Building the Offensive Line

[stech81]

As a side note, we loaded up on defense that year, and three seasons later the defense hasn’t progressed by most of the measures I watch. We’ve also tried to bring in transfers all over the defense to shore that unit up. That hasn’t yielded progress either.

Well, let's think about what the problem has been

 

[TromboneJacket]

We've had a lot of debate on this topic. A common argument is that Collins needed to recruit a new offensive line and that he couldn't really use the players that Johnson had recruited. I'm not saying that's true, but let's pull up the time machine and take a look back.

If I were a coach and felt that I had to make a complete transition on an offensive line, and it was a multi-year process, I'd have a couple of components: 1. recruiting new offensive linemen to groom for my line in a couple of years and 2. moving some of the Johnson players to guard and center and 3. pulling in some transfers to fill gaps in the meantime--especially at tackle.

2019: Collins is hired and turns away two offensive linemen that Johnson had offered. For the recruitniks, that class had 1 4 star (Jamious Griffin) and Yates (depending on the service), and most of the rest were 3 stars. We had two DTs and no OL from high school. We pulled in defensive line recruits and no offensive line recruits (unless you count 1 tight end--Dylan Leonard).
Brent Key didn't start until Jan 10, 2020. I don't think he was involved in the recruiting process that year--at least, he shouldn't have been. One of the key (no pun intended) experts in designing our new OL wasn't active in finding players for this recruiting cycle.
We had one offensive line transfer (Jared Southers) and one TE transfer.
If you felt that OL was a critical need, then 2019 was a missed opportunity. If you were an NFL GM, you'd have drafted an offensive tackle and maybe gotten one in free agency.
The recruiting and transfer emphasis was on defense and at skill positions.
If you're a coach, and you think that it's going to take three years to grow an offensive line, then the read from 2019 is that you're starting in 2020 and your first "homegrown" offensive line is 2022 or 2023, depending on how you count.
That's a LONG wait if you're a fan. That's also the season after next.
I have to chalk this up as a planning error. If you actually believe that this is a huge transition and it's mainly on the offensive line, then have a consultant help you until Key comes on board and find the linemen you need.
There's an old saying that if you want to know someone's priorities, don't listen to what they say--watch what they do. Our priorities were defense and wide receiver. I also have to think this was Patenaude's influence too--he could have pushed for offensive linemen.

2020: OK, this year we recruited 6 linemen. After a year, someone decided we needed new blood on the offensive line. Rankins, Williams, Wing Green are at tackle, and Vaipulu is recruited as a center. Our total recruits are Jordan Williams, Cade Kootsouradis, Wing Green, Michael Rankins, Ryan Spiers, and Paula Vaipulu. Ryan Johnson transfers as a guard and Devin Cochran as a tackle.
Williams, Vaipulu, Johnson, and Cochran are "starters" as of 2021. Williams and Vaipulu are homegrown and "young"
It looks like the coaching staff is adopting an offensive line rebuild, but they do it in year #2.
Cochran doesn't play during the covid season, so you don't really get as much of a quick fix for that year.
IFF you believe it takes 3 years to rebuild a line, then we're one year behind from the 2019 class, and possibly two years behind from the lost 2020 offseason practices being cancelled.

2021: You are here. Kirby and Pendley transfer. Weston Franklin and Jakiah Leftwich are our two OL commits. Our ATL offensive linemen at the end of the year are: Jordan Williams (Fr), Mikey Minihan (RS JR from CPJ), Vaipulu (FR), Ryan Johnson (RS SR), Weston Franklin (FR), Kenneth Kirby (RS SR), Wing Green (FR), Devin Cochran (RS SR), and William Lay (RS JR, Walkon).
We didn't recruit that heavily for this year, but we're up against roster limits.

2022: Next Season. Pierce Quick transfers from Alabama and Paul Tchio transfers from Clemson. Bobby Mooney, Tyler Gibson, and Brandon Best are recruits.
So, for next year, we have to guess a lot to see what's going to happen. Here comes a lot of guesswork.
Here is the OL listed on our Ramblin Wreck roster for next year:
Jordan Williams
Mikey Minihan
Will Scissum
Paula Vaipulu
Michael Maye
Cade Kootsouradis
Will Milam
Nick Pendley
Anthony Minella
Joe Fusile
Matthew Morgan
Weston Franklin
Jakiah Leftwich
Wing Green
William Lay
Brandon Best
Tyler Gibson
Plus Mooney, Tchio, and Quick who aren't listed yet.

At TE we have Dylan Leonard, Dylan Deveney, Chris Miller, Billy Ward, Ben Wilhelm, Ben Postma, and Jack Coco. Jack Coco is also a long snapper, as are Henry Freer and Cade Long.

I would expect us to lose players to the transfer portal or injury scholarships, based on the 85-player cap

I guess that Tchio and Quick are projected starters. Some of our 2020 large OL class will be in their third season. Home grown players should be emerging this year and next on the "three-year plan". The transition should be over this year if the lost COVID offseason weren't a factor.

In the end, we have two questions

• How long should a transition take? If you planned ahead and connected successfully with transfers, 2020 would have had a pretty good line, and this past season would have had an above average one.
  • Things didn't pan out that well, we didn't plan ahead, we had COVID, and we're at least two years behind where we should be
  • To have a good line last year, we'd have had to "hit" really well on our transfers and/or our recruits and have done more in 2019. We didn't do much in 2019, so we weren't going to have that strong line last year
  • Without making a move in 2019, we could have had a good line this season. The question is "how big a deal was the lost off-season?". Everyone else had to deal with that lost season on offense and on their defensive lines. We had a full spring practice and summer practices and transfers.
  • Our transfers did not hit big enough for us this season to have a quick fix.
  • There are options like 2-back sets, Fullbacks, H-Backs, and Tight Ends that can be used to solidify your blocking. We haven't had much success with our TE blocking and were late to adopt 2-back sets. This is something we should have done back in 2019.
  • I'd expect our offensive line to have been decent this year.
• Other question: Will it pan out for next year?
  • Some things had to go wrong for us to be behind schedule--not going big in 2019 on the OL, a lost COVID year, and some of the transfers panning out OK but not as good as we'd like.
  • It has potential. The linemen are old enough and the 2020 class will be "on their third season". There has been enough time for development.
  • It has to.

It's pure guesswork on my part and it's dangerous to assume what's in a coach's mind but looking at the timeline I have to think that Collins thought that he'd have more time and more patience from the fans. He probably also thought he'd hit more on his transfers and recruits. Player development hasn't been what I'd hoped.

Purely looking ahead, combined with the trends over the past three seasons, I'd forecast our offensive line as being good in the 2023 season, and under our next coach.
Collins and Long and Key are going to have to do everything humanly possible to move that timeline up a year.

Pretty good write up for the most part. The one thing I have to disagree with you on is your analysis of the 2019 class. Recruiting is not an easy task, and a big component of it is relationships. Collins was hired and started recruiting for Tech in December of 2018, close to the early signing period. Good OL are a hot commodity, and Tech is not the easiest school to recruit for. Collins had very little time to decide on which players he liked, which ones of those might be willing to come to Tech, and then convincing them to do so. And that’s for every single position, not just OL. Not to mention that Brent Key was the last hire we announced. For the guys he wanted (without the input of the guy who was responsible for that position group), Collins would have likely had to flip guys from other schools and get them to commit to a staff that hadn’t even named their position coach yet. That’s a real tough sell. I don’t blame CPJ for not recruiting to someone else’s preferences, but it’s not fair to blame Collins either for not working miracles at the eleventh hour on the recruiting trail.

Truth be told, I actually think the OL has been improving each year, and they were good enough for us to win more than 3 games last year, but the defense held us back (and there’s no excuse for that).

 

[slugboy]

Pretty good write up for the most part. The one thing I have to disagree with you on is your analysis of the 2019 class. Recruiting is not an easy task, and a big component of it is relationships. Collins was hired and started recruiting for Tech in December of 2018, close to the early signing period. Good OL are a hot commodity, and Tech is not the easiest school to recruit for. Collins had very little time to decide on which players he liked, which ones of those might be willing to come to Tech, and then convincing them to do so. And that’s for every single position, not just OL. Not to mention that Brent Key was the last hire we announced. For the guys he wanted (without the input of the guy who was responsible for that position group), Collins would have likely had to flip guys from other schools and get them to commit to a staff that hadn’t even named their position coach yet. That’s a real tough sell. I don’t blame CPJ for not recruiting to someone else’s preferences, but it’s not fair to blame Collins either for not working miracles at the eleventh hour on the recruiting trail.

Truth be told, I actually think the OL has been improving each year, and they were good enough for us to win more than 3 games last year, but the defense held us back (and there’s no excuse for that).

I did explicitly call out Key's start date and its relationship to recruiting on the line. However, I don't think we'd hired Marco Coleman by signing day (not by much) but we still signed DEs, and we had an OC in place.
Unlike when Gailey started, Collins had been recruiting OL for years, and had relationships--just not as deep in GA, but he had OL recruits he could have tried to pull to Tech. BC seems to do well pulling linemen from the northeast, so you'd have thought that Collins had a few options available.
Even if you believe we weren't going to sign HS OL without having Key on board first, we didn't cover what we only got one transfer--a guard. The traditional view of the flexbone is that guards and centers are more similar to traditional linemen and that the tackles would require the biggest transition. 2019 comes out as a lost year for the OL regardless of whether you excuse it for Key's late onboarding or not.

As far as Offensive Line progress, it hasn't shown up in the eye test for me, but I started pulling some stats from Football Outsiders.

I pulled the last 5 years because it's a round number and Football Outsiders only provides this data back to 2014. Collins is the last 3. Here's our rank in "how much did the OL contribute to our rushing" over the last 5 years:

Lower is better, and I'm not shocked that a "system offense" up through 2018 generated some of the best per-play yardage via blocking. We hit #47 in adjusted line yards this season, so that trend line is good. 2020 is better than you'd expect, but we didn't play UGA that year, and I'm sure that helped.

Here's how it comes out in adjusted yards per play (the scaling changed in 2018, so the previous years would not make sense):

 

[JacketFan137]

Pretty good write up for the most part. The one thing I have to disagree with you on is your analysis of the 2019 class. Recruiting is not an easy task, and a big component of it is relationships. Collins was hired and started recruiting for Tech in December of 2018, close to the early signing period. Good OL are a hot commodity, and Tech is not the easiest school to recruit for. Collins had very little time to decide on which players he liked, which ones of those might be willing to come to Tech, and then convincing them to do so. And that’s for every single position, not just OL. Not to mention that Brent Key was the last hire we announced. For the guys he wanted (without the input of the guy who was responsible for that position group), Collins would have likely had to flip guys from other schools and get them to commit to a staff that hadn’t even named their position coach yet. That’s a real tough sell. I don’t blame CPJ for not recruiting to someone else’s preferences, but it’s not fair to blame Collins either for not working miracles at the eleventh hour on the recruiting trail.

Truth be told, I actually think the OL has been improving each year, and they were good enough for us to win more than 3 games last year, but the defense held us back (and there’s no excuse for that).

yeah early signing day was already in place. a lot of the higher rated o line talent was probably already locked in by the time collins was appointed and took over. collins flipped like a handful of people but that class is by no means his and even included players like jordan yates and demetrius knight that were not cut out for the new direction we were going for

 

[MonroeJacket]

At TE we have Dylan Leonard, Dylan Deveney, Chris Miller, Billy Ward, Ben Wilhelm, Ben Postma, and Jack Coco. Jack Coco is also a long snapper, as are Henry Freer and Cade Long.

Don’t forget about the transfer from Syracuse.

 

[chewybaka]

Pretty good write up for the most part. The one thing I have to disagree with you on is your analysis of the 2019 class. Recruiting is not an easy task, and a big component of it is relationships. Collins was hired and started recruiting for Tech in December of 2018, close to the early signing period. Good OL are a hot commodity, and Tech is not the easiest school to recruit for. Collins had very little time to decide on which players he liked, which ones of those might be willing to come to Tech, and then convincing them to do so. And that’s for every single position, not just OL. Not to mention that Brent Key was the last hire we announced. For the guys he wanted (without the input of the guy who was responsible for that position group), Collins would have likely had to flip guys from other schools and get them to commit to a staff that hadn’t even named their position coach yet. That’s a real tough sell. I don’t blame CPJ for not recruiting to someone else’s preferences, but it’s not fair to blame Collins either for not working miracles at the eleventh hour on the recruiting trail.

Truth be told, I actually think the OL has been improving each year, and they were good enough for us to win more than 3 games last year, but the defense held us back (and there’s no excuse for that).

The offense and special teams placed the defence in relentless precarious positions. Our turn over rate was a joke. As I recall from a number of coaches most games are lost not won...I hope CGC careful considers this precept as his job is in the balance....

 

[TromboneJacket]

The offense and special teams placed the defence in relentless precarious positions. Our turn over rate was a joke. As I recall from a number of coaches most games are lost not won...I hope CGC careful considers this precept as his job is in the balance....

It’s not the offense’s fault our secondary looked confused so much or that we barely got any interceptions the entire season or that we kept allowing our opponents to convert 3rd-and-longs. Don’t get me wrong; our OL was still well below average, our play calling was uninspired, and our offense as a whole was not good, but our defense was so bad that it may have actually been worse than Al Groh’s 2012 defense.

 

[JacketFan137]

It’s not the offense’s fault our secondary looked confused so much or that we barely got any interceptions the entire season or that we kept allowing our opponents to convert 3rd-and-longs. Don’t get me wrong; our OL was still well below average, our play calling was uninspired, and our offense as a whole was not good, but our defense was so bad that it may have actually been worse than Al Groh’s 2012 defense.

every game we had multiple passes go to WRs that didn’t have a defender within 20 yards of them. that may happen once in a blue moon to a good defense but it happened to us regularly and it wasn’t even on blitz plays. our DBs truly did not know how to cover anyone.

we were giving up 500+ yards a week the last like two months of the season. you can’t go into games expecting your offense to have to match that every time lol

our offense has areas of improvement but our defense was arguably the worst power 5 defense

 

[RamblinRed]

I'll be honest, i'm worried fans are putting way to much optimism on Quick and Tchio.
Quick effectively did not contribute at all in his time at AL.
Tchio was a minor contributor in his 2 seasons at Clemson, with almost 40% of his snaps coming in 2 games (SC ST And NC ST). Otherwise it was alot of 3 snaps here, 4 snaps there and don't play at all in 1/2 the games.

If fans believe they are likely starters in 2022, then we may be setting ourselves up for disappointment. The OL who have come in and played since CGC's arrival have been much more productive on the college level than those 2. I see them as backups this year, if they play much at all.

 

[JacketFan137]

I'll be honest, i'm worried fans are putting way to much optimism on Quick and Tchio.
Quick effectively did not contribute at all in his time at AL.
Tchio was a minor contributor in his 2 seasons at Clemson, with almost 40% of his snaps coming in 2 games (SC ST And NC ST). Otherwise it was alot of 3 snaps here, 4 snaps there and don't play at all in 1/2 the games.

If fans believe they are likely starters in 2022, then we may be setting ourselves up for disappointment. The OL who have come in and played since CGC's arrival have been much more productive on the college level than those 2. I see them as backups this year, if they play much at all.

the bar is truly that low that imo they are instant upgrades. they also have a good bit of eligibility left so its not like a one year rental. we have stuff to look forward to

 

[slugboy]

The offense and special teams placed the defence in relentless precarious positions. Our turn over rate was a joke. As I recall from a number of coaches most games are lost not won...I hope CGC careful considers this precept as his job is in the balance....

If you mean our offense, we were tied for 55th in interceptions thrown--10, the same as Notre Dame, Michigan State, Rutgers, etc.: https://www.ncaa.com/stats/football/fbs/current/team/459/p2. Higher is worse, so we throw fewer interceptions than the median team. Wake threw 15 on the season. We're tied for 42 with 6 fumbles lost. We're not a turnover factory compared to most of the NCAA. We're better than average.

We're tied for 15th on defense with 10 fumbles recovered. Our interceptions gained were near the bottom at 125th--3 interceptions made for 6 yards.

 

[TromboneJacket]

I'll be honest, i'm worried fans are putting way to much optimism on Quick and Tchio.
Quick effectively did not contribute at all in his time at AL.
Tchio was a minor contributor in his 2 seasons at Clemson, with almost 40% of his snaps coming in 2 games (SC ST And NC ST). Otherwise it was alot of 3 snaps here, 4 snaps there and don't play at all in 1/2 the games.

If fans believe they are likely starters in 2022, then we may be setting ourselves up for disappointment. The OL who have come in and played since CGC's arrival have been much more productive on the college level than those 2. I see them as backups this year, if they play much at all.

Who’s our starting LT going to be? How about LG? With those two coming in, LT looks much less dire, and now we have more options at guard. Not getting many snaps at Clemson or Bama says something different than not getting many snaps at, let’s say, Northwestern. It’s not that these guys are expected to play like Walter Jones and Steve Hutchinson right out of the gate, but there’s a decent chance that given their talent and bit of experience (and time spent being coached at the P5 level) they could be among the top five OL on our roster (which, given the fact that both can play either guard or tackle, means they can be starters at whatever positions would have otherwise been the weakest on our line).

 

[JacketFan137]

If you mean our offense, we were tied for 55th in interceptions thrown--10, the same as Notre Dame, Michigan State, Rutgers, etc.: https://www.ncaa.com/stats/football/fbs/current/team/459/p2. Higher is worse, so we throw fewer interceptions than the median team. Wake threw 15 on the season. We're tied for 42 with 6 fumbles lost. We're not a turnover factory compared to most of the NCAA. We're better than average.

We're tied for 15th on defense with 10 fumbles recovered. Our interceptions gained were near the bottom at 125th--3 interceptions made for 6 yards.

our players were very good at attacking the ball and punched out a few in the secondary. to intercept a pass you have to be in the zip code of the receiver so i understand why we didnt get any lol

 

[slugboy]

our players were very good at attacking the ball and punched out a few in the secondary. to intercept a pass you have to be in the zip code of the receiver so i understand why we didnt get any lol

Our problem wasn't so much that we threw picks. The problem was that we didn't score, so the impact of the pics was magnified. If you factor in the number of attempts, we're probably about even in interceptions per pass with UGA, who threw more picks than we did.

Here's the ACC scoring data:
Scoring Offense

Index	Team	G	TD	FG	XPT	2XP	DXP	SAF	PTS	AVG/G
1	Pitt	14	76	17	71	0	0	1	580	41.4
2	Wake Forest	14	72	23	65	4	0	0	574	41.0
3	North Carolina	13	57	19	53	3	0	0	458	35.2
4	Virginia	12	52	15	50	2	0	2	415	34.6
5	Miami	12	51	17	48	1	0	1	409	34.1
6	NC State	12	51	13	48	1	0	1	397	33.1
7	Louisville	13	53	14	51	0	0	0	411	31.6
8	Florida State	12	43	10	37	2	0	1	331	27.6
9	Clemson	13	40	21	39	0	0	0	342	26.3
10	Syracuse	12	39	9	36	0	0	1	299	24.9
11	Boston College	12	37	13	35	0	0	0	296	24.7
12	Georgia Tech	12	36	11	31	2	1	1	288	24.0
13	Virginia Tech	13	36	18	34	0	0	1	308	23.7
14	Duke	12	33	14	32	0	0	1	274	22.8

Here's the flip side on defense:
Scoring Defense

Index	Team	G	TD	FG	XPT	2XP	DXP	SAF	PTS	AVG/G
1	Clemson	13	22	13	18	1	0	1	193	14.8
2	NC State	12	29	11	29	0	0	0	236	19.7
3	Boston College	12	32	13	31	0	0	2	266	22.2
4	Pitt	14	43	10	39	1	0	1	331	23.6
5	Virginia Tech	13	42	12	39	1	0	0	329	25.3
6	Syracuse	12	37	19	33	1	0	0	316	26.3
7	Florida State	12	41	11	35	2	0	0	318	26.5
8	Louisville	13	43	19	40	0	0	0	355	27.3
9	Miami	12	40	19	36	2	1	1	341	28.4
10	Wake Forest	14	51	16	48	1	0	0	404	28.9
11	Virginia	12	48	15	45	1	0	1	382	31.8
12	North Carolina	13	52	17	46	4	0	0	417	32.1
13	Georgia Tech	12	50	17	47	2	0	0	402	33.5
14	Duke	12	60	20	57	0	0	0	477	39.8

The picks looked terrible because we needed every scoring opportunity we could get.

From https://theacc.com/stats.aspx?path=football&year=2021.

 

[first&ten]

Well, let's think about what the problem has been

View attachment 11923

Good job stech, made me smile, then lol. This ape looks like every guy that thought they had everything figured out , then BAM!

 

[chewybaka]

It’s not the offense’s fault our secondary looked confused so much or that we barely got any interceptions the entire season or that we kept allowing our opponents to convert 3rd-and-longs. Don’t get me wrong; our OL was still well below average, our play calling was uninspired, and our offense as a whole was not good, but our defense was so bad that it may have actually been worse than Al Groh’s 2012 defense.

Sadly the statistics are pathetic for both sides of the ball...it will be a most interesting season to watch the improvement!

 

[forensicbuzz]

It’s not the offense’s fault our secondary looked confused so much or that we barely got any interceptions the entire season or that we kept allowing our opponents to convert 3rd-and-longs. Don’t get me wrong; our OL was still well below average, our play calling was uninspired, and our offense as a whole was not good, but our defense was so bad that it may have actually been worse than Al Groh’s 2012 defense.

Only thing I don't care about is highlighted. Interceptions are as much opportunity as ability or scheme. The confusion started with those in the front seven dropping into coverage. Thought the scheme, in general, was problematic and did not put the players in a position to be successful.

 

[takethepoints]

I've said this before.

The performance of an OL depends a lot on the kind of offense it has to block for. Paul's O was formulated to make things easy for OLs: yard-wide splits, tons of deception to freeze LBs and DBs, four potential RBs on every play, lots of planned double teams, WRs who were trained to (gasp!) block, and plays that often left the better DLs (the DEs in most cases) unblocked. I mean that was a recipe for OL paradise, even against good teams. The shotgun spread we run now depends instead on being able to out physical the D on virtually every play. And we weren't doing the obvious things - run our QB, two back sets - that would have helped.

In short, our OLs, with average talent, were expected to do too much. We can only hope that Coach Long is more willing to design things so that they can catch a break.

 

[TromboneJacket]

I've said this before.

The performance of an OL depends a lot on the kind of offense it has to block for. Paul's O was formulated to make things easy for OLs: yard-wide splits, tons of deception to freeze LBs and DBs, four potential RBs on every play, lots of planned double teams, WRs who were trained to (gasp!) block, and plays that often left the better DLs (the DEs in most cases) unblocked. I mean that was a recipe for OL paradise, even against good teams. The shotgun spread we run now depends instead on being able to out physical the D on virtually every play. And we weren't doing the obvious things - run our QB, two back sets - that would have helped.

In short, our OLs, with average talent, were expected to do too much. We can only hope that Coach Long is more willing to design things so that they can catch a break.

I agree with everything you say about CPJ’s scheme regarding the run game. Pass blocking is another story, but there aren’t a whole lotta tricks that make pass protection easier when overmatched physically 1-on-1. There’s basically double-teaming, play action, and max protect.

I think you’re selling the Shotgun Spread a bit short by saying that the players have to out-physical the D on every play. That sounds more like the old Power I. You don’t want any player getting beat repeatedly, but the Shotgun Spread is about (as the name implies) spreading out the defense and finding matchups that can be exploited. Patenaude’s big failure in calling plays was that we had too many slow-developing pass plays, and that put unnecessary stress on both the OL and QB. For a young QB with a struggling OL, you need to call more quick-hitters with easy reads. And frankly, take some pages out of CPJ’s book with regards to the run game. But I digress. Long story short, the problem wasn’t the shotgun spread so much as Patenaude getting possessed by the ghost of Don Coryell when it came to calling plays. I’m optimistic that Chip Long will remedy much of that.

 

[Jmonty71]

Happy New Year, everyone!

I'm just thinking out loud here, and I'm not a football guru...just a loyal fan. Based on my very limited knowledge and what I've read in this forum, it's my impression that in order for Tech to become successful again, we need to do the following in this sequence:

1. Get BIG on the Offensive Line immediately (which is pure recruiting and transfer portal),
2. Get BIG and OLD on the offensive line (which only time and the transfer portal can accomplish), and
3. Get BIG and OLD and QUICK on the offensive line (which will require winning since the quick big men will have lots of offers to choose from).

In the short run, Tech will probably have to settle for big, SLOW lineman that the factories have decided to pass on. FWIW, I wouldn't get too fancy with the blocking schemes - I'd focus on basics, discipline (no penalties & clear understanding of assignments) and consistency.

In the intermediate, I'd put these guys in the S&C program and get them bigger, stronger and OLDER (experienced) as Juniors and Seniors.

Then, once this begins to pay dividends in the win column, we can attract some four-stars who also have QUICKS and speed.

Further, if I was a hot high school prospect, I'd want to play where I could be developed for the NFL. So, maybe spending some money hiring the best Line coach(es) we can possibly afford would help attract talent.

A final thought: I'd guess that most high schools have small-ish backs with blazing speed who can hit the holes and get outside as well as undersized quarterbacks who can run and/or get the ball to a receiver. They don't have to be Heisman candidates; they just have to be able to read the defense and hit an open receiver 5-15 yards downfield consistently.

So, if we have a big O-Line that can open holes and protect the pocket, even average "skill" players should be successful enough to win some games in our conference.

Am I right or wrong?

Short answer? Depends. Bigger doesn't mean better. I think a lot of being a good o line comes down to blocking schemes and execution. Size can only do so much. I rather have speed, mixed with size. Guards able to pull and move piles. I think our blocking scheme is/was pretty lame. Now we have a new OC, we (hopefully) , will see better play. Having big hog mollies is good. However, if they are just statues, than it doesn't matter. Give me 315 and mobile, all day long...