![Wall Bang :wallbang:](./images/smilies/wallbang.gif)
Bridgewater is often in retreat mode before the play really can get started. When he can sit back in the shotgun and step up into the pocket he's fine. But when he's under center and has inside pressure immediately and nowhere to go and he is forced to scramble... He either has to throw it away or make something happen with his legs or make a throw on the run.
Apparently we brought in Donald Penn as undrafted free agent... Coaches didn't see the potential in him, so we let him walk. He then signed with the Bucs and eventually made the pro bowl.
We also signed Mike Remmers of the street for 4 games and he never saw the active roster and let him walk. He has started for the Panthers at RT....
JaMarcus Webb was on our roster as a RT backing up Loadholdt until we let him walk, he now starts for the Raiders at RG.
There's probably others...
The problem doesn't seem to be an inability to bring in starting caliber talent. It's either determining who to keep and start or an inability to get the starters playing to their potential.
In part, the 5 step and 7 step drop also makes things a bit tougher on the OL... But I also think Zimmer was right to fire Davidson. I also think that we need to put a lot more emphasis on finding pass blockers than run blockers and running spread offense from shotgun. Adrian lead the league in rushing yards, but our offense was near last in yards. The gameplan may have made things easier on the defense, but I think we need to open things up. Bridgewater looked fine in December of 2014 without Adrian in the shotgun. We saw flashes out of him from under center vs Arizona too, but the spread offense will always be ideal for Bridgewater.
http://www.dailynorseman.com/2015/12/7/ ... gotta-give
Pro football focus actually rated Bridgewater as most accurate QB in the NFL when you take away catchable drops as well as passes batted at the line of scrimmage or thrown away... Partly due to him playing a bit more conservative as the coaches wanted him to. But that is an indication we should put more on his shoulders and let him sit back in the gun to mitigate some of the OL concerns and open things up and let him take chances a bit more.
Obviously we also probably need to make some acquisitions in the offseason to improve our OL.