Crow Eating Time
Noots’ Notes-Preseason: Louis a Most Pleasant Surprise
By
Michael Nudo
The cuts are official. Before the season starts, I need to first eat a plate of crow. I made it clear here in my blog that I felt Josh Beekman deserved to be a starting guard until he lost that job. I also felt Lance Louis was too much of a project, having gone from college tight end to professional tackle and now to starting guard in a very short space of time. The games that count haven’t yet started, but it’s clear I was wrong. Beekman’s release put a nice bow on it. Some of what I have to say here is also about how neglected the Bears’ line has been in terms of Jerry Angelo’s drafting priorities.
End of the road in Chicago for Josh Beekman (Michael Nudo photo)
There are football lessons and clichés that swim around in my head all the time. One of them says that no matter how good you think a certain player is, if he’s a wide receiver, “they’re a dime a dozen.” Well, with few exceptions, I think that’s true. You look at all the different wide receivers some of the great QBs have had. One of the other ones says that closer to the ball you line up, the more important that position is. Oh, and I don’t care for the recent notion by some that guard is the easiest position to just throw a failed tackle at. Omiyale wasn’t even a failed tackle yet, and, well, last year he showed he was a failed guard. For all our sakes, let’s hope he doesn’t also prove out to be a failed tackle.
Guard requires a much different combination of quickness and sheer physical strength to deal with the mauling defensive tackles of this league. Based on the defensive front, there are many times he’ll be uncovered and will need to help a fellow lineman in pass protection while also having the awareness to be able to see a blitz coming and peel off. It also means being quick enough to reach a linebacker, and to get out of your stance and not only pull, but to be able to gather yourself to actually hit someone. Usually you’re trying to do that at top speed, as you’re rounding the corner or up into the hole. It’s akin to making an open-field tackle on a scat back, except you’re doing this not as a svelte 215 pound defensive back but as a lumbering 315 pound rhinoceros of a man zeroing in on a slippery gazelle.
Jerry Angelo’s tendency to relegate picking linemen very late in the draft is disheartening. That guy so many of us sorta liked from a few training camps ago, Kirk Barton…I think I read the other day that he retired already, LOL. Third-round selections Jarron Gilbert and Juaquin Iglesias were recently cut. Gilbert, the guy who jumps out of pools, had his most shining moment in that video and not on the field. Doesn’t that say something? There were quite a few offensive linemen the Bears passed on to make those picks. Many of them have already become starters and solid contributors to their teams.
I will give credit on the Lance Louis pick. Going into this preseason, I was shocked it wouldn’t be Beekman as a starter until proven otherwise, and Louis, the converted tight end, would continue to have a tough row to hoe. Josh Beekman was surprisingly competent at guard, even though he was being groomed to take over center, once Olin Kreutz decided he’d had enough. But Beekman was RAG DOLLED throughout the preseason. I’m actually GLAD he was let go. It’s inexplicable how bad he looked. He was consistently being blown three steps off the ball.
Lance Louis, who I had no FAITH in, well, he’s been the most happy and pleasant surprise I’ve seen this preseason. I watch him. He makes you forget he was a tight end. He plays with a mean streak wider than anybody on the Bears’ line. I wish Chris Williams had half of this guy’s aggressiveness. I really like the way he pass protects, too. I’m sure he’s going to make some mistakes, but another old football cliché sticks out for me too, which is to say that you’d rather see someone playing with “reckless abandon” and allowing a few mental errors as long as they’re doing so with that reckless abandon. Don’t lose that aggression, Lance. You’re Jerry’s saving grace for now.