It's not Ronnie. It's not Ricky. Heck it ain't even Henning.

the 23rd · Nov 2, 2010

CitizenSnips said:

If you're wondering why we're not moving the ball on the ground as well as we've grown accustomed to these past few seasons, look no further than the offensive line.

Jake long is still a tank and probably the best in the business at his spot, so just exclude him from all of this.

You know that saying "Running backs grow on trees?" Well, it works both ways. When running backs look great, most of it is because their offensive lines are pushing people around and not missing blocks. So when a running back doesn't perform well, it's usually the offensive lines fault as well.

This Bengals front 7 was not very tough today, and yet the holes just werent really there. Ronnie and Ricky may not be very explosive anymore (although that was never either of their styles to begin with) but they are better than their production right now is showing.

Part of it is the lack of the wildcat. Im not advocating we run it more, what i'm saying is our offensive line can't block for it anymore. Say what you will about Justin Smiley, Donald Thomas, and Jake Grove, those guys could move. Smiley might have been the best pulling guard in the league. Smiley somehow managed to have a great block on almost every big wildcat play we had and i think losing that mobility on the offensive line has really hurt us.

You could make the argument that it's playcalling, but there's really no excuse for a running play not to work. There are 11 guys on each side of the field, the only guys on defense that are not accounted for on a running play are the safeties. So unless the two safeties make every tackle for the opposing defense, clearly our guys are not making their blocks.

An additional wag of the finger goes to Polite and Fasano, as they are also part of the problem when it comes to run blocking.

This offensive line, while excelling at pass blocking, is not getting it done on the ground. Ronnie and Ricky are both former #2 and #5 picks respectively. They've both been to the pro bowl. Their lack of production is on the offensive line, not them.
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100% right

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It's not Ronnie. It's not Ricky. Heck it ain't even Henning.

the 23rd a.k.a. Rio

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It's not Ronnie. It's not Ricky. Heck it ain't even Henning.

the 23rd a.k.a. Rio

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