PFF Final 2021 Offensive Line Rankings (Regular Season)

[puddycat]

Some odd titbits I ran across looking at these rankings.

Fred Johnson graded out at 80.1 at 90 snaps at RT. I know it was RT because Williams played 100% of the snaps at LT. 53 of these came in a single game against the Broncos week 15 when Reiff went on IR and Prince had covid. In that game he gave up 2 pressures and 0 sacks in 29 dropbacks. He had no penalties in this game or the entire year. The following week he was listed as questionable and did not practice and then picked a few snaps in weeks 17 and 18. If he gave up zero pressures why didn't he play more? Isaiah Prince played instead of Johnson. He had 9 penalties, tied with Eli Apple. Although Eli edged him out in the post-season 4 to 3. And to be fair, Trey Hill got 5 penalties in only 211 snaps). Here's where it gets weird to me. Fred Johnson was a healthy inactive for all the playoffs. So the back-up for Isaiah Prince was ... nobody. In theory it was D'Ante Smith backing up both tackle spots. Considering he played guard up until week 17 this year.
He must have really pissed off the coaches. Even so, it was malpractice to go into playoff games with your only OT backing up both spots to be a back-up guard.

[Frank Booth]

(02-22-2022, 11:53 PM)Nicomo Cosca Wrote: Some of you really prove how little you watch other teams.

I watched Burrow get sacked the most times in the league this year

I watched Burrow get crushed last season every game, and eventually tear his knee apart

Bengals o-line was bottom 3 last season

[*bfine32*]

(02-23-2022, 12:21 AM)Frank Booth Wrote: I watched Burrow get sacked the most times in the league this year

I watched Burrow get crushed last season every game, and eventually tear his knee apart

Bengals o-line was bottom 3 last season

I agree we need to look at upgrading the oline, but let's be rational.

Burrow did not "tear his knee apart" last year

JB brings a lot of sacks upon himself

We have one of the best young LTs in the game

[Frank Booth]

(02-23-2022, 12:41 AM)bfine32 Wrote: I agree we need to look at upgrading the oline, but let's be rational.

Burrow did not "tear his knee apart" last year

JB brings a lot of sacks upon himself

We have one of the best young LTs in the game

I’m just saying, nicomo says we clearly don’t watch other teams because CLEARLY there were 10 worse offensive lines than cincy’s in 2020

I mean, clear as day

[Nicomo Cosca]

(02-23-2022, 01:06 AM)Frank Booth Wrote: I’m just saying, nicomo says we clearly don’t watch other teams because CLEARLY there were 10 worse offensive lines than cincy’s in 2020

I mean, clear as day

There’s a lot of really terrible OL play around the league. And there has been for some time now. So I’m not surprised there’s that many teams ranked behind them. When teams are trading for guy’s like Billy Price you know things are bad.

These rankings are also not just pass protection. I think Mixon covers up a lot in the running game, but PFF is supposed to be grading these guys individually.

[fredtoast]

(02-23-2022, 12:09 AM)puddycat Wrote:  If he gave up zero pressures why didn't he play more?  

He must have really pissed off the coaches.  

Or maybe PFF does not know what they are talking about sometimes.

[fredtoast]

FootballOutsiders ranks O-lines as a unit. Their rankings are more in line with what I saw.

Adjusted Sack Rate.....31st. (Sacks + intentional groundings / pass plays). Adjusted for strength of opponents pass rush.

Power Run......31st. Conversion rate on runs on 3rd/4th downs with 1-2 yards to go.

Adjusted line yards.....15th. Tries to rate run blocking by removing the difference in RBs. Gives the O-line more blame for tackles behind the line of scrimmage and less credit for yards gained more than 10 yards past line of scrimmage

[jj22]

(02-22-2022, 10:06 PM)Ell Prez Wrote: I personally love the comparison. Nothing wrong with it. I like to see how Sewell does over the years.

I was team Chase before we even drafted Burrow. While watching LSU games (Bc I knew we would take Burrow), I couldn’t stop thinking, this kid #1 is a stud. Never would have thought we would get him back then. Thank you Chase for sitting out a year.

The Sewell debate will rage on until the Oline is fixed. Both "teams" were right given Chase's success, but Burrow being battered, beat up, and reinjured while being sacked the most in the league and taking record breaking sack numbers in the postseason..... along with the brutal end to the season play from the Oline that cost us the Super Bowl and fairytale storybook ending. Nothing really was settled.

It's cool to keep an eye on Sewell's career. Trust me, if he had sucked we'd hear about it form those who want to move on now that his rookie season was impressive once he settled in.

We was certainly hearing about it when he struggled those first couple games at RT.... He was still a Lion then.

[KillerGoose]

(02-23-2022, 10:42 AM)jj22 Wrote: The Sewell debate will rage on until the Oline is fixed. Both "teams" were right given Chase's success, but Burrow being battered, beat up, and reinjured while being sacked the most in the league and taking record breaking sack numbers in the postseason..... along with the brutal end to the season play from the Oline that cost us the Super Bowl and fairytale storybook ending. Nothing really was settled.

It's cool to keep an eye on Sewell's career. Trust me, if he had sucked we'd hear about it form those who want to move on now that his rookie season was impressive once he settled in.

We was certainly hearing about it when he struggled those first couple games at RT.... He was still a Lion then.

I agree. There is absolutely nothing wrong with keeping an eye on or discussing Sewell. Plenty of people discuss other players around the league all the time. The only issue with Sewell is that there was a hot debate around him or Chase. I wanted Sewell, but I loved the thought of Chase and knew that Chase was going to be the pick. I had no issue with that, and he was better than I could even imagine. I also still really like Sewell, he is a fantastic player like many thought he would be. He had his early struggles and once he settled in, he was stellar.

I do agree, there were some posters on here that were quick to point out Sewell's disappointing start and they became rather quiet as the season went on but I suspect that was due to fatigue around the conversation and Chase's success rather than Sewell picking up his play. Either way, they are both fantastic young players and it looks like there was several like them from this draft. Awesome draft class. 

[THE PISTONS]

(02-23-2022, 12:21 AM)Frank Booth Wrote: I watched Burrow get sacked the most times in the league this year

I watched Burrow get crushed last season every game, and eventually tear his knee apart

Bengals o-line was bottom 3 last season

It's a little more gray than that. When Reiff played, the line was better. You can go back and find a lot of threats about how the line was about average. When he went down, it got much worse.

Sacks? Yes - Bad. Some are definately on the line. PFF put some on Burrow. Also, we pass the ball a really high percentage. So teams are going to pass rush us more. So it's a combination of things.

But, we still need 2-3 upgrades on the offensive line at minimum. And they need to be considerable upgrades so we aren't in the same spot. We need a Top 10-15 line.

[KillerGoose]

(02-23-2022, 11:04 AM)THE PISTONS Wrote: h worse.

Sacks? Yes - Bad. Some are definately on the line. PFF put some on Burrow. Also, we pass the ball a really high percentage. So teams are going to pass rush us more. So it's a combination of things.

The concerning thing is that the Bengals didn't pass the ball a ton. In raw dropbacks, Cincinnati was 22nd. In pass play percentage, Cincinnati was 20th in pass play percentage in the regular season. They started passing more in the postseason, but they were still only 9th in pass play % in the postseason. 

EDIT - Postseason numbers are tough because of small sample sizes. LV had the largest pass play %, and they only played one game. Teams like that are who beat out Cincinnati, primarily.

[THE PISTONS]

Doing a deep dive in offensive line numbers, I can see how there were teams ranked worse than us during the regular season by PFF. While our sack numbers are really high, hurries and pressures are around league average. Plus, teams don't blitz us a lot. So they get that pressure without blitzing.

So we had 555 pass attempts. Opponents only blitzed us 132 times. Only 3 teams were blitzed less (Chiefs, Lions, and 49ers.)

Times hurried was 48 which was on the low end. Probably low quartile.
Times hit was 50 which was right in the middle. The high was 85. The low 23. I'd say most teams were in the 40 to 50 range.
Pressures were 153 which is right in the middle.
Pressure % was 24.2% - 11 teams were worse. (The worst team was pressured 28.3% of the time.) The Bills with Josh Allen were pressured 25.5% of the time. Eagles 26.1%. Titans 23.6%. I will say though, that generally the good teams have a lower percent with these outliers.
Sacks - 55 which is 3rd worst.

[*Wyche'sWarrior*]

(02-22-2022, 11:53 PM)Nicomo Cosca Wrote: Some of you really prove how little you watch other teams.

I dunno man, I can almost buy 20th this year, but 22nd last season? Nah, I can't see that.

[Frank Booth]

(02-23-2022, 01:44 PM)WychesWarrior Wrote: I dunno man, I can almost buy 20th this year, but 22nd last season? Nah, I can't see that.

That’s what I’m saying, but apparently we don’t watch enough football

[*Wyche'sWarrior*]

(02-23-2022, 01:56 PM)Frank Booth Wrote: That’s what I’m saying, but apparently we don’t watch enough football

They were horrible last year, 2019, and 2018. It started to unravel in 2016. I would easily have them in the bottom five of the league last year.

[Joelist]

Plus one area we were atrocious at was backs and TEs pass blocking. The problem is PFF for one (and FO too I think) lump those sacks on the OL a lot because they do not know what the play called was. We gave up at least 10 such sacks, which is kinda incredible. Maybe one reason Burrow likes empty set is he knows the backs are incompetent at pass protection .

[THE PISTONS]

(02-23-2022, 02:04 PM)Wyche Wrote: They were horrible last year, 2019, and 2018. It started to unravel in 2016. I would easily have them in the bottom five of the league last year.

That's what has me skeptical that they can fix it this offseason. I hope they can. I mean, willingness to spend will help.

[*Wyche'sWarrior*]

(02-23-2022, 03:01 PM)THE PISTONS Wrote: That's what has me skeptical that they can fix it this offseason. I hope they can. I mean, willingness to spend will help.

They'll have to spend some. Normally, I'd severely doubt them, but after the last two off-seasons, I have a little bit of faith they will.