Al Saunders: was he necessary?

[Schneed10]

I think the reason the passing game is stalling has nothing to do with Mark Brunell and everything to do with the offensive line. And nobody on that line has forgotten how to play football. They've had some hiccups with penalties, but by and large the problem is blitz pickups. They don't have the protection schemes down yet. Brunell got chased around in both games and had no time to throw.

Secondly, the offensive line isn't run blocking very well right now either. They need more time to practice these schemes. Opponents are sitting back in Cover 2 because we don't have Portis. But even against the Vikes, Portis only went for 3.9 per carry, hardly scary.

It's all about the line right now. It's the backbone of an offense, and they clearly have work to do in order to learn the protection schemes better and to practice executing their blocking assignments on running plays.

SO... if we didn't bring in Saunders, this would not be an issue. We'd be using the old protection schemes and would probably look a lot better. But bringing in Saunders was a long-term type of move. It might hurt right now, but we'll be better for it in the end. Hopefully we're not 0-5 before we turn it around.