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OL Workload Management · Filmstudy - Baltimore Ravens Talk

0:02
[SPEAKER_01]: Hi, folks.
0:03
[SPEAKER_01]: Welcome to the episode of Film Study.
0:04
[SPEAKER_01]: This is Canbecuse, a great interesting short for you tonight.
0:07
[SPEAKER_01]: This is something that came through Film Study Mailbag at gmail.com.
0:10
[SPEAKER_01]: I want you always to send your questions there and a lot of them end up becoming show ideas when it's something interesting and really outside the box like this one is.
0:19
[SPEAKER_01]: But we're joined today by Dario Roos.
0:21
[SPEAKER_01]: I hope I pronounced that correctly, Dario.
0:23
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
0:24
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, sir.
0:25
[SPEAKER_01]: And he's going to he has a I think a very revolutionary idea with regard to workload management for the offensive line.
0:33
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't want to take him let him take us through some of the background for this.
0:37
[SPEAKER_01]: I'll interject and have questions.
0:39
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm sure.
0:39
[SPEAKER_01]: But Dario, talk about some of the background for this in terms of fatigue on long drives and how you see this problem.
0:47
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so I really believe that the the offensive and defense of the lines are the most physically demanding physically taxing positions.
0:56
[SPEAKER_00]: So I would say that the O line positions are never rotated and unless there's an injury, the five that start the game are the same five that finish the game.
1:07
[SPEAKER_00]: So I feel like the defense commonly rotates.
1:12
[SPEAKER_00]: their defensive tackles, brings in fresh adressures on third down.
1:15
[SPEAKER_00]: So it seems like a definite advantage for the defense, especially as you get late into the game, and on long drives when there's no chance to take a breather, so long drives can be punishing to the cardio.
1:28
[SPEAKER_00]: So yeah, that's the idea behind it.
1:31
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, I'm with you so far and you know I certainly this is at the very first time I've ever heard this idea one of the things that's commonly mentioned is playing defense is a lot more strenuous and playing offensive line because it's offensive line is kind of a reactive and a protective position as opposed to being one, sorry, that has to come up with the large amount of energy needed to beat the band opposite you.
1:56
[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah.
1:57
[SPEAKER_01]: You've heard me say probably before that Merlin Olson talks about past rushing and whenever he did he's past now, but he would always say, you can't imagine how difficult it is.
2:06
[SPEAKER_01]: There's nothing more tiring that you could do.
2:10
[SPEAKER_01]: Flopping food books together or things.
2:12
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I agree.
2:13
[SPEAKER_00]: Deaf defensive line first.
2:15
[SPEAKER_00]: I think offensive line would be second after the defensive line.
2:20
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, but you're making a good point here that the defenders naturally do rotate oftentimes they'll never play more than three or four snaps in a row, and they may have maybe specialists by down and distance or whatever, but they certainly are replaced fairly frequently without very long consecutive plays.
2:42
[SPEAKER_00]: Exactly, yeah.
2:43
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's where I feel strategic substitution slash rotations could help negate that advantage,
2:50
[SPEAKER_01]: All right.
2:50
[SPEAKER_01]: So let's talk about this.
2:52
[SPEAKER_01]: We've seen examples by series previously with the Ravens in part and fairly recently, in fact.
3:00
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
3:01
[SPEAKER_00]: So in 22 and 23 specifically, it was Ronnie and McCarrie rotated positions.
3:08
[SPEAKER_00]: And it was really, um, in my belief, it was not really work load management.
3:13
[SPEAKER_00]: It was injury management.
3:14
[SPEAKER_00]: Ronnie was coming back from his ankle injury.
3:18
[SPEAKER_00]: And in 2022, they did a couple of game of rotation.
3:23
[SPEAKER_00]: And then in 2023, coming back again from his ankle injury, they started substituting Ronnie and McCarrie again.
3:33
[SPEAKER_00]: And also Morgan Moses, who was dealing with a shoulder injury, and playing through a shoulder injury, they started rotating at right tackle with Daniel Fawlailey.
3:47
[SPEAKER_00]: And John Harball, his quote, let me see, said the goal is to reduce their workload and keep Stanley and Moses.
3:57
[SPEAKER_00]: stronger for the fourth quarter, and that sounds like workload management, but I believe that was injury management.
4:03
[SPEAKER_00]: They were concerned these older players would get re-indred, and we all remember the pressure on Ronnie to come back and play, and he was dealing with that ankle injury, that kept re-indring itself, and it was anything to stop that from happening.
4:18
[SPEAKER_00]: So this idea of rotating
4:21
[SPEAKER_00]: taking away some of the reps, keeping them less likely, mitigating that risk to injury.
4:28
[SPEAKER_01]: All right.
4:29
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm with you on that.
4:30
[SPEAKER_01]: And I'm not sure it really matters whether we call it workload manager.
4:33
[SPEAKER_01]: Workload management though from the sense you're talking about it is really more like for effectiveness and the injury management is is to avoid injury.
4:42
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
4:42
[SPEAKER_00]: To mitigate the risk of injury.
4:43
[SPEAKER_00]: That's why I think it's different.
4:46
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, so there have been other times where we've seen this sort of rotation for other teams and one kind of famous one, do you want to talk about that?
4:55
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, yeah, this I could not find too many examples and that tells you that that this is a rather radical idea right if teams aren't doing it, but in the 2015 Patriots, they were very good team and they finished 12 and four and
5:09
[SPEAKER_00]: Bill Belitechek was rotating, he had some young players and he did a press conference and he had three separate ideas when they asked them about why the rotations are taking place.
5:22
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, one was freshness workload.
5:26
[SPEAKER_00]: So the fact that a starting tackle didn't have to play every offensive snap and.
5:31
[SPEAKER_00]: He had Canon, could take a series for solder and vomere.
5:37
[SPEAKER_00]: And then developmental evaluation, development evaluation.
5:41
[SPEAKER_00]: He had Mason and Jackson were rookie fourth rounders.
5:44
[SPEAKER_00]: So New England could bring them in and have them kind of show themselves and he could evaluate them and develop them.
5:59
[SPEAKER_00]: would work with certain formations.
6:01
[SPEAKER_00]: So he had, it was more formation specific.
6:03
[SPEAKER_00]: He had certain players.
6:05
[SPEAKER_00]: So he had seven offensive linemen for the five positions.
6:11
[SPEAKER_00]: And one of the offensive linemen played two different positions, guard and tackle.
6:15
[SPEAKER_00]: So my feeling really is, it was more about evaluation because they had several young players competing for the position.
6:23
[SPEAKER_00]: And no
6:26
[SPEAKER_00]: and I think the rotations gave the coaching staff a chance to compare them in meaningful game situations, so before they could determine a starter.
6:37
[SPEAKER_01]: it sounds like the much more important reason anyway so if you're if you're trying to evaluate a young player and you want to rotate the ravens have done that in other positions that don't inferior require rotation like cornerback they've they've certainly done it to rotate through in fact that when you're hungry when the team MVP even though he didn't really play every snap at corner which was an odd kind of a situation that's true
7:01
[SPEAKER_01]: So, but I agree with you, the third one almost sounds like a back-filled reason, like, like, we think of specific formations.
7:09
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know if I really blame it.
7:11
[SPEAKER_00]: That sounded weak to me, too.
7:12
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
7:13
[SPEAKER_01]: All right.
7:14
[SPEAKER_01]: Interesting.
7:15
[SPEAKER_01]: Interesting.
7:16
[SPEAKER_01]: All right.
7:16
[SPEAKER_01]: So, there's some historical examples.
7:19
[SPEAKER_01]: There's some team examples.
7:20
[SPEAKER_01]: There's certainly, it's a cabinet multiple positions for the Ravens.
7:25
[SPEAKER_01]: You haven't even more revolutionary idea of how you would implement it on the offensive line.
7:31
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I think, first of all, let me talk about for the approach to work.
7:35
[SPEAKER_00]: I think the talent gap between starter and backup has to be relatively small.
7:39
[SPEAKER_00]: So if the drop-off is too significant,
7:42
[SPEAKER_00]: You lose the potential benefits, they're outweight by the risk and by risk, I mean poor performance risk, right?
7:50
[SPEAKER_00]: But but if we have a backup that's 80% as effective of the starter, let's say, and then you add the advantage of the backup coming in fresh, so that closes some of that 20% gap that makes that makes the actual drop off relatively small who knows the backup could become an inferent exhausted starter in which case the backup would actually be in an advantage.
8:13
[SPEAKER_00]: But remember, the goal is that when we get the starters to return, they will then be at an advantage being refreshed.
8:20
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's the idea.
8:21
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
8:23
[SPEAKER_01]: All right.
8:23
[SPEAKER_01]: That makes all kinds of sense.
8:24
[SPEAKER_01]: It's certainly what they do in the defensive line.
8:27
[SPEAKER_00]: And the benefits of offensive line rotation.
8:30
[SPEAKER_00]: They get more pronounced as a game where it's on, right?
8:33
[SPEAKER_00]: The greatest impact is going to come in the fourth quarter, where it has the most value.
8:40
[SPEAKER_00]: Incrent condition.
8:41
[SPEAKER_00]: You could make the difference on a game deciding fourth and one, right?
8:44
[SPEAKER_00]: So at the end of the game that a little bit of extra could make a difference.
8:52
[SPEAKER_01]: Alright, I agree with that.
8:53
[SPEAKER_01]: I think one thing I've really noticed in terms of defensive line play where we're recording every snap and obviously the offensive, we could do the same thing and we have it, but since there's almost no variation by series, you'll get it.
9:05
[SPEAKER_01]: With the defensive line, I think it's a number of consecutive plays as much as it is, how many have they played in the game.
9:13
[SPEAKER_01]: maybe more.
9:14
[SPEAKER_01]: So if you're on a 15-play drive, you don't want one guy out there for nine plays and occasionally a team who's effectively running no huddle on you can force a defensive alignment to stay on the field for extended period plays.
9:27
[SPEAKER_00]: That's right.
9:28
[SPEAKER_00]: That no huddle could be really effective as a strategy also when you're dealing with this kind of approach.
9:37
[SPEAKER_01]: All right.
9:39
[SPEAKER_01]: I know there's more to this.
9:39
[SPEAKER_01]: So Hey, tell us the details.
9:42
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I was talking about the difference between the talent gap between Start and back up and you mentioned in your recent podcast at the O line is average overall and I agree
9:52
[SPEAKER_00]: It sounds harsh, but Yohane is going to be great.
9:55
[SPEAKER_00]: I know, but he's a rookie Ronnie's 32.
9:57
[SPEAKER_00]: So we're not really sure what we're going to get this year.
10:00
[SPEAKER_00]: Roger, I think, is definitely above average.
10:02
[SPEAKER_00]: But if you look at the entire O-line overall, they are about league average.
10:08
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I think we have three positions where there is not much drop off really between starter back up.
10:14
[SPEAKER_00]: And that couldn't be a test case for this approach with the Ravens this year.
10:19
[SPEAKER_01]: I'll fair enough.
10:20
[SPEAKER_01]: So I mean, it certainly could be true.
10:22
[SPEAKER_01]: Probably it's center if postsick was healthy.
10:26
[SPEAKER_01]: I'd hate to think that it might be true at left guard, but it might be true at life.
10:30
[SPEAKER_00]: I think left guard is the other one.
10:31
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm thinking of either Voorhees or Emery Jones and then of course Vincent for Ronnie Stanley.
10:37
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel like those are the three positions I'm talking about.
10:41
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, so you're not advocating to do in this city the right guard or right tackle for the 20's reasons.
10:46
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think so.
10:47
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think it would be beneficial, but you know, it depends on the on the situation is strategic, so it depends.
10:56
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
10:57
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, so now we've identified where you'd want to do it.
11:01
[SPEAKER_01]: How, how would you actually implement this?
11:05
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, so it has to do with, you know,
11:09
[SPEAKER_00]: the strategy can be all over the place, but certainly on long drives, I believe that that would be beneficial.
11:17
[SPEAKER_00]: If you're having a long drive, you know that the offensive players are in a position where they're getting exhausted, getting tired, bringing in a substitution at that point.
11:32
[SPEAKER_00]: could be beneficial on play, you know, 7 or 8 of the drive.
11:37
[SPEAKER_00]: You have the thing about that that makes it difficult because you have control of the playbook, right?
11:42
[SPEAKER_00]: You know what the plays are going to be, but you have no control over down in distance.
11:45
[SPEAKER_00]: So you can be planning, hey, when we get the starters back, we're going to have this advantage on play 9 and 10 of this drive, but you may not have a 9 or 10, there may be no play 9 or 10 on the drive.
11:56
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's hard to plan that way, but
11:59
[SPEAKER_00]: But definitely, I was thinking on long drives, substitutions, rotations, or good.
12:05
[SPEAKER_00]: Otherwise, it's really just a question of doing it throughout the game with the hope and intent that it's going to make a difference at the end of the game where it really matters.
12:20
[SPEAKER_01]: OK, well, I mean, that's fair enough.
12:21
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think if there's truth to what I'm saying about consecutive staffs played, then in a really only manner, so it matters most on the long drives.
12:31
[SPEAKER_01]: And so even if you can't plan for a long drive, you could do something about it when one occurs.
12:36
[SPEAKER_00]: If you want to put a different offensive line then at that spot.
12:41
[SPEAKER_01]: Now we've heard Roger Rosengarten talking at the podium about improving his cardio and doing it with Yuanay, apparently.
12:49
[SPEAKER_01]: Is it just because they're the two you're proposing to not come out.
12:52
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah, that was that was interesting, right?
12:55
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I actually remember this, so I actually looked it up this morning, knowing that we were going to do the podcast tonight.
13:03
[SPEAKER_00]: And I tracked down the quotes.
13:05
[SPEAKER_00]: This is from August 3rd, part of the Ravens Press Pass podcast.
13:10
[SPEAKER_00]: titled Roger Rosengarten wants to assert dominance in year three.
13:14
[SPEAKER_00]: I think it applies to our conversation because he says, I really challenged myself to be in the best shape possible cardio-wise.
13:21
[SPEAKER_00]: This offseason, myself and a few other guys in the league, and my roommate, which I think you've just identified with you one, and I'm going to believe that's correct.
13:28
[SPEAKER_00]: We challenged ourselves to really push our pace when it comes to cardio.
13:32
[SPEAKER_00]: If I wear out the defensive lineman in front of me, and I know that I can do that for 12 to 13 play drives, it's going to be good.
13:40
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's really encouraging and inspiring.
13:43
[SPEAKER_00]: It stuck with me.
13:45
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think, you know, he's admitting right there that conditioning is an obstacle that has to be overcome.
13:50
[SPEAKER_00]: And of course it is, um, as their superior athletes, no doubt, incredible condition, but the human body has limits.
13:58
[SPEAKER_00]: And you don't want those limits reached at a pivotal time in the fourth quarter.
14:01
[SPEAKER_00]: And bottom line is it's hard to perform well at the end of a game when you're your tired big surprise right.
14:06
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you know, what's good about that is it almost provides a transient excuse, which is exactly what we want for any kind of underperformance such as Rosen's Gardens had his career today.
14:19
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, honestly, Rosen Gardens way out performed his positional peers from that draft.
14:23
[SPEAKER_01]: If you look at, you know, I talk about a seeding a really good grade for a first-year player and it really is.
14:28
[SPEAKER_01]: There's very few players who can
14:30
[SPEAKER_01]: who can get that point.
14:31
[SPEAKER_01]: He was about a seat plus and then he turned it in another very similar last year is rookie year.
14:35
[SPEAKER_01]: He had a lot more help than he did in his second year.
14:38
[SPEAKER_01]: There were reasons to believe his year might have been a little better in year two, but it wasn't a massively forward or anything.
14:45
[SPEAKER_01]: But what's good about it is if you have a transient reason that was holding him back, you can point to it.
14:50
[SPEAKER_01]: It isn't something he's going to stick with them for the rest of his career.
14:53
[SPEAKER_01]: That's the transient label.
14:55
[SPEAKER_01]: Then he can correct it.
14:57
[SPEAKER_01]: That's really fantastic.
14:59
[SPEAKER_01]: And John Simpson, if the reason is, if he could just cut his penalties, that'll be a good point.
15:04
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, but that's, that's, that's, you know, that's been something that's been chasing him as whole career.
15:08
[SPEAKER_01]: He hasn't been able to, to shake, you know, all this, all this long after all these years.
15:12
[SPEAKER_01]: And I, I don't, I think it's more reasonable to think that Rosengarten could become a, a cardio workout warrior and keep his win better.
15:21
[SPEAKER_00]: that would be fantastic and now he brought up the long drive issue right and that's what I'm talking about inability to take a breather during a long drive really pushes your cardio but also want to point out that you don't reset to 100% after every drive, you know, just like a car your gas tank is depleted a bit after every drive so that's 12 play drive at the end of the game is not going to be the same as that opening drive 12 play drives.
15:45
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm with you on that so okay so there's a certain certain amount of completion then some regeneration of the tank and then I would go along with that with with it with time spent off I've been you know obviously a huge proponent of restricting total
16:01
[SPEAKER_01]: defensive snap counts.
16:03
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think that's you know the bigger wear and tear is on the defense in terms of trying to keep up with the offense.
16:09
[SPEAKER_01]: But you know, I wouldn't I'm not going to minimize the notion that an offensive line doesn't suffer some of that as well.
16:17
[SPEAKER_01]: I just think.
16:19
[SPEAKER_01]: they're more likely to impose it on the other team at a higher level as time goes on.
16:24
[SPEAKER_01]: So if you can put a 75 snap offensive effort on an opposing defense, the defense is going to look uniformly pretty damn tired at the end of that game.
16:33
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, as the offensive arrives, it's going to be some guys who are in some guys who aren't as much.
16:38
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that's what happened last year.
16:40
[SPEAKER_00]: Remember our snap counts.
16:41
[SPEAKER_00]: They were regularly teams that were putting up 75.
16:45
[SPEAKER_00]: can't snap counts against this and that's one of the reasons our defense was in such trouble.
16:50
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's a topic maybe that we could discuss is the the return to a grinding offense because that is also those are the big long drives, right?
16:59
[SPEAKER_00]: That's what you want.
17:00
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think you and I both can.
17:01
[SPEAKER_00]: We prefer that 12 paid that 12 play TD drive.
17:06
[SPEAKER_00]: Derek Henry crushing the soul of the defense over that
17:13
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, you know, I understand there's some things to go with that with some turnover risk and whatnot, but yes, I absolutely do.
17:18
[SPEAKER_01]: I think there's a lot of additional value in the 12 play dry touch down drive over the one play touchdown drive and the 26 Ravens, so the 25 Ravens didn't really have a lot of trouble with explosiveness.
17:29
[SPEAKER_01]: They were okay.
17:30
[SPEAKER_01]: They were.
17:31
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, they were a place, but snap count and time of possession when it gets this and that was very unraven like in my opinion.
17:38
[SPEAKER_01]: Yep, absolutely.
17:40
[SPEAKER_01]: All right, Daria, absolute pleasure having you on a really interesting new topic to bring up.
17:46
[SPEAKER_01]: Tell folks where they can talk football with you online.
17:48
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, that's yeah.
17:50
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, you know, uh, I'll give you my home email address, Dario R11131 at Yahoo.
17:57
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm happy to talk football with anyone.
17:59
[SPEAKER_00]: And also, um, you know, I, um, I'm usually on the chat, the live chat for Jason's Hollywood up live shows.
18:06
[SPEAKER_00]: So you'll see me chat there when I can make it that people in the chat, they're great.
18:11
[SPEAKER_00]: They're kind and smart.
18:12
[SPEAKER_00]: And you know, Jason, I mean, he's a big fan of yours.
18:15
[SPEAKER_00]: Uh, he's another exceptional Raven's analyst like yourself.
18:18
[SPEAKER_00]: And, um, also, Alec, Alec, Polyonus is a regular show.
18:23
[SPEAKER_00]: And you know, he's a big friend of the
18:28
[SPEAKER_00]: And the people in the chat.
18:29
[SPEAKER_01]: All right.
18:30
[SPEAKER_01]: Outstanding.
18:31
[SPEAKER_01]: Daria, thanks for joining us.
18:32
[SPEAKER_01]: Other folks out there.
18:32
[SPEAKER_01]: Please use film study mailbag at gmail.com for your questions.
18:35
[SPEAKER_01]: As we talked earlier.
18:38
[SPEAKER_01]: And if you have a chance at some point this year, join us on a Wednesday night.
18:43
[SPEAKER_01]: We'll be at the elephant in the room, which is at 8421 Veterans Highway, just off 97.
18:51
[SPEAKER_01]: in Miller'sville, Maryland, and that's a show I'll be doing with Femi-Ian Badejo for two hours on Wednesday nights from 7 to 9 p.m. Great food, great drink, great football conversation.
19:00
[SPEAKER_00]: I think it'll be an event you'll really enjoy.
19:03
[SPEAKER_01]: There you go.
19:03
[SPEAKER_01]: Thanks again for coming on.
19:04
[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks, God.
19:05
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll talk to you next time on Phil's study.