Tag: youth

Saints’ offensive line experiencing a youth movement in 2024

The New Orleans Saints new scheme prioritizes offensive line’s athleticism. This shift coincides with a drop in the unit’s average age:

The New Orleans Saints offensive line is going through a youth movement. By their scheme, it is necessary. Trevor Penning highlighted Klint Kubiak’s wide zone scheme for utilizing the athleticism of the offensive line. That change of direction has also coincided with the unit getting much younger. Not every change can be tied scheme, but it does feel like an intentional shift.

Erik McCoy and Cesar Ruiz are the only returning starters from last season. Trevor Penning is excluded because he spent most of the season on the bench. The offensive line’s average age drops from 28.2 to 24.6 years old. Even if Shane Lemieux starts at left guard ahead of Nick Saldiveri, the average age only rises to 25.2, which would still be a 3-year drop from last year’s average age.

James Hurst was the oldest player on the line last year, and he simply didn’t fit the new offensive scheme Kubiak is installing. He was the one player who needed to be replaced. New Orleans has always valued athleticism, so the pieces were already there. Of the new starters, first round pick Taliese Fuaga is the only one who wasn’t on the roster in 2023. His experience in a similar scheme, however, may provide one of the smoother transitions to Kubiak’s offense.

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Rams partner with the Disneyland Resort to get young fans interested in football

The #Rams announced a partnership with the Disneyland Resort on Thursday in a move that they hope will lure young fans into their audience

In conjunction with the Disneyland Resort, the Los Angeles Rams are looking to get young people interested in the game of football, and hope to bring a new generation of fans into their audience. The team announced on Thursday that they had finalized a partnership with the renowned entertainment consortium that would seek to engage young people by showcasing their brand around Disneyland and bringing advertising for the resort into SoFi Stadium as part of the game day experience.

There will be a season-long series of content called “Rams Kids Fact Friday” as part of the collaboration that will be aimed toward the youth, which is set to be released on all of the Rams’ media outlets. According to the team, each video will feature Disney characters and Los Angeles cheerleaders, with Fact Friday topics including fun facts about Rams players, the team’s history, and their upcoming matchups.

All of this will lead up to an event held for the Watts and Inglewood Rams youth football teams at the Disneyland Resort. The team’s press release states that the function will celebrate the achievements of the young student-athletes, and will be an opportunity for players, families, and coaches to come together.

Additionally, Los Angeles has arranged to have certain players on their roster vacation at the resort to “create new memories with their families while experiencing seasonal celebrations at Disneyland Resort.”

“Disneyland Resort will also have a presence in SoFi Stadium on Rams gamedays with LED and Infinity Screen signage highlighting seasonal offerings at the Parks. Rams will also present ‘Magic Moment’ in-game features,” according to the release put out on Thursday.

In a market like Los Angeles, collaborations and partnerships are expected, but the announcement of a deal of this magnitude is a bit surprising in the middle of the football season. The Rams will look to get their new collaboration underway with a win against the Carolina Panthers this week.

Chiefs HC Andy Reid comfortable with rookies in secondary heading into Week 1

The #Chiefs have four rookies who will play roles in the defensive secondary, but that doesn’t seem to worry HC Andy Reid in the slightest.

The Kansas City Chiefs added a lot of new faces on the defensive side of the ball this offseason and especially so in the secondary.

A total of four draft picks are expected to play key roles in the defensive secondary for Kansas City, be it in a starting capacity or as depth. With the first week of the 2022 NFL season upon us, Chiefs HC Andy Reid isn’t too concerned about the relative inexperience of players like Trent McDuffie, Jaylen Watson, Joshua Williams and Bryan Cook.

“Yeah, I like them,” Reid said of the young secondary. “I like the speed they play with. I think Juan (Thornhill) has done a good job of kind of helping everybody out back there and managing that from a player’s standpoint back there. But it looks like we’ve got good speed and range and those type of things.”

It’s not like the group is entirely comprised of rookies. They have Thornhill as Reid mentioned, but there’s also Rashad Fenton, L’Jarius Sneed and Justin Reid for the young players to lean on. Still, Reid expects and plans to live with the growing pains that will come from having a young secondary.

“There are going to be some hiccups here and there when you have young guys,” Reid said. “That’s what happens, but I think in the long haul we’ll be okay with the guys we got there.”

What this group lacks in experience, they make up for in athleticism and speed. That was something that was clearly lacking from the entire Chiefs defense in recent seasons, but it was especially apparent in the 2021 NFL season. If this group can stay assignment sound in Week 1 and rely on their natural gifts, the team should be in good shape as they kick off the regular season.

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Doug Pederson explains unique challenges posed by Jaguars’ youthful roster

With so many first and second-year players on the roster, Pederson will have his hands full coaching up the #Jaguars this season.

In his second stint as an NFL head coach, Doug Pederson has big plans for the Jacksonville Jaguars in his first season with the team. He helped recruit big-name talent in free agency and oversaw a draft process that put his squad in a position to be successful in the regular season and for years to come.

The longevity factor is a major piece of what Pederson hopes to accomplish with this Jaguars rebuild; not just to win this year, but to continue winning in the future. He told reporters on Monday about how his experience in Jacksonville is unique from his previous tenure in Philadelphia, where he served as head coach of the Eagles from 2016-2020.

“I think the biggest thing is that we’re younger this time around for me, which I like,” Pederson explained. “The guys understand, too, the new additions to the team are all guys that can help us. They’re here for a reason. It’s unfortunate that the team they were on probably had to let them go, but it’s fortunate for us that we got them. We’re excited to work with these guys.

“They understand that it’s a process for them, too. They can’t just exhale that sigh of relief like, ‘I’ve made it.’ They’ve got to continue to work and prove that they can still hold a job next week. I think it’s the practice squad guys that it’s on a week-to-week basis, but it’s a good group, I’m excited to work with these guys, it’s an energetic bunch. We’ve got a sprinkle of veterans in there, too, so that’s good, too.”

One of his most challenging tasks this season will be his need to acclimate so many of the Jaguars’ younger talents to the rigors of professional football. With help from veterans like Shaquille Griffin, Dawuane Smoot, Brandon Scherff, and Christian Kirk, this relatively inexperienced crop of first and second-year players could bring Jacksonville back to relevance sooner than some may have expected a few months ago.

Cowboys were among oldest teams in 2019, but with a special catch

The 2019 Cowboys finished the regular season as one of the oldest teams in the NFL, but one veteran is responsible for much of that curve.

There’s a youth movement in the NFL. But the Cowboys seem to be trying hard to buck that trend, especially in one specific unit.

Football Outsiders last week released its 2019 report digging into the age of each roster in the league. As they have with every season since 2006, they didn’t just calculate the average age of all the the guys who are technically on the team. They charted the players’ snap-weighted age; that is, they weighted the age of each player according the number of snaps he played in the regular season.

It makes sense: if the aging veterans and hotshot rookies on a squad mainly stand around on the sidelines, it doesn’t really say anything meaningful about a team’s “average age,” at least not in the way that people usually imply. That first-year quarterback who actually starts and plays the whole season? That definitely counts toward a team being considered “young.” But a long-in-the-tooth third-string emergency backup who only ever holds a clipboard shouldn’t skew the team toward being called “old.”

The Cowboys as a whole, in 2019, were the sixth-oldest team in the league, with an average snap-weighted age (SWA) of 26.7. The league average was 26.4, a number nearly all 32 teams were fairly tightly clustered around.

Where it starts to get interesting is when SWA is broken down by unit. The SWA of the Dallas offense in 2019 was 27.0, just two-tenths of a year above the league average. That ranked 13th. The defense skewed even more toward the middle of the pack compared to the rest of the NFL; the Cowboys’ SWA on the defensive side was 26.2, 18th place against the average of 26.3.

But special teams? That unit might as well qualify for early-bird specials and senior matinee discounts.

The Cowboys’ special teamers in 2019 were the third-oldest bunch in the NFL with a SWA of 26.9. That figure is a full year above the league average. Special teams play is generally thought of as a young man’s game (think gunners), but many teams do anchor that phase of the game with a greybeard kicker…

…or a 39-year-old long snapper.

L.P. Ladouceur will embark on his 16th season as a pro in 2020. His age (he celebrated his 39th birthday in March) certainly sets the curve for the rest of the special teams players in Dallas, but his is a position where longevity is a plus, not a hindrance, and extra experience is definitely a plus.

The Cowboys special teams unit got slightly (but suddenly) older late last season with the swapping of Brett Maher for Kai Forbath, as Forbath is two years older. He and new signee Greg Zuerlein are both 32, so the winner of their competition for the upcoming season’s kicking duties won’t change that number for Dallas. With punter Chris Jones turning 31 years old, there’s a good chance that the Cowboys will remain one of the oldest special teams units in the league under John Fassel’s leadership.

The defense may see their SWA rank slide toward the older end of the list moving forward. Yes, Michael Bennett turned 34 just a few weeks after joining the Cowboys last season, but in his nine games with the team, he played just 40% of the defensive snaps. Linebacker Sean Lee will turn 34 before the season begins. Gerald McCoy is 32. Dontari Poe will blow out 30 candles before Week 1; all three will likely see high snap counts and will definitely ratchet up the SWA in 2020.

Of course, any discussion of the Cowboys and their age in 2019 has to include Jason Witten. At 37 and playing the vast majority of the team’s offensive snaps last year, he made Dallas the oldest team at tight end last season. Take him out of the equation, though, and the Cowboys come in under the league’s average SWA at every single offensive position group.

Granted, youth doesn’t automatically translate to a better football team: New England was by far the oldest team in 2019- in all three phases- and they were still, by and large, the Patriots. And three of the four youngest teams- Jacksonville, Cleveland, and Miami- didn’t really scare anybody. So maybe SWA is just interesting trivia, fodder for bar bets.

Still, 2020’s Cowboys offense should feel a lot younger. Fans will no doubt be encouraged by that. The defense may feel slightly older. Maybe some additional veteran presence there is a good thing.

In any case, the special teams will still be wearing their pants too high and yelling at whippersnappers to get off their lawn.

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