Great Patriot O Line Breakdown and Nick MacDonald Update

[pbmax]

http://www.footballoutsiders.com/word-muth/2012/word-muth

As far as the interior line goes, Connolly started the game at right guard but was replaced in the first quarter. Since Donald Thomas was already filling in for Mankins on the left side, Nick McDonald was forced into action. McDonald didn’t play great, but he was far from a disaster. In fact, considering he is the Patriots' fourth guard, he was fairly impressive. He pulled well and was sound in his assignments, avoiding any disasters. That’s more than most deep reserves will give you.


That being said, he did really struggle coming up to the second level when involved in combination blocks. There were multiple times where he was late leaving a down lineman for a linebacker and couldn’t make the block as a result. I’m not sure if he wasn’t used to linebackers scraping at game speed or if he really wanted to secure the down guys to avoid a tackle for loss, but it was a consistent issue on Sunday. He also got beat across his face a couple of times in pass protection, but I can't recall him giving up a sack.

[Fritz]

Nick, we hardly knew ye.

[Freak Out]

I take it he was a Packer? Damn...sounds like we could have used him.

[pbmax]

I take it he was a Packer? Damn...sounds like we could have used him.

Yes. Patler noted McCarthy was pretty happy with McDonald's offseason and talked him up quite a bit. He then had a desultory camp and was passed by EDS. The Patriots either claimed him off the PS or picked him up outright and noted blowhard Greg Bedard declared that he was excited by the idea of MacDonald getting some real coaching from the Patriots.

Ever since that broadside, we have been tracking MacDonald to see how he would develop. So far, it looks like Campen is a better O line coach than Bedard is a judge of O line talent or coaches.

[HarveyWallbangers]

EDS must be pretty good if he beat out McDonald, right?