The Eagles offensive line is all over the place right now. We’ve got guys coming back from injury and other guys either still hurt or getting worked on. Last year’s rookie is starting for now, while this year’s rookie is a backup. That has people curious. Nobody knows what to make of Danny Watkins. And new OL coach Jeff Stoutland remains a mystery.

Stoutland was interviewed the other day and PE.com has video of it. The man said good things about both Kelce and Mathis so clearly he needs some professional help. Giving public compliments to those guys is just asking for trouble. It is funny to hear how much he likes the NFL. “No recruiting.” He can devote all his time to coaching and just football. Being a college coach means dealing with a lot of B.S. You’ve got to recruit. You’ve got NCAA stuff to deal with. There are classes and exams.

Stoutland made a great point about the no-huddle. He said that it makes defensive coaches very nervous. The big issue is that those guys love specialty packages. They can’t use them against the no-huddle. They have to run in one group of players and stick with those guys.

Howard Mudd was funnier, but Stoutland seems like a good guy. He certainly has a terrific track record.

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Should we be concerned that Lane Johnson is a backup right now? I don’t think so. I like the fact that Chip Kelly isn’t just giving him the job. Kelly is going to make every player earn his spot. Johnson is learning the offense and adjusting to the NFL. Johnson has had 3 rookie camp practices and 6 days of team OTAs. If we’re in mid-August and Johnson is still the backup RT, we’ll re-visit this discussion and it will be much different. I don’t anticipate that happening.

Let’s talk about Johnson a bit more. While he is incredibly talented, he is still a bit of a project. Johnson has only played on the OL for a couple of years, starting at RT in 2011 and LT in 2012. He has a great combination of size, athleticism, and natural ability, but he is not a polished blocker by any stretch of the imagination.

Football analyst Ben Muth specializes in writing about OL since he played the position at Stanford. In a recent column, Muth wrote several paragraphs praising Johnson and then said this:

“All that being said, Johnson is a pretty horrific fundamental pass blocker who probably wouldn’t have gone in the top five in any other draft. Well, maybe the 2000 NBA Draft. Nothing he does can’t be fixed, but if you’re taking someone that early, you would probably like a few less loose nails. Let’s start with the fact that he leads with his head all the time.”

Muth does a good job detailing his concerns and the areas where Johnson must improve. There were reportedly some teams that didn’t think there were 3 OTs at the top of the draft but rather Joeckel/Fisher and then a whole major level below them was Johnson. Obviously the Eagles didn’t feel this way. Nor did I.

Here’s the tricky part with a guy like Johnson. If he was a polished player, he’d have gone #1 overall. He’d have been a better version of Joe Thomas. Johnson isn’t polished. There are some questions. However, these are issues that can be fixed by coaching. If you think he’s smart and hard working, you then anticipate the coach fixing the issues. There are no physical concerns with Johnson.

The flip side is that NFL teams are nervous about Iowa OL. Those guys are experienced, polished players who come out of an NFL type offensive system. They have less upside so you have to be careful when rating them. It isn’t quite “what you see is what you get”, but it is much closer to that than with guys from almost every other school.

Muth did say in his piece that he thinks Johnson can be a great NFL player. Me too.

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So with Johnson on the second team that means Dennis Kelly is starting. Reuben Frank wrote about that the other day.

Kelly isn’t naive. He knows that the Eagles drafted Johnson 4th overall and what that means. Still, Kelly has the right attitude. He’s got the job for now and will do everything in his power to keep it. Kelly has experience at RT, having finished there down the stretch last year. He didn’t light it up, but showed some promise.

That experience involved Andy Reid and Howard Mudd. This is Chip Kelly’s world. That’s not lost on Kelly and he is acting accordingly.

“I tried to slim down a little,” he said. “I’m still probably about the same weight, but it’s better weight. From a cardio aspect, I probably started a little bit early just to make sure I wasn’t taken aback and keeling over on the first day.”

Kelly was hardly a fatboy last year, but you must be in top shape to play for Chip so it was wise to get in good shape and be ready for the up-tempo offense.

Can Dennis Kelly be the #3 OT for the Eagles? That would be ideal. I’m not sure what to think of him at LT. He showed LT potential at Purdue, which is where he played for them, but I didn’t see that ability last year. He was just a rookie so you can’t make too much of that.

Most likely, Herremans or Johnson would slide over to LT. Kelly would replace Johnson at RT if he moved. I don’t know about RG. Kelly hasn’t practiced there this year. Maybe Danny Watkins would take that spot if the team wanted Herremans to shift over to LT.

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Speaking of Watkins…he is definitely a Stoutland fan. Tim McManus wrote a good piece on Watkins the other day. Watkins didn’t get along with Mudd and struggled with his scheme.

“I struggled with Howard, and his coaching and some of his concepts,” Watkins admitted. “But that’s not his fault, that’s on me — that’s my responsibility to get better and do what I need to do. But this is more of a conventional type of offense in the pass protection and run progressions so it feels a lot better.”

It would be easy to rip Watkins for his struggles, but I am encouraged that he took responsibility there. “That’s on me.” Those are important words to hear. It helps you to think he’s got a chance. If Watkins simply thought that a new coach would magically solve everything, his career would definitely be headed to a bad conclusion.

I think there is still hope for Watkins. He is a good fit for the running that Chip Kelly wants to do. The injury to Mathis could prove to be a blessing in disguise. Getting reps with the 1’s has to help his confidence, no matter the reason. You just have to feel better when you’re on the field with Peters and Herremans.

I don’t anticipate Watkins winning a starting job, but it would be good to see him play well and get his career back on track. We will have injuries at some point. It would be nice to have an experienced OG to plug into the lineup.

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Ed Kracz of PhillyBurbs.com got some good comments from Stoutland about backup C prospects, Dallas Reynolds and…Julian Vandervelde.

Stoutland said he made some corrections with the way Reynolds uses his hands and that he is improving.

The line coach then mentioned Julian Vandervelde as someone who could be a factor in the race to be the backup center.

“Vandervelde is an interesting guy,” Stoutland said. “He has some girth to him. He can get some push. In this league there are a lot of 3-4 teams who are playing the big nose guard, and you better have somebody who can move him from a physicality standpoint. I think he brings a little bit of that to the table. I’m letting him play more center than before because I want to look at him to see if that’s a possibility for him. And it’s intriguing me.”

Mudd tried to get Vandervelde to play C last year and that didn’t work at all. Vandervelde struggled early on and that seemed to affect his confidence and then he even struggled some at OG. I don’t think his issues had anything to do with Mudd. I just think Vandervelde didn’t handle the move to C well. Some guys can make the move, some can’t.

I’m betting Vandervelde spent January, February, March, and April snapping the ball and trying to play some C. If you can play G and C, you greatly improve your hopes of having a long career as a backup OL. Much harder to make it as a pure OG.

No word on Matt Tennant or UDFA Kyle Quinn. I think Quinn could be a natural in Kelly’s offense.

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