VOR Posted May 27, 2009 Posted May 27, 2009 "Several of those have been addressed..." you say. Yeah, but how? Dockery has been replaced with a rookie. He's never played a down in the league and a fair amount of rookies turn out to be flops. Most of us think he'll be a good one. But it's basically an educated guess. Fowler was replaced with a guy with some experience. I have less problem here than anywhere else on the o-line. But how well will he do against the mammoth nose tackles in this division? We had a strength at RG. So we moved him to a position that he has never played as a pro. And replaced his strength at RG with a rookie. See the comments about rookies above. Peters had his worst year as a pro but was still upper echelon by the end of the year. We replaced him with a guy who is not physically built to be an LT. He just doesn't have the body or the skill set to keep speed rushers out. This is not good. The o-line is a massive hulking question mark. And as many many have said, it is just as likely that Trent's decline was caused simply by facing better teams. Before his injury he was playing well ... against the league's dogs. The Bills addressed the O-line by finding a new center (who will stand-up better against the NT's than the previous group did) and drafting OL high. As for the changes, personally I'd rather they kept the right side intact, had Wood or Levitre start at LG, and started Bell or Chambers at LT, but I'm curious to see how this configuration works out, and the one I proposed is still a fallback option. And the presence of TO will take away a lot of the 8-man fronts the team saw. As for Peters, he was not an upper echelon player by the end of the year. I figured that once he returned to the team, he would have returned to his 2007 form after about a month or so, but it never happened. That's the main reason I didn't have a problem with the Bills balking at giving him a huge contract.
SteamRoller67 Posted May 27, 2009 Posted May 27, 2009 The problem on the OL was Peters', Dockery's, and Preston's/Fowler's poor play, combined with the lack of a true #2 WR and Trent's decline post-concussion. Several of those have been addressed, and TO's presence in particular will help the offense out a lot. Well said. That is my feeling about 2008 as well.
billybob Posted May 27, 2009 Posted May 27, 2009 I wanted the the two Bells to start at tackle- then the Bills running attack could be called Marshawn and the Belligerents
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