Fox looked better at LT against Denver than Thomas has ever looked at RT at any time. Fox played RT in the preseason and looked better there than Thomas ever has. Granted it was against backups. Give me Jon Martin or Billy Milner as rookie RTs rather than Thomas.
That is a very valid opinion and I agree to an extent. The issue that seems to be arising is that Philbin is a very much "practice coach". He makes decisions on what happens in practice and applies it to gameday. For example, Chris McCain has a sack, 2 TFL, and a blocked punt vs. New England week 1. The following week he is abysmal at practice and consistently fooled and keying at the wrong elements, Philbin will give him very little snaps. Say that weekend (week 2), McCain gets another sack. Then the following week he is awful again at practice. His snaps are going to decline even more in practice. I actually hate that approach. When I played football in college, I was literally the worst practice player ever. I would mess up routes, drop easy passes, and miss key blocks on the secondary. However, when gametime came around against teams in conferences like the PAC-10 or Big-Ten, I would turn it on. Catch 4-5 passes in a drive, crack linebackers, run good routes. I was told by the coach that I am a game-time player and that I won't get more playing time unless I show it more in practice - which is ridiculous. Back to the point though, if you hear what everyone says about Landry - He practices every play like its his last and wants to get in the endzone. Thats a classic example of Philbin playing players that excel in practice. Rishard Matthews probably does terribly in practice every week and hence why we rarely see him even though he should be getting 60-70% of the offensive snaps. Its a positive sometimes, but honestly Philbin should be playing players who make plays on game days rather than consistent on practice days.
Great post! I'm not going assume I know as much as the coaches, but everyone is fallible and our obvious resistance to playing the younger guys is at times questionable.
Clearly there's something about Colledge that has endeared him to the coaches. I hope we find better options than both during the off-season. They're both unreliable and without big upside.
That would be nice but I'm resigned to us not having good players at every position. With more depth at RB we could play to our strengths, more balance (running). Id also like to see some WRs better suited to the quick pass game, winning one on one, and creating after the catch. Allow Tannehill to be a distributor as opposed depending on him to make play after play.
Well either way as a line guy I hope we go into this off season and really focus deep on OL/DL alongside the popular targets of CB and RB. As long as we have Albert we need a viable backup swing tackle. Shouldn't be moving James over every time Albert's nicked up. Get Pouncey back to center and in that weight room. Guy is woefully bad as a guard. Get a free agent RG in there and hope to god Turner and whatever late picks/veteran pick ups can handle that LG spot. DL we need to let Starks go. His play has fallen hard. Need to consider moving Earl to Odrick's side and maybe investing very high in a DT that can dominate up front in all phases of the game (And we have seen first hand what a dominate inside tackle can do for a team as we've been killed by them all year). That would help free up Wake and Vernon who also aren't getting help from the backup rushers. This is where the Dion situation hurts. Shelby surprisingly has been our best run stopper but doesn't provide a pass rush. Right now I'm leaning toward DT/MLB/CB for our first & second rounder depending on what we do in FA.
