I thought the OL played great in this game, especially with missing all the pieces. Those last two drives of the game were amazing by them! To hold up to one of the best defenses in the game was true testament to their play. Their play bodes really well to the rest of the season going forward.
The difference in coaching and overall talent evaluation is night and day. Sam Young and Urbik aren't world beaters but we had to plug them in and guess what? They're capable of playing offensive line in the NFL. And that's that. We plug in Turner and Thomas yesterday and we lose. During philbins time I said to myself "it's not supposed to be this hard to find competent olineman" Kudos to Gase and crew for finding competent backups
Yup tough to handle that D line with starting lineman, let alone Urbick/Steen/Young. Basically were down to 3rd string LT. They kept Tannehill clean in crunch time, and won us the game. Great work.
They were better than we likely expected against that front. Tannehill still got knocked around far too much. They got Jay blown up a lot in the backfield. Their blocking on the few screens we attempted was poor. The OL looked competent at times because of the quick passing game we were using to offset the mismatch of our backups against that great DL. What they did do well though, is not have many complete mistakes and blowups like the old backups. It is pretty amazing though what a difference the backups looked like without Dallas Thomas, Billy Turner and Jamil Douglas. Talk about wasted draft picks. Wow. When it mattered most though, they came through, so there's that. They're going to be tested a lot more moving forward, we still have some strong defensive fronts on the schedule. So they've got to keep that next man up philosophy going, do what they can, and hope the injury to Tunsil isn't serious, and hope we get Albert and Pouncey back sooner rather than later.
Any updates on Tunsil? Sam Young must've played his butt off. I never saw him get beat and the O-line shined the most when it mattered most.
I think the Rams have one of the best defenses in the league. Look at what they have done this year without any offensive help. Now that defense may break down going forward with all they have to do, but through 1 half of a season they might have been the best.
I agree the OL played really well given the major injuries, but only in pass protection. And props to the coaches for that. But they really couldn't open up much in the running game, so I can't give them much credit there. Rams have a great defense where it counts most: points allowed, but they're only average in run defense, giving up over 100 per game.
I think they are the very best honestly, our two td's in the 4th quarter were the first td's they had allowed in 11 quarters. That's incredible when, like you said, the offense isn't doing much. Without Watt healthy, I think Donald is the best defensive lineman in the game.
Let's be honest though, had Miami lost, we would be blaming the O-line and rightfully so. They played well when it mattered despite being pretty bad for 3 1/2 quarters of football. That Rugby style TD where they pushed Landry in was a play no Dolphfan will soon forget.
Tannehill was playing like a total *****, too, until the end of the game. That interception was horrible, a couple of his sacks were like "dude, how do you NOT avoid getting sacked there?". He was looking very much like the old Tannehill in that game. Even on the game-winning drives he threw some lousy balls that Parker bailed him out on. It still seems like poor, or overwhelmed O-line play rattles him and he loses that competitive edge that I assumed he just 'had' now. The offensive line, starting midway through the 4th quarter not only protected him, they gave him just enough assurance that he wasn't distracted by it and he was able to start balling.
Agreed 1000%. Those two and virtually no hope in the last series ending in anything other than a strip-sack fumble to end it.