Chicago Bears vs. Baltimore Ravens: Offensive grades
Offensive Line: C
Ok, let’s do make sure we give the line credit for their part in this win.
It’s not easy to be tasked with such a conservative, seemingly uninventive game plan and still carry it out well enough for your team to win. I mean, when the defense knows you’re going to run on first and second down every possession, blocking them is difficult. And despite that, they still opened up holes in the run game for Jordan Howard and Tarik Cohen.
Ravens allowed a franchise-worst 231 yards rushing to the Bears. The previous worst was 227 yards rushing to the Cowboys in 2012.
— Jamison Hensley (@jamisonhensley) October 15, 2017
But boy do they have some problems.
First and foremost, at the risk of sounding British: what in the bloody hell is wrong with Cody Whitehair?
Come on, dude. Moving around the offensive line might’ve worked as an excuse in the first few games of the season. But we’re in Week 6, and he’s still snapping the ball into the turf or over his quarterback’s head?
Trubisky saved him and the Bears from a safety in the third quarter, and then Whitehair was saved on THE NEXT SNAP, which he dribbled past Trubisky into the end zone, by a timeout. Good gracious.
Also, the numbers don’t tell the whole story all the time about how bad the line looked at times.
They might have only allowed four sacks, but Trubisky was under constant duress. In fact, he made his two best throws of the game while running for his life. Kyle Long got treated like a turnstile on both plays, which may hint at lingering issues with his health.
And Howard, for the second week in a row, was turning awfully blocked plays into positive yards.
For example: on the outside zone that he broke away on in overtime, he essentially did it on his own. Charles Leno almost got shoved into the end zone. Whitehair and Sitton ended up on their backs. But three broken tackles and 53 yards later, Howard ended up in Ravens territory
So, while the line played “well enough to win”, that doesn’t mean they were particularly good. If anything, Trubisky, Howard and Co. did their best work in spite of them at times. The game planning isn’t their fault. Some of the execution definitely was.