[GTripp0012]

I think the OL is a problem. I also think it's far and above what we witnessed last year. Part of that is because Rabach is playing better (more because of an epically bad 2009, 2008, and 2007), part of it is because there's an actual interest in playing guys who fit an ideal scheme rather than just playing the best five players we could acquire without putting in actual effort. Most of it is because Artis Hicks, if nothing else, has started all 8 games at RG. At this time last year, we had 4 different RGs already. Number 5 was a game away.

McNabb has fairly decent protection, which is to say that protection is not the 1a problem with this offense. I don't think we protect at a level sufficient enough to facilitate an elite passing or rushing offense. I do think we got dominated on the line of scrimmage by the Lions. But I think the OL has outperformed the RBs and QBs on offense this year.

That doesn't mean we shouldn't fix the problems and try to upgrade at C and RG, and expect Trent Williams to bounce back from a game where he clearly didn't handle KVB as he was expected to. We need more out of the OL than we got vs. the Lions. This comes a week after Julius Peppers and Israel Idonije went nuts against us. There is room to improve.

But even if there is no immediate improvement, the offensive skill players need to play better and produce more. They are the ones not producing any touchdowns. They are the underachievers on this unit.

I fear that we've let McNabb take so many hits (forget sacks) to this point that we're seeing indirect effects of that pressure in his play. But the quantity of hits on McNabb isn't occurring because of poor OL play, it's occurring because the scheme requires the QB to make plays under duress and frankly, far too often.

You could argue that improving the front five might make it easier and more sensible to run the football, and that running the football would result in fewer hits on McNabb. That's all true. But it's also a chicken or egg argument. We throw too much so McNabb gets hit a lot and then he doesn't produce because he's getting hit too much. Or we have to throw as much as we do because that's where our offensive capabilities are and we're losing that capability because we don't have any balance in our offense. Pick your explanation. We just have to change something.