(11-01-2017, 10:21 PM)NYC4jags Wrote: (11-01-2017, 10:07 PM)haveaseat Wrote: ... We're one of the few teams who maximize on a TE's ability to block first and being the most important skillset. When we do use our TE's as pass catchers it's used pretty sparingly. Usually a dump off option if the play isn't there. Or when we take advantage of Mercedes Lewis and his height advantage. London game being an exception because no one on the Ravens gameplanned Lewis actually catching a pass and just rolled with the hot hand. We had Julius Thomas under Hackett and it made no difference in how we utilized him. We could probably have Gronk and Kelce here and they would block most of the season. Probably the main reason why we let Julius go. They knew they couldn't use him to block.
I disagree completely.
A few important points regarding your post:
- Julius Thomas was only active for two games under Hackett and Hackett was running Olson's playbook- Bad example
- The Marrone/Hackett offense uses a two TE set fairly often and one of those two TEs will often throw a chip block and then leak out as a receiving option. This is where Rivera can excel beyond what Koyack and O'Shaugnessy offer. Usually in these plays one TE is a dedicated blocker and the other is not. Marcedes and Rivera make a good duo for this because while they excel more at one skill than the other they can both execute blocking and receiving tasks well enough to interchange at times.
- The way they've used Marcedes thus far despite him having notoriously bad hands should tell you how off base you are with the Kelce/Gronk remark.
- They've actually attempted two deep seam routes to #89 this season, BTW. I'm sure they'd rather be throwing those to Rivera and calling them more often.
- They are using the TEs to block because they have to, more than because they want to.
Julius is still a more proven pass catching TE than anyone on the roster now (including Lewis as of the past however many seasons). Even if Hackett was using Olson's playbook then the team could've easily found a way to incorporate him into the offense more productively this year using his own playbook, correct? If what you're saying is the case then they could've made him look like the Julius of Denver again. It just wasn't necessary here so why keep him around?
It's just like you said. Mainly to block and chip block which is what we've been doing. Highlighting the blocking aspect here. We'll have Lewis block and you'll a TE or FB just roll out in the flats for a checkdown. Not something you're utilizing down the field in this system.
And that's the thing you're talking a few plays here in the stretch of 7 games. That's not a good argument. Neither is being presumptuous enough to say what plays we would be calling with Rivera here. He's done nothing here yet. Based on what we've seen and how comfortable they were at the position going into the season I think the TE game here is more focused on assisting the run. *shrug*
