Iowa’s Excellent Center

[*ochocincos*]

(11-01-2021, 04:46 PM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: Whether it's this guy, or another center, we desperately need a new starting center. Hopkins was always, at best, average (honestly, I always felt he was below average, but we have endured such consistently terrible center play for the last 16 years, it's hard to complain when you're merely given "meh" rather than "Bodine/Ghiaciuc levels of bad"), but he has reached a new low this season and he is getting rocked back on every single 3rd and short run we've had this season. We need to get better at those 3rd and short conversions and a good push from our IOL is a big part of that required improvement.

I'm not sure we can just get any early-round pick C that would be an upgrade over Hopkins.
We saw what happened with Billy Price, who was projected to be one of the Top 3 C's in the draft.
He turned out to be worse than Hopkins.

We probably need to start putting together a list of Centers (both in FA and draft) that we legitimately feel would be a solid-or-better starting C.

Right now, the only ones I feel confident in are:
- Linderbaum (1st round pick)
- Jason Kelce (FA)
- Ben Jones (FA)

I know there are some other prospects like Alec Lindstrom and Luke Matthews (both who have siblings playing in the NFL), but I need to revisit their scouting reports/tape, as I haven't gone through that in a few months.