Joey B talks to Collinsworth

[Shake n Blake]

(04-22-2021, 05:01 PM)TJ528 Wrote: Listen I'm not a Paul Alexander fan either.

If you look at the Bengals drafting of OL all the way back until 2002, Levi Jones was taken in 2002, then Steinbach in 2003, and after that it was pretty much a bunch of crap.  Ghiaciuc was drafted in 2005 and was poor center, then didnt have another impact offensive lineman until Andre Smith in 2009, then Boling in 2011, and Zietler in 2012.  

So prior to their current run of ineffective, overrated OL they had drafted pretty good on the OL and Alexander was a part of that.  

Alexander was let go after the 2017 season and if we really look at this team's drafts the last 4 years has the OL they drafted really hit with the expection of Jonah and that's only if he can stay healthy.  He'll be a steady piece but not elite.  

Thing is, I don't know how much Paul banged the table for any of those good players, but it was well publicized that he did lobby hard for his last few guys, who were all terrible. IMO, we should've fired PA because the run game was terrible for many, many years.

Sure the pass blocking was decent (not amazing) from 2003-2015 (with the exception of 2008-2010)...but our run game was completely ineffective for a staggering amount of years:

YPC rankings:
2006- 25th
2007- 28th
2008- 30th
2009- 24th
2010- 32nd
2011- 27th
2012- 20th
2013- 28th
2014- 12th
2015- 23rd
2016- 23rd
2017- 29th

Average rank for 12 years: 25th

This for a team - under Marvin - that was big on running the football. During this same span, our average rank in rush attempts was 14th. So we were - for the most part - a run first team that struggled to run the football. That's why I wanted Paul Alexander gone.

Lo and behold, in our first year without PA, the team jumped to 8th in YPC, which was our best ranking since 2000.

Thankfully we got Pollack back, because Jim Turner was bad at everything.

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All of this said, our o-line drafting has been bad since PA left, with guys like Billy Price. Jonah has been "ok". That's kinda why I want the "can't miss" guy in Penei Sewell. We do have Pollack back, so give him a top piece to mold and lets go.