03-16-2022, 12:03 PM
(03-15-2022, 12:50 PM)Shake n Blake Wrote: Great point. How often does a linemen go from dumpster fire as a rookie to "wow, he's actually pretty good and I'm confident starting him" in their 2nd year?
Anyone who judges an NFL player by his rookie season does not really understand the NFL. In the last 10 years there have been 15 O-linemne who did not start as a rookie who went on to Pro Bowl selections.(T.J. Lang, Evan Mathis, Donald Penn, Taylor Lewan, Rodney Hudson, Brandon Brooks, Terron Armstead, Josh Sitton, Jason Peters, Jerome Bushrod, Charles Leno, Chris Meyers, Jeff Saturday, Wyatt Teller, Jeremy Zuttah).
The list of guys who just became good starters would be much, much longer. So to answer your question, it happens all the time.
Andrew Whitworth would not have started as a rookie except for injuries, and he looked so bad playing OT against the Colts that there were many Bengal fans who claimed FOR YEARS that he was not good enough to play OT in the NFL and should be moved back to OG.
