Hogs Haven
Bullock’s Film Room (subscription)
Against the Patriots, he had a rep with chip help where he almost sprinted outside to the rusher instead of using the chip to help cut off the speed rush and giving himself extra time to get set. Against the Bengals, he corrected that mistake.
Here we can see a side by side comparison of Conerly blocking with chip help. The play on the left of the clip is against the Patriots in the preseason opener, the play on the right comes from the Bengals game on Monday night. On the left, you can see how off the snap, Conerly is immediately looking to gain as much width as possible to try and get his hands on the rusher early, despite having chip help. This actually works against him because the chipper gets in his way and prevents him from getting his hands on the defender. That leaves Conerly with his hips square to the sideline instead of the line of scrimmage, putting him in a bad position for the rest of the play.
But against the Bengals, he corrected that mistake. At the snap, you can see Conerly takes a much more measured set, dropping back a little more vertically while also staying attached to the right guard to help secure the gap inside. He knows he has the chip help on the edge to protect him against speed, so he can set himself back a little more and prepare himself for the rushers second move. The results speak for themselves. Against the Patriots, the edge rusher is able to turn the corner and force Conerly to hold onto him to save a sack, whereas against the Bengals, Conerly picks up the edge rusher after the chip and negates him.
But it wasn’t the only thing we saw Conerly improve on.
A to Z Sports
The Commanders signed veteran offensive tackle Fant after a workout a few days ago, and he could make the team thanks to his experience. He’s a former teammate of Commanders left tackle Laremy Tunsil in Houston as well, so you’re getting an instant connection between the two. Fant has almost split reps between left and right tackle in his career, and he can step in at either spot and the addition is huge according to Quinn.
“The length, obviously for tackle, he looks great,” Quinn told the media. “He had a workout with us last week and then [General Manager] Adam [Peters] was able to finalize all that over the weekend. So, that’s a really big deal for us to add somebody with George’s experience and length at offensive tackle. It’s very, very cool to have somebody with his experience and background and play style and skill, all that....
