Football
Offensive Line Being Retooled this Season
By John PorentasThere aren't going to be a whole lot of seniors on this year's Ohio State football team. One of them will be offensive lineman Jim Cordle.
Cordle has seen his share of ups and downs during his OSU career, and there is one of those "downs" he hopes to remedy this season, the hit the reputation of the OSU offensive line has taken recently.
"I don't want to be on a line again that everybody says 'they suck', so our hope is to be good, very good," said Cordle.
Cordle definitely is aware of what has been said about the OSU offensive line the last couple of years and if nothing else, his heart is in the right place. Just a couple of days into spring drills he's also noticed that the OSU coaching staff is taking a little different approach to practice this spring, one that should help with some of what has ailed OSU's offensive line, a lack of nastyness and toughness.
"The coaches are definitely putting that message on us," said Cordle.
"Today was the hardest, most physical spring practice that I've ever been in. We were going against the D-line full contact, full go.
"We're doing a lot more team and lot more live stuff and putting the jersey scrimmage at the end of every practice. That definitely gets an attitude. You're out there competing and you don't want to lose, you don't want to get beat even in just a one on one drill."
The competition angle, and the hitting, seems to be the theme this spring. For starters, the last six plays of each practice are ones on ones, and count toward the outcome of the jersey scrimmage, an event the players take seriously. Each day is ended with competition that means something and with heavy hitting. Cordle is hoping the change in practice philosophy will help the Buckeye offensive front have a better attitude from day one when the season begins.
"The criticism was just (last season)," said Cordle.
"We started out the season and we weren't where we needed to be attitude-wise. We came along as the season went along, but this year we can't start out that way. You've got to be right from the start or you could be 0-4."
OSU"s practice methods are aimed at promoting toughness, but to make good chicken salad, you have to start with good chicken. OSU is hoping that the an influx of new personnel along the offensive front will also help bring along that toughness. One of the new faces in the mix is Justin Boren, and Cordle likes what he sees in the newcomer.
"He does add that dimension of a little mean streak. It rubs off on guys definitely. He's maybe a little to much of staring fights and stuff, but thats what you need, you need to play a little pissed off I guess," Cordle said.
The Buckeyes are mixing and matching along the offensive front this spring, looking for that right combination of players. Offensive coordinator and offensive line coach Jim Bollman ticked off some of the possibilities at each position.
"Michael Adams and Andrew Miller have been working at left tackle," said Bollman.
"Justin Boren and Conner Smith have been working at left guard,
"Michael Brewster, Jim Cordle and Andrew Moses have been working at center,
"Bryant Browning, Michael Brewster and Evan Blankenship have been working at right guard.
"And at right tackle there has been Bryant Browning, Jim Cordle, Josh Kerr. Chris Malone has been working some left guard and left tackles, Jack Mewhort some left guard and left tackle, Zach Slagle mostly at right guard."
Bollman described what he is looking for in whoever ends up manning each of those positions.
"You want to try and finish plays better, you want to try and control the line of scrimmage more in both run and pass, give the other guys the chance to do their jobs.
"When you give the running backs a little room to manuver at the line of scrimmage, get them to the line of scrimmage, give the quarterbacks that extra split second of time, things are always going to operate better."
Bollman said that wasn't the case at times last season, particularly early in the year.
"Looking back things probably improved as the year went on. In the second half of the year the Illinois game was a game we ran the ball pretty good. The Michigan game we ran the ball pretty good."
The offensive line will have some youth this season, and that has the potential to bring about problems, but Bollman likes what he sees in its overall talent.
"There are some guys who are pretty mobile. They've worked hard this winter.
"The toughest thing to get back is always your pass protection, always. That's been the same ever since I've been in this business. That's something that we have to keep working on every day," he said.
All that while still working on OSU's bread and butter.
"There are some running plays that we're always going to do, that we've always done. We're always going to run the power, but there may be some different things we'll experiment with as the spring goes on."
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