-line to apply pressure.  If they know the QB is no threat to roll out of the pocket, they are going to have a target 5-7 yards behind the o-linemen and will be able to go full bore with that pass rush.  They won't have to worry about playing any contain at all.

 

[Mavric]

A few 7-8 yard runs (which don't take 30 seconds if you're in hurry up, especially if any of them result in 1st downs) is what I think you'd need to setup the play you're analyzing, So IMO the play isn't terrible, but you've got to either call it when the defense is at least thinking run or set it up on that drive so that you get them thinking run.

It's too late to be setting things up at this point.  You should have been setting them up earlier in the game - which we were.

 

[ColoradoHusk]

Correct, but he also has time to read the field and have another receiver break open, or just throw the ball away. Of course it's easy for me to say this (hindsight 20/20 and all) but I think Lee was trying to make a play and young QB's need to realize that more often than not it's better to throw it away and live to play another down 

I was told over and over during the off-season that Lee was going to be able to step up in the pocket and move around just enough to avoid the pass rush.  He didn't do that very well against Oregon.

 

[SuperBigFan69]

I was told over and over during the off-season that Lee was going to be able to step up in the pocket and move around just enough to avoid the pass rush.  He didn't do that very well against Oregon.

Plus, since his arm release is basically a laser-rocket release he would not have to worry about the pass rush.

 

[BigRedBuster]

I was told over and over during the off-season that Lee was going to be able to step up in the pocket and move around just enough to avoid the pass rush.  He didn't do that very well against Oregon.

And he has been better at that so far this year compared to our past QBs.

Are you two seriously going to turn a good football discussion into a waaa waaa boo hoo......crap fest???

Just because we say he is going to be better at that, doesn't mean he isn't going to get caught in there sometimes.  

 

[Undone]

One thing we will have to get used to with a true pocket passer like Lee.  He is going to hang in the pocket and not have happy feet like TA had.  This is going to be mostly good.  He will be able to deliver the ball to more options.  You do run a chance though on a play like the last play where he gets caught there.

It's going to be mostly good *if* he checks down to the underneath routes.

I realize we were in a situation essentially the entire game where we were behind and had to throw the ball down field quite a bit. And I don't think it's a shortcoming of Langsdorf; I really believe Langsdorf knows exactly how to get this offense to grind out long drives. 

Lee needs to just be given a couple more games to settle in and settle down. And we need to find high-percentage ways to get the ball in Lindsey & DPE's hands and let them do things in space. Too much "boom or bust" so far (but I know it's only been two games).

 

[Mavric]

I guess my caveat to my original comment is I don't think they were completely busting very much.

I"m sure there are times when they weren't giving Lee as much space as he would like.  But there's always going to be some pressure.  I don't think there was very often that he didn't have enough room to make a good throw.

And I'm sure there are things that could be better in the running game.  Maybe we only got 3-4 yards when they thought we could get 6-7 or whatever.  But, again, I didn't see a lot of complete busts.

So I guess it depends on what the standard is  for "average."

 

[zoogs]

The OL is playing pretty average. If you're disappointed in the overall caliber of the team or its performance thus far, it's really inconsistent to give the OL a break. If the OL has been about fine so far, then so has the entire offense -- mistakes, imperfections, lack of greatness and all. 

The standard cannot be "that which maximizes blame on the coaches." Which isn't to absolve coaches of blame.

 

[Mavric]

The OL is pretty average. If you're disappointed in the overall caliber of the team or its performance thus far, it's really inconsistent to give the OL a break. If the OL has been about fine so far, then so has the entire offense -- mistakes, imperfections, lack of greatness and all. 

I don't really think so.  That's kind of an overly-simplistic way to look at it.

There isn't any reason that some position groups can't be playing better than other position groups.  Our offense hasn't been terrible by any means.  We're 35th in scoring.  69th in yardage is not very good.

But there isn't any reason that good OL play can't be wasted by bad QB play or vice versa.

 

[zoogs]

Sure, there's not. But we generally consider OL play to be one of the defining factors of a football team. It's often cited as a reason to turn up the heat on the OL coach for not recruiting or developing his guys well enough, for example. Or used as a reason to excuse a lack of demonstrable quality at QB because the OL is not doing great. 

'Average' OL performance explains a lot of things. Dress that up to 'pretty solid' and this points the finger elsewhere. In this case it seems hardly fair to merit that. The OL needs to kick it up a notch, along with other groups. Most things right now are within some reasonable definition of average, and so long as that holds we'll (probably) have a pretty average season. Which, if this is considered fine, so should the latter. If not, then a great deal of improvement will be needed and the OL is as good a place as any to start -- if only because of the importance of the line to the game, but also because the potential here is fairly bright.

 

[The Dude]

Honestly I kind of blame Lee for this. While the protection is no the greatest, if he just steps up in the pocket he can make an unpressured throw

It doesn't look like he had a pocket to step into.  Farmer should probably take the blame on that one.   He gets beaten to the inside when he had help to the outside.  Not that I believe Lee would have taken advantage of it if it was there.  He appeared committed to whip it into double coverage from the snap.

I've always thought a strong middle is the most important part of pass protection.  If tackles get beaten to the outside, where the best pass rushers typically are, the middle 3 should have a clean pocket to step into.

Nothing I've seen from Lee so far indicates this is a strength of his though.  Even when he has a clean pocket to step into he doesn't use it.

 

[Hunter94]

There is definitely a give and take with having a statue like Lee.  While he is going to stay in the pocket longer, he is still going to be effected by the pass rush, which we saw against Oregon.  I didn't think Lee handled the pressure very well.  It could be an issue that has gone back to his days at Tulane, and he could grow and improve.  We will have to see if he does.  The one thing that the statue QB does it makes it a lot easier for the D-line to apply pressure.  If they know the QB is no threat to roll out of the pocket, they are going to have a target 5-7 yards behind the o-linemen and will be able to go full bore with that pass rush.  They won't have to worry about playing any contain at all.

pretty good assessment, he doesn't seem at all interested in running the ball, even if there is an opening.........was hoping we would see someone back there between happy feet and a statue.

 

[Igetbored216]

I think average is a pretty good description for how the o-line played. Some good, some bad. I'm not sure the blocking schemes are helping their cause. As was stated above, with many of the blocking schemes, there is zero margin for error.

How would the group look and perform if things were simplified?