How much do you think the season changes with our starting Oline for the whole season so far?
Abe Lucas is so good. He is a difference maker at right tackle. I don’t even think he got injured in that game. I’m worried he has a chronic knee, which may also explain why he fell in the draft.
11-0, probably
They have 4/5 of that offensive line back and the offense is still awful.
I don’t think it would be much different.
Maybe 8-3 but we might have had a blowout win over the Commanders or the Giants or the Panthers that would have quietened the fire Pete crowd.
I still think we’re a step behind the Niners and the Eagles and therefore our ceiling would be losing in the Divisional which would still cause some to demand a wholesale reset.
I think the only way we don’t end in that scenario is a healthy OL and Geno to find true chemistry with his receivers and play like a Top 3 passing team (think Burrow with Chase and Boyd and Higgins).
I would ask this question in response to this:
How would the 2013 Superbowl Season have gone if the Falcons hadn’t squeaked by us the year before?
Because that loss hurt them, it made them angry. It put a chip on their shoulder. Sometimes adversity gives you what you need. After that game Pete told the locker room that THIS was why they need to have home field advantage. And because of that we crushed the next season and had the #1 seed. If we would have beaten the Falcons and made it to the NFC Championship game they may not have felt like they MUST WIN home field. For me personally I’m hoping that Lucas is able to come back in and our line can stabilize. And we can get back on track. All we need is to swing momentum. We do have a very stacked roster. If we can start playing our best game we can turn things around. If that happens, this path will have been worth it.
We would still have a quarterback that stares at his target before he throws. We would still have a WB that holds the ball too long. We would still have an OC that makes it easy to figure out which play we run by how we line up. 2023 is over.
And injured our current QB and our last QB too
Better. But still not great. I feel like we’re seeing a ceiling to this team given its current makeup.