Willie Taggart wants Florida State fans to start believing in the offensive line.

The coach understands the reason for skepticism and low expectations after fans watched subpar line play for the past several seasons. But he’s spent the spring trying to build up a unit that clearly lacked confidence in recent years, and he thinks the line will start giving fans something to cheer about in the near future.

“It’s been years and I get it. But when it comes to offensive line, it only takes one guy to be bad and they all look bad. They’re all not bad,” Taggart said to fans during his final Seminole Boosters spring tour stop in Miami Gardens on Friday. “After three years, that’s all I’ve been hearing, how bad our offensive line is. I hear it from our fan base. I hear it from other fan bases. To be honest with you, I’m tired of hearing it.

“...I think our guys will give us a little more if they know we believe in them. Let’s leave that to our other fans, to talk about our guys. Let’s encourage our guys, let’s have an expectation for them. Our guys know that in order for that to change, we’ve got to do it.”

Building up the line was a clear emphasis this spring. Teammates, assistants and quality control types would regularly run over to linemen to show them love after solid reps during individual drills or ‘Nole Drill as they aimed to encourage even subtle victories.

And to Taggart’s point, there were tangible signs of growth. Linemen held their own far more often against the defensive front in the ‘Nole Drill before each practice compared to last season, and with that success came confidence. Younger players such as Chaz Neal and Dontae Lucas made strides throughout the spring and were clearly impacted by the support from within the program.

“So often we just want to throw them out there and for them to be really good. It doesn’t work that way, especially up front,” Taggart said. “We’ve got to coach them up, develop them to get them where we want them. I think a big part of getting our offensive line back is, we’ve got to do a good job of coaching them up. Our guys are good enough. We’ve got to coach them up to make sure we get them in the right position to be successful. Again, we’ve got to understand what their strengths and weaknesses are. Don’t ask them to do something they can’t do. I think if we do that, we’re all going to see improvements in our offensive line.”

Taggart said he saw tangible signs of progress this spring, giving credit to new offensive coordinator Kendal Briles for identifying strengths and weaknesses of his linemen...and then finding ways to play to their respective strengths.

Now Taggart wants FSU fans to start believing in the line as well.

“I like what we’re doing, I like what Coach Briles is doing on the offensive side of the ball,” Taggart said. “I think you all are going to be really impressed with our offensive line.”