The Game Plan - Previewing Badgers Offensive Line

I'm very excited about the offensive line because I have been spending a lot of time over these last couple of months watching AJ Blazek talk about the offensive line. If you have any desire to coach, go on YouTube and search AJ and look at all the myriad of information that he's put out there. He seems like a very open coach, very open to work with in clinics and stuff like that. You hear a lot about his philosophy when it comes to offensive line coaching, and it's exciting. The dude loves to talk about offensive line play. He's the type of coach where I can tell his voice is gone at the end of every practice because he coaches at a thousand miles an hour, and I love that. That's what this room needs. The teacher who's going to get on your ass and you'll hate and love every minute of it.

So when we get into looking at our offensive linemen from a fundamental point of view, this room has got to get better in the passing game and pass protection at getting their hands on defenders early. I think we saw a lot last year with guys like Jack Nelson and Michael Furtney when they got into pass protection they would get out "quick" but then they would just sit back and wait for contact. there was so much time from their get-off to the point of first contact that unless they locked out and got in position perfectly right away, they were going to get lost.

We're not running complicated deep passing schemes and we don't need to keep that pocket open for two and a half seconds. So I want to see our offensive linemen get out of their stance, work more laterally to get their hands on those pass rushers early to let the pass rushers react to the protection instead of the other way around. Get off, get your hands on the guy, and work to your strength. Obviously, our strength is our power.

We saw a little bit last year where they would play action and be able to pull out Tanor Bortolini and work a little bit of semi-roll stuff. I'd like to see more movement in pass protection. To allow movement, we need to be able to almost essentially build a run scheme when it comes to picking up the rest of our defenders. We need to have that quick lateral movement and quick hands that set up the ability to move uncovered linemen and rotate and move the pocket. Overall improving our pass protection skills is going to allow for a more diverse arsenal when it comes to pass protection schemes. We're just building and building upon all this movement, and it's going to allow us to get better at screens.

The screen game is so important to the Air Raid offense because it really extends the amount of space the first and second-level defenders have to cover in terms of pass coverage. It brings so much more emphasis to the first level of the passing game. We've been building up this whole time about a three-layered effect. Utilizing the running backs more effectively in the passing game is going to help with the lower level, but getting better at the screen game and not just throwing bubble screens or quick screens. Getting those big linemen upfield and letting them get hands on quickly and effectively. We ran it a few times last year with moderate success.

There were a couple of great schemed-up screens that we ran last year where we would fake power in one direction and then bring out backside linemen to set up a wall in a screen game. We showed that we were capable of doing it last year. Let's hope being a year faster, a year more agile, a year smarter, on top of being a year stronger, can improve that group and allow us to be more aggressive on the first level of the defense, bringing the offensive linemen to the defense instead of the other way around.

2024 needs to be a year that the offensive line has got to return to the forefront of the Wisconsin offense. It's a veteran group. We're returning essentially five starters, or four starters, from last year. There is a lot of experience: multiple-year starters, All-Conference type players. We have some young talent who have been patiently waiting, like Joe Brunner and JP Benzschawel, to get into that rotation. Then we've got the young guys coming up. There's a reason why we've dedicated 10 bodies in the last two recruiting classes to offensive linemen. We're going to see some of these young guys who have been brought up in modern football and have been training since they were younger in the ways of modern football: the combination of power and agility, the combination of speed and aggression. That is going to take the dynamics of our offensive line group to another level.

When guys like Kevin Heywood, Emerson Mandell, and the rest get into the rotation, I think they will early. Especially now that we hear Leyton Nelson is unfortunately going to be out for the season, our depth is kind of back down to where it was pre-spring. So, that's going to mean a lot of young guys. The easy thing to do with young guys is just give them a spot, tell them to run, and go get it. I think our offensive line group can do it. It's just going to take a leader, a coach in that room, that can get his guys really excited about the details of offensive line play. I think AJ Blazek is that type of guy. From a coach's point of view, I think our offensive line is in good hands this coming season.

Alright, so that's the offensive line. Next time, we're going to wrap up our position outlook preview by looking at the quarterbacks and how the quarterbacks can improve. The room is different, but the ideas behind the offense are the same. The room needs to grow if the offense is going to take a step forward in the 2024 season.