It was an epic whiff. Granted, the play called for "slide" rather
than man-on-man pass protection, but I set that Washington State defensive end
free for a quarterback kill shot straight from "The Waterboy." Wary of
an outside speed rush, I set too wide from my right tackle spot and watched
helplessly as the rabid Cougar set his sights on QB Randy Fasani's ribcage. Only
I wasn't helpless. All-everything guard Eric Heitmann was there to pick up my
trash and save my butt - not to mention Fasani's. It wasn't the first time one
of my fellow offensive linemen bailed me out, and it certainly wouldn't be the
last. And after four years surrounded by All-Pac-10 and future NFL hogs at
Stanford, I'd like to think I occasionally saved their bacon, too.
"Chemistry" is one of the most maddeningly overused words in
sports, but it truly is essential in melding five fleshy elements into one
cohesive blocking unit. A receiver doesn't have to like his quarterback to
accept a touchdown pass, just as a holder won't bobble a snap to foil his
contemptible kicker. But absorbing a destructive defender to rescue your
adjacent blocker, or joining forces to blow a nose tackle off the line, requires
mutual trust and respect, as well as an exhaustive understanding of your
linemate's tendencies, born from mind-numbing repetition. "There are so
many different types of combination blocks that you perform as an offensive
line, and you have to have trust and chemistry with those around you in order to
have success," says Heitmann, entering his seventh season with the San Francisco 49ers. "Ultimately, you have to be able to trust that the guy
next to you is going to do his job, because it affects everybody on the
line."
Heitmann wasn't able to stop that hell-bent end just because he was one of
the best linemen in Stanford history. He also knew center Zack Quaccia could
handle the nose tackle - the play's more immediate threat - by himself, and that
I had made similar mistakes before. It is helpful for offensive linemen to know
one another's strengths, but absolutely critical to comprehend one another's
weaknesses. In an ideal running play, linemen fuse their hands and hips to
create a violent sea, washing the defensive front away so the ball carrier can
roam unscathed. Pass protections are conceived to give the quarterback a
spacious pocket from which to casually read the coverage. This hardly ever
happens. Assignments are blown, blocks are defeated, and sometimes linemen
simply trip over their own feet or get in one another's way. As important as it
is for linemen to begin with the same script, it's even more critical that they
be able to improvise amid the chaos of a game. "With how complex defenses
are, there are often times when you don't have time to make the call," says
Kirk Chambers of the Buffalo Bills, the Cardinal's starting left tackle from
2000-03. "Defenses are so into trying to trick you and confuse you, you
have to make your reads basically when the ball is snapped, and you have to
trust that the guy next to you is on the same page and you'll block the play
appropriately." And according to Chambers, who is entering his fourth
season in the NFL, some things don't change between college and the pros.
"You learn to trust the guy next to you so you can try to cheat certain
protections," he says. "Like if it's a slide protection, I can really
go out and be more aggressive on the defensive end, knowing that if I overset
him, I have help inside."
A four-year starter, Mike McLaughlin was a first-team All-Pac-10 center and a
senior anchor for our 1999 Pac-10 championship squad. But a knee injury forced
him out of the Rose Bowl lineup after one snap, and we never recovered. There
were several reasons why we lost that contest - including a shaky fourth quarter
by yours truly - but perhaps none was more glaring than our reshuffled offensive
front. McLaughlin's injury forced Quaccia from left guard to center, altering 40
percent of our line. Though Quaccia was an excellent center, and Joe Fairchild,
who replaced Quaccia at guard, was a proven veteran with starting experience,
the shakeup affected our cohesion and, ultimately, our entire offense. We
finished the night with -5 yards rushing, allowing the Badger defense to key on
our typically potent passing attack. The result? Wisconsin 17, Stanford 9. Yes,
the Badgers had talented defenders and a great game plan, and it's very possible
that they could have silenced our running game and disrupted our pass protection
had we been at full strength. But our line had featured the same five starters -
including first-team All-Pac-10 left tackle Jeff Cronshagen - for nearly the
entire season for a good reason: You don't mess with a productive recipe, even
if the new ingredients are proficient on their own.
John McDonell and Mike Denbrock may as well have been chemistry professors.
The pair took over as Stanford's offensive line coaches in 2001, and despite
working with us, as well as each other, for the first time, they orchestrated a
line that helped the Cardinal lead the Pac-10 in rushing with more than 200
yards per game. A stable of talented backs, including Brian Allen, Kerry Carter,
Casey Moore and Kenny Tolon, certainly contributed to our ground dominance, as
did a potent passing attack that kept defenses honest. Having six
better-than-average linemen - and tight ends and wide receivers that were eager
to block - helped, too. But McDonell, who moved to The Farm from Washington
State, and Denbrock, who settled in Palo Alto from the Arena Football League,
brought a brilliantly basic and refreshing approach: simplify terminology,
emphasize aggressive play, and stand back and watch the product gel.
The tinkering took place during the 2001 offseason. Begrudgingly at first, I
moved from right tackle to right guard, sending Heitmann to left guard while
Kwame Harris cracked the starting lineup in my former spot. Chambers remained at
left tackle, and Quaccia tied the line together at center as our only fifth-year
senior. Paul Weinacht became a do-everything luxury, giving us previously
unknown depth while playing long stretches at both guard spots and starting
twice without the line missing a beat. Our schemes were virtually identical to
the previous three years under offensive coordinator Bill Diedrick, but Denbrock
and McDonell freed us to attack defenders. They never dismissed proper
technique, but their streamlined approach reduced "paralysis by
analysis." Find a way. Get it done. Results are all that matter. The
outcome of their bottom-line philosophy was a group of linemen so impressed by
one other's performance that no one was willing to be the weak link. None of us
were perfect, but the sum nearly was. Instead of agonizing over the robotic
angles of their pass sets, our tackles were allowed to be the NFL-caliber
athletes they were, punishing defenders with powerful strikes rather than
passive palms. The interior of our line didn't bark assignments to each other as
we had in previous years; we had enough shared experience to avoid dropping
verbal hints for the defense. Sure, Harris and I occasionally bickered, but even
that was indicative of our bond. We appreciated each other's skills too much to
accept anything less than synchronized supremacy. It was the first time our
linemen spent as much time in film sessions marveling at one another's exploits
as critiquing our own performances. Our '99 and 2000 lines pass-blocked well and
got along just fine, but nothing unifies an offensive front like running the
ball at will.
It's a chicken-and-egg relationship: Winning teams typically are happy, and
satisfied players usually will do anything to contribute to their squad's
success. I can recall plenty of selfless displays from losing seasons - wide
receivers Ryan Wells and Teyo Johnson decleating defensive linemen in 2002 come
to mind - but 2-9 teams rarely are remembered for their good chemistry. Locker
rooms are fractured when players can't accept responsibility for their role in a
team's woes. Some teams never pull it together because the pieces simply don't
fit. If there were a surefire formula for creating chemistry within an offensive
line, let alone an entire team, it would be relentlessly repeated. Coaches and
team leaders will employ any speech or gimmick imaginable if they believe it
will yield unity. Buddy Teevens prefaced 2002 team meetings with
getting-to-know-you games, and required each position group to write and perform
a song during preseason camp. Tyrone Willingham read "The Little Engine
That Could" to our 2000 squad before a midweek practice - not so much to
inspire us for our upcoming game against No. 5 Texas, but to whimsically lift
our spirits after our third straight loss to San Jose State. We beat the
Longhorns a few days later, but none of us attributed the victory to "Storytime
With Ty".
Every Stanford line I was a part of gathered for dinner on Thursday nights
during the season. We talked about video games, impersonated coaches, and
relived gaffes and pranks from that week's practices and meetings. We hardly
ever discussed Xs and Os, and there was no difference between starters and
reserves. We were just a group of overgrown kids devouring pizza and Buffalo
wings while consequently improving our team. It's impossible not to respect the
man next to you once you learn he's played the entire season with a bum
shoulder, and it's hard to let petty differences spoil your line's relationship
after you've shared a feast of grease drenched in ranch dressing. Still, it
takes more than five well-fed chums to protect a quarterback. "Camaraderie
off the field definitely can help," Heitmann says, "but I think,
ultimately, you have to be able to play together on the field, and you develop
that trust through practice and repetition and game experience." I guess
fried food doesn't solve everything.
About the Author: Greg Schindler, LSJU '03 has been living in
Kalispell, Montana, working as a sports reporter for the Daily Inter Lake.
He was a four-year starter and four-year letter-winner for the Cardinal from
1999-2002, starting 42 of 46 games. After redshirting as a true freshman in
1998, he was the team's starting right tackle in 1999-2000 and the team's
starting right guard in 2001-02. Prior to Stanford, Schindler starred at Live
Oak High School in Morgan Hill, CA and was named a First-team All-American by
Prepstar in 1997. Following his Stanford career, Schindler was signed by the San
Francisco 49ers as a free agent after graduating in 2002 with an English Major
and a Political Science minor. His sister, Veronica Schindler, is a Development
writer at the Stanford Athletic Department.
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