Devo182's post on
advanced O-line stats was pretty eye-opening. While it's reaffirmed the things many of us have said all season, it's certainly nice to have quantitative proof of that.
Some of the intereting highlights of
the Football Outsider stats --- we were:
(1) Dead last on percentage of running plays stuffed behind the line of scrimmage ("Stuff Rate") and not even close to next-to-last,
(2) Bottom 10% in every single run blocking category,
(3) #127 / 130 on Adjusted Line Yards
(4) #103 / 130 on Sack Rate
Football Outsider's stats go back to 2014, so we can compare with much of the Butch Jones era. 2018 was by far the worst performance for the O-line. Worse than 2014. Worse than 2017.
The One Weird Outlier
That said, there's one very weird thing in the data for 2018 --- one stat we were not terrible on: "Passing Down Sack Rate".
This is a measure that takes downs that are considered obvious or very likely "passing downs" and looks at the percentage of sacks. We weren't spectacular on this metric, but we were rated #57, which is very middle of the pack. Why were we OK on this, but horrible on every single other metric?
The answer IMO is that
every down was a "passing down" for us.
Most teams have a much lower sack rate on "standard downs" than "passing downs." Georgia and Texas are both good examples. On standard downs, their sack rates were around 3.5% - 4.0%. On pass downs, that increased to about 8.5%. Meanwhile, our sack rate was similar on "standard downs" and "passing downs". In fact, the sack rate actually went down a bit on "passing downs" from 8.9% to 7.6%.
Our run blocking was so poor that our opponents didn't respect the run. Probably the greatest example was the South Carolina game where Muschamp decided to play his DBs back and dared us to run and throw short passes. This is not a tactic that he could have applied to any other team in the SEC. He knew we were incapable of winning in the trenches, so he simply had to prevent giving up "big plays".
Other teams simply blitzed to their hearts' content. They weren't concerned about getting bit by the run, because they knew our O-line was going to lose the battle. In essence, our inability to run block undermined everything else, so that opponents were able to treat 1st and 10 or 2nd and 6 just like "passing downs".
Why Were We So Bad?
There are a lot of reasons we were so awful on O-line.
(1)
Firing of Mahoney; hiring of Walt Wells. Butch effectively fired Don Mahoney at the end of 2016 and replaced him with Walt Wells. Mahoney never had elite O-lines, but he did have a history of developing O-linemen and some of the stats were better than people realized in 2015 and 2016. Mahoney was probably an average OL coach at the SEC level ... not great, not awful. Walt Wells, on the other hand ... before UT, he was fired at USF for his dismal performance under Willie Taggart. He was exiled to lower-tier programs for a few years before becoming an Analyst under Butch. Our stats and O-line performance plummeted under Wells. Butch's O-lines were never great, but Wells turned an average OL into a very bad one in a single year.
(2)
Firing of Dave Lawson. In April 2016, Butch fired Dave Lawson and basically left an open position on the S&C staff for nearly a year. This was also the period in which the now infamous "shirtless out of shape" team photo was taken. We experienced an unprecedented rash of injuries in 2016, which is likely due in part to poor S&C. In spite of the hire of Rock Gullickson the next season, it never felt like S&C recovered under Butch. Our guys continued to be weaker than their counterparts in the SEC. While Pruitt went out and hired one of the best S&C directors out there with Craig Fitzgerald, it's still important to remember that our O-linemen spent 2 years with inadequate S&C which hurt their development.
(3)
The depleted 2015 class. The 2015 class was our Senior (or RS-Jr) class for 2018. It's the most important class for the O-line. Take a look at our 2015 recruiting haul on OL: Drew Richmond, Jack Jones, Chance Hall, Venzell Boulware, and Zach Stewart. Stewart's mom died after he signed and he never ended up enrolling at UT. Boulware transferred to Miami. Jack Jones was forced to retire due to injuries. Chance Hall has also suffered from repeated injuries and never felt close to 100% in 2018. So we signed a class of 5 O-linemen and you can say 1 -2 of them are left in a best case scenario. And Richmond is largely considered to be a huge underachiever; he would probably be re-rated as a 3-star rather than a 5-star.
(4)
Bad luck. On top of all of this, we've just had plain ole' bad luck. Our 2 best O-linemen were unavailable for much of the season. Trey Smith's health issues have kept him off the field and may end his career. Kennedy suffered a season-ending injury in the 1st game. That's on top of losing Jack Jones forever and a host of other injuries that have limited several linemen.
(5)
Butch's recruiting got worse. Butch Jones recruited well for a few years, but his recruiting clearly got worse during his last two seasons. In spite of the rash of injuries on O-line, Butch only took 3 OLs 2017. At least you can credit him for not going "FULL DOOLEY!", as Dooley failed to recruit O-linemen at all for over a year, but we still needed more guys to replace the ones we'd lost due to injuries and other issues. While we did get Trey Smith in 2017, the rest of the O-line haul was a bit weaker. Riley Locklear may turn out to be good with more experience, but he was probably thrown into the fire a bit early. Similar deal with K'Rojhn Calbert, who lost the entire 2017 season due to a knee injury, and who was more or less coming into 2018 in the same position as a true Freshman. But in reality, we probably needed at least 1 more blue-chip OL in 2017
(6)
Scheme change. Then just to top it all off, we went through a scheme change and many of the current O-linemen are a poor fit.
Looking Forward to 2019
I think the O-line will get better next season, but the real question is "how much better?" Many of our guys were probably playing before they were ready (e.g. Locklear, Niehaus). Many were out of position (e.g. Ryan Johnson). Most would benefit from another offseason of S&C.
We'll add at least 2 blue chip recruits and hopefully a 3rd with Darnell Wright. But we'll still be a very young line and true Freshman rarely take starting OL jobs. Nevertheless, our depth will be much better next season.
Overall, I think the narrative that the 2018 O-line performance is all 'coaching staff' is inaccurate. Our issues stem from a series of mistakes by Butch Jones, a scheme change, and a mound of bad luck to go along with that. We'll have a much better sense of how this staff does with the O-line in late 2019 and 2020.
) but he was always one of the smartest players on the field and some cases was a better coach than I was. I told him a center is the only guy that touches the ball every single play on offense and he liked that. I say that to say I have never had a good Oline without a smart center who can set up protection and understand where the pressure is coming from. Much more important for the center to understand what the DL is doing than the QB in most coaches opinion and lets the Qb trust all he has to do is look for the hot read in the open zone area. He can only do that when he trusts his OL. Why JG hasn't axe murdered someone on the sidelines I don't know...
