As most everyone knows former NY Jets Offensive Line Coach Tony Wise has been hired. Wise had been an NFL Offensive Line coach for 18 years. In 1977 he was on the same Pitt staff that Dave Wannstedt got his coaching start on. By all indications Wise is a trusted friend of Wannstedt and has worked with him on several occasions in the NFL.
What does this all mean for the Panthers beleaguered O-Line? Well I think the main improvement to the O-Line is going to be technique. You don't work for 18 years in the NFL without knowing a thing or two about technique. Hopefully, Wise can bring some fire and enthusiasm to our talented albeit young offensive line. Guys like Lucas Nix and Chris Jacobsen have all the talent in the world to make it at this level and Wise is going to have to nurture them. I'm pretty excited about the change in coaching for the offensive line just because of the way that players seemed to regress under Paul Dunn. Also anybody who throws an injured player back into a game and cost him the rest of the season deserves to lose his job (Jason Pinkston playing at Michigan St with one arm).
Losing a projected first round pick in Jeff Otah is going to be the immediate task in spring. The obvious choice is to move Pinkston to left tackle but perhaps Wise goes another way. We have plenty of bodies now; barring catastrophic injury situations which seem to be a Pittsburgh disease over the past few months. We are going to be replacing two 5th year seniors at right guard and center. Center appears to in experienced hands with Rob Hauser the JUCO transfer. Guard is going to be a great battle going into spring ball with Joe Thomas and Chris Jacobsen the front runners. Also who is going to be the other tackle?
Wise is coming into a much improved situation over what Paul Dunn had to deal with last year. With the level of talent we currently have at O-Line he needs to have an immediate impact. Young players are going to need to be ready by the opener against Bowling Green. I don't see how anybody could do much worse than Dunn so Wise should be an improvement.
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
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4 comments:
He has his work cut out for him, o-line play was mediocre at best last year, the talent is there on paper but it is going to take a great coaching effort.
DW made a good move in firing Dunn, we shall see if Wise can translate his experience to on the field performance.
I think just the guys coming off injuries will improve the line. We had some really bad injuries last year. Dunn had to go and hopefully Wise can bring his experience and improve the young guys.
My guess is that Pinkston moves over to LT as well. RT is more problematic, so it will be interesting to see if Matha will be ready. I think that unless he is hands down the best at his position, I would redshirt Nix and give him time to grow instead of throwing into the mix immediately. I also remember some reports that they were considering moving Malecki to the o-line since they seem to think d-line is in solid shape.
Bachman and Jared Martin are also nice to have for a little depth at the guard positions. Other than that, I don't know much about how any of last year's redshirt freshmen progressed.
I'm a big fan of redshirting Nix and allowing him to get ready. If he is as good as advertised we might only get three years out of him.
The redshirt freshman really are the wildcard we all have no idea how they are going to look. I think Matha is the front runner at right tackle too but who knows what is going to happen. I wouldn't be shocked to see Joe Thomas move back to tackle.
Line doesn't seem like it will be a problem we have a wealth of bodies. Hopefully people step up and win some spots.
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