A good O-line: what does it take?

[Flowers4Heisman]

We've never really had a good O-line, as someone alluded to in another post.

 

Is it just a matter of getting 4-star and 5-star athletes? Is it coaching? Is it our scheme?

 

We've brought in big guys, but our O-line has never really improved, and this goes back to the first days of USF football.

 

I'm hoping that the O-line is much improved from 2014. This is my biggest concern going into this season. But maybe if we are playing the spread, the O-line just needs to be okay for us to get yards.

 

[TExpress]

D) All of the above

[raptorcj]

I get the impression the market for big ugly athletic guys is much tougher than skill positions. Lots of kids want to be the hero and win the game, but in my experience finding guys that want to put their hands on the turf is much harder, let alone someone that's really good at it.

[Mama_Bull]

We've had some pretty good offensive lines under CJL. The main problem for us has generally been not enough depth and experience at the same time. Injuries to one or two OL makes it very difficult to adequately replace. The most important thing to replace is cohesiveness as a unit. One OL not doing his job properly ruins it for everyone else.

[GaUSFBull]

D) All of the above

 

/thread

[Gismo]

Lack of depth.

[The Great 8]

There's a reason the spread is so popular. There's not enough quality lineman to go around to be effective with power run games in college football anymore. The Leavitt lines were decent, but undersized. We couldn't consistently get the caliber of recruit we'd need to have a good line, much less a deep line. We've never been able to do it. We're in a land of skill players and the few prodigious lineman that do exist are 4/5-star and sought after by the entire country. This is why Willie's scheme was so idiotic in our recruiting territory.

[smazza]

recruiting and emphasis on recruiting big men up front

 

we never had either

 

usf never had a salesman running the football program

 

usf has always underachieved

[BDYZR]

recruiting and emphasis on recruiting big men up front

 

we never had either

 

usf never had a salesman running the football program

 

usf has always underachieved

and we need a qb...

[Flowers4Heisman]

One play that sticks out from last season was we had two guys, a RB and somebody else (a big guy), and the defender went right through them both, just like strippers greeting you when you enter Mons Venus, "Welcome!"

 

So, it's not always the O-line that has been porous.