Jon Jansen: Starter Next Year?

[#56fanatic]

Originally Posted by JoeRedskin

Next year, the entire starting line (Jansen, Samuels, Thomas, Kendall and Rabach) will all be 31 or older. Given that stat, at least one or possibly two of them are not going to play the entire season. Which two? God knows, it's kind of a crap shoot. Actually, with five aging starters it's more like Russian Roullette with 5 bullets. While freak accidents are just that, with age comes brittleness, these guys simply aren't as flexible and resilient as they were 3 or 4 years ago.

Thus, cumulatively the likelihood of a "freak" accident occurring is increased. Mark my words - next year one of them will go down for the season, early, with an injury that all will say "Not much you can do to prevent [insert injury here]". I am not hoping for this obviously and will be thrilled if it doesnt occur, I just think its as likely as finding the open chamber in our game of O-Line Russian Roullette.

So while we can plan on Jansen starting, I wouldn't bet the ranch on him playing out the season. So Heyer (or somebody else) better be ready to step in at either tackle position. Same at the guard position and, clearly, they need a guard who can pull.

I don't know what's available in the draft or in the FA market, but I guarantee that this line has maybe one more year as a complete starting unit. In 2009, count on two or three new starters.

Get a line that can get a yard anywhere on the field, and we can win the f'ing Superbowl with the rest of the team unchanged.

The 0-line is "getting old" it isn't old yet. Over 31 is not old. that is considered still prime. I think we have a year or two with these guys, that we can draft some guys and mold them into lineman. Heyer is being one of those guys, I think when these guys are on the field together we have one of the best lines in the NFL. Proven last year when I believe their rating was 5th in the NFL.. I dont understand why people are bashing the oline. It is (was) one of our strong points of last season, and unfortunately we had injuries. No way we throw that away! Thomas is still one of the best guards in the league, Casey one probably top 10 centers, and Samuels and Jansen as bookend tackles is probably one of the top 5 or 10 tandems in the NFL.