Big Blue Huddle

https://x.com/benbbaldwin/status/1876711852903723176

Gee. Who would have thought there would be a correlation between offensive line play and final season record. 

In a league where the rules favor the offense, it's always all about the offensive line.

It's the most important unit in pro ball, more important than who's playing QB. QB is only one guy, and any player who gets to the NFL as a QB has a certain level of competence which can only be fully revealed behind a top offensive line.

Bob

Quote from: Bob In PA on January 08, 2025, 08:43:52 AMGee. Who would have thought there would be a correlation between offensive line play and final season record. 

In a league where the rules favor the offense, it's always all about the offensive line.

It's the most important unit in pro ball, more important than who's playing QB. QB is only one guy, and any player who gets to the NFL as a QB has a certain level of competence which can only be fully revealed behind a top offensive line.

Bob

Bob,

I have a similar point of view.  I will take PFF passing and pass blocking receiving scores from this season to further examine the issue.


When you sort teams by their PFF Passer score, here are the top 10



When you sort teams by their PFF Pass blocking score, here are the top 10



I did this for all the measure and these two most closely tracked with team success

I initially forgot to include the "sarcasm" indicator. lol

Quote from: Bob In PA on January 08, 2025, 08:52:08 AMI initially forgot to include the "sarcasm" indicator. lol

Bob,

I didn't take it as sarcasm because, listening to NFL talk all the time, I get a sense many people focus too much on the QB and not enough on the 5 guys in front of him

Quote from: MightyGiants on January 08, 2025, 08:50:24 AMI did this for all the measure and these two most closely tracked with team success

Rich: Maybe I should have used instead of but I'm not going back to change it. lol

In any event, it's no surprise to see (in a passing league) that the best passers have the best offensive lines AND the best offensive lines have the best passers.

They're inexorably interconnected.  Thanks for doing all that work.

Bob

Quote from: MightyGiants on January 08, 2025, 08:55:36 AMBob,

I didn't take it as sarcasm because, listening to NFL talk all the time, I get a sense many people focus too much on the QB and not enough on the 5 guys in front of him

Rich: There is no doubt about that, but IMO the vast majority of our members know better. Bob

So the Bengals had an awful line but the top rated PFF passer?

It's a shame so many think talent at the QB position simply doesn't matter.

Bizarre narrative to push.

Quote from: EDjohnst1981 on January 08, 2025, 09:09:00 AMSo the Bengals had an awful line but the top rated PFF passer?

It's a shame so many think talent at the QB position simply doesn't matter.

Bizarre narrative to push.

Ed,

I know of no one on our forum who has pushed the narrative that the QB positions don't matter.  In fact PFF numbers have consistently shown it does matter.  I would point out that you might consider that you focused on a single pillar to try and disprove the idea that the three pillars of support greatly impact a QB's performance. 

When you consider that Zac Taylor has been a successful coach from the offensive-oriented Sean McVay coaching tree, it is reasonable to assume Burrow enjoys top-10 coaching, and it came as no surprise that Burrow also had top-10 receiving (7th).

It's been shown over the seasons that if you have two solid pillars of support and a quality QB, they can perform.  What requires elite special talent is performing with a single pillar of support, and having no support will usually take down all QBs, even the best ones.  I would also add that a QB playing with poor support for a long enough period of time can suffer damage that can take time to recover from if they are able to recover from it.

Quote from: EDjohnst1981 on January 08, 2025, 09:09:00 AMSo the Bengals had an awful line but the top rated PFF passer?

It's a shame so many think talent at the QB position simply doesn't matter.

Bizarre narrative to push.

ED: You've simply spotted an exception to the rule. 

There are always exceptions to the rule (except for death and taxes lol).

Take note of the high-quality supporting cast Burrow has at WR, TE & RB. A fairly impressive group, IMO.

Bob

Quote from: Bob In PA on January 08, 2025, 09:35:23 AMED: You've simply spotted an exception to the rule. 

There are always exceptions to the rule (except for death and taxes lol).

Take note of the high-quality supporting cast Burrow has at WR, TE & RB. A fairly impressive group, IMO.

Bob

He does have good players around him but I believe the QB to be most important position - fantastic QB can overcome 'lesser' supporting pillars. Pure speculation, but insert Burrow into this team (even with its 10 combinations at OL), I think he puts up similar numbers. He's just that good.

What you cannot do is talk of building up the other pillars, - Line, receivers etc - and expect good-to-great QB play from a less than stellar QB.

That's what the Giants have done over the last couple of years and in my opinion, it's why we are where we are.

Is there a way to look at stats like that before and after Thomas went down?  I don't have a PFF account but if I were to guess the OL at the beginning of the season while not elite was more than serviceable, and the OL at the end of the season when they're picking up guys off practice squads...probably less so.

Quote from: Gmo11 on January 08, 2025, 09:53:24 AMIs there a way to look at stats like that before and after Thomas went down?  I don't have a PFF account but if I were to guess the OL at the beginning of the season while not elite was more than serviceable, and the OL at the end of the season when they're picking up guys off practice squads...probably less so.

Quote from: Gmo11 on January 08, 2025, 09:53:24 AMIs there a way to look at stats like that before and after Thomas went down?

Gm: Ordinarily, that would likely yield important information, but in this case I'm not so sure... mostly because the Giants had two "new" guys to start the year. IMO even with their best player in there, that OL began the season slow and took a while to gel.  Right when they seemed to be getting their "sea legs" Thomas was injured. I may not have explained this perfectly but I think you know what I mean. Bob

PS. I posted this before Rich put up the individual game grades. I think you can see the improvement from game to game to start the season. I personally believe had Thomas not been injured the Giants' OL would have finished the year in the top half of the league.

Injuries happen and there was a significant number of OL injuries throughout the league this year.  I am sure if you look at teams ranked better than the Giants, a good deal of them had OL injuries.