There’s a good article in today’s AB-H about the high hopes placed on Georgia’s offensive line in the wake of the Moreno and Stafford departures.
No pressure, guys on Georgia’s offensive line.
Matthew Stafford and Knowshon Moreno are NFL rookies now, not playmakers you are blocking for, but with talent and depth now in the trenches, your teammates have faith in the line holding the Bulldogs’ offense together.
“I kind of think about all of the guys that are coming back and I just have this image of a brick wall in my mind,” Georgia fullback Fred Munzenmaier said. “So many young guys started last year and so many older guys are coming back. I feel personally like that there’s just going to be a big pool of experienced guys.”
Now, my motto for the past two seasons has been “In Searels We Trust”, so I don’t want to make it sound like I’m unduly anxious here. But I have this nagging thought in the back of my head – to be fair, about the team as a whole, not just the offensive line – that goes something like this: how reasonable is it to expect all these injured players to come back without missing a beat?
I don’t doubt that many of them will. But with as many kids as Georgia lost to injury, the law of averages says that a few most likely won’t. There’s going to be a Dannell Ellerbe or two. The question is, who?
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yeah, i’m a bit worried about the kind of year we could have next season. in addition to the concerns about players bouncing back from injury, i’m also concerned that the o-line won’t be blocking for a feature running back who consistently turns busted run plays into gainers. searles is a hell of a coach, but i don’t underestimate the extent to which knowshon helped out the line the last two seasons. how much poorer would our impression of the line’s play over the last two seasons be if most of the run plays that were bottled up, but which km turned into positive yardage, had been stuffed?
perhaps i’ve already begun romanticizing the memory of km, but for all of his flashiness, the part of his game that impressed me most was how often he turned nothing into something. i’m not confident we’ll have a back who can do that next year.
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I’m praying that maybe the O-line can make whoever is running the ball look a lot better than what I’ve seen so far. The spring game isn’t a good measuring stick for what we should expect. There were many starters out that day. I know we must move on from Stafford & Moreno, but just imagine those two with what we have coming back this season. With Marlon Brown, Brandon Smith (this kid is very fast), an experienced & deep O-line, two solid fullbacks it would’ve had potential to be one of the most dangerous offenses in the nation. Oh well, guess it was just not in the cards for us. A guy can dream though.
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Count me as one who feels the “combo” of our returning offensive and defensive fronts may be the best I can recall. Even without a “premier” RB everyone can salivate over during the summer, our ability to control the LOS is huge for a first year QB and talented, yet unproven runners. Moreno was most valuable as a back who could turn that two yard loss into a 3-4 yard gain. That was critical last season, but should not be as necessary behind this OL. Add a deep, talented, and experienced front 7 on defense and this team has great potential to suprise to the upside, imo.
Senator, I appreciate your heads-up that many of us are assuming all the injured returnees perform at the same level as when they were hurt. I admit, I was guilty of this in my initial analysis. It may take my optimism from a giddy “10”, down to a “9” although I draw encouragement from the nature of the injuries. Many are of the type which are slower recoveries for shifty RBs and WRs than for the big uglies. Fingers crossed, but love our depth at this point which could cover any slow development issues.
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I am a Hershel fan from way back and love the guy but that line he ran behind was damn good as was he.
My point is good “o” lines can help backs a bunch so I’m hoping Searles is the man we annoint him to be. And I think he is so watch the backs have a good year and Cox some time to throw.
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The truth is that Searels did a great job, but Moreno and Stafford made the OL look better than it was both years. They will need to improve quite a bit in order for us to get even close to the production we had last year.
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