OLP Lounge - Building the Perfect Offensive Line Athlete

Welcome to the OLP Lounge. I'm LeCharles Bentley, and I am pumped about this episode because I'm talking about something that's near and dear to my heart and hopefully near and dear to your heart as well, and that's football, but most importantly, offensive line play. You know, when we talk about offensive line play and we get into identifying who's the best and what constitutes a great offensive line athlete, We hear a lot of coachy epitaphs like, "Oh, they got great knee bend," or, "They're a waist bender," or, "Oh, they got heavy hands." That's another good one. You hear all this garbage, and it's like, look, that's not really what it takes to be a great offensive line athlete. Because if you go back and you look through the history of the game, not every single one of the greatest players to do this, really, has really built the skill set, built the craft of offensive line play. They don't necessarily have the traits that we often talk about. So what we decided to do here at Offensive Line Performance is build out the traits that we believe are the key traits that every offensive line athlete should embody. So I got some notes here and I'm going to hold my notes up just because, you know, my brain is good and I remember a lot of good things, but some stuff I like to just, you know, take my time with and do it the right way. So with that said, I'm going to get into building the perfect offensive line athlete. This isn't just a one, video deal. It's going to be a little bit of a series here because we're going to get into centers, guards, and tackles as well. But we got to give you the foundation, like, from the history of the game, who are the players that have built what we see or what we should be aspiring to be in terms of offensive line play. And so number 1, you got to be strong. And I don't believe there's a player in the history of the game that embraces what strength is— or did embrace what strength is other than Mike Webster. Iron Mike Webster. We're talking about somebody with 4 Super Bowl championships, 150 consecutive starts at the center position, but also was one of the first players to embrace weight training and took it to an entirely different level. But when we think of strength here at Offensive Line Performance, it's not necessarily about how effective you are the weight room, it's more so about how do you take what you can do in the weight room and then put it onto the field. And that's what I think made Mike Webster so special, was because, yes, he was a weight room warrior, a weight room phenom, whatever you want to associate with him. But at the same time, he wasn't one of those players that left their strength in the weight room. You would see his strength show up in his performances. And obviously in his durability, the time in the weight room impacted that as well. So without just the strength element, You know, Mike Webster, look, you got to pay respect to the men that really established the game and the culture of what we're talking about today. And beyond the strength, look, I would be remiss if I didn't pay respect to one of the most important players in the history of football, and more so one of the most, if not the most important player in the history of offensive line play, and that's Mike Webster. So then we get into power. I know some of you are gonna think when I say the name, "Well, why wasn't he in the strength category?" Hold on one second. Here's why. In our opinion, power is actionable strength. It's being able to turn your strength into velocity, into speed. When you hit people, they move. When people hit you, they stop. So who am I talking about? You guessed it, Larry Allen. Hall of Famer, yeah, he's great, he's done this, he's done that in his career. At one point in time, he was labeled to be the strongest man in the history of National Football League. And yes, at one point in time, I didn't believe it, and I low-key, well, high-key, high-key challenged him on that. It was 2006 Pro Bowl, and I'm young and full of myself in terms of confidence. I really felt that I was as strong as Larry, and I felt that I could legitimately challenge him for the crown at the bench press at the 2006 Pro Bowl Skills Challenge. So I kind of, "Hey, Larry, you know, you're getting a little long in the tooth. I think I got you, bro." And he kind of hit me with the typical Larry Allen, "Yeah." And that's all I got out of him. Literally, that's all I got out of him. So we get to the event, and I'm all gassed up. I had probably a couple of Red Bulls thinking I'm really about to get after it. Before I give you my numbers, let me kind of just preempt it with just, you know, I was a little sore. I was coming off the season, my body wasn't exactly massaged and purified and ready for the Larry Allen that we know of, but I did my best. I hit 40 reps, and I was proud of that. And I really at that time thought to myself, maybe Larry gets mid-30s. If he does beat me, I'm thinking 42, 43, 45 would be max. And you know what? I could live with that. You got beat by Larry Allen, the strongest man in the history of the National Football League, by 5 reps? Psh, I'm good with that. I could tell my kids about that all day. But what I can't tell my kids about is the fact that Larry Allen goes up after my reps and he gets to about 35 and he kind of just kind of looks over and I saw like a little gleam in his eye and I'm just like, oh no. This is not going to be good. So he stopped around 58. Now notice what I said, um, he stopped around 58. He could have kept going. And so I took my little $500 I won. Yeah, I got my little $500 check for the Pro Bowl, uh, skills challenge, and I was very proud of that check. But I think he ended up getting like 5 grand or something like that. So anywho, Larry Allen, when you talk about building, uh, the most ideal offensive line athlete We got our strength in Mike Webster. We have our power in Larry Allen. There's nobody in the history of the game that has turned their strength into action, and that's what power is to us. With that said, now you got strength, you got your power. That's all fine and dandy. There are a lot of big, strong, explosive athletes that have played this game, but they just weren't very good, or they weren't able to even make it to the next level. But what is it that separates the big and the strong, or the big, strong, and explosive, from those that can actually perform, and obviously that's skill. What you're going to notice here is this list kind of keeps going. Every player on the list other than this one particular player that I'm about to say right now is the only player that's still playing today. Everyone else, they're the guys of yesteryears. But Marshall Yanda is my choice for skill. Why? Because Marshall Yanda is a future Hall of Famer, 7-time Pro Bowler. In my opinion, he has represented this league and he has represented offensive line play at the highest level. Not only has he been an excellent guard, he was a really good right tackle, he was a really good left tackle— or left guard, rather— and he just didn't do it in the National Football League. He also did it in college at Iowa, which is a football factory, an offensive line factory within itself. But he's excelled at every single position that he's been put into or put— or played at as an offensive line athlete. But Here's the thing with Marshall Yanda, he's not exactly what you would call a high-level athlete. And this is where the skill distinction gets a little interesting. Now many people out there are probably thinking, why didn't you go with a Walter Jones or Orlando Pace or maybe even Ogden? All those guys are skillful, and yes, they all play tackle. But I believe that what qualifies you as an offensive line athlete isn't necessarily genetic potential. So when you think about someone like Walter Jones, I mean, Tremendous athlete, maybe one of the best athletes to ever play offensive line. Doesn't discredit anything he did. He's still one of the best, if not the top 2 or 3 best tackles to ever play. But he had some genetic potential and he was able to do things that most mere mortals cannot do. And it's the same thing for Ogden. I mean, you can't coach what he had relative to his size combined with skill, but having skill and being 6'9", 330, 340, 350, 360, you know, ish, It definitely helps. And the same thing with someone like Orlando Pace, go Bucs. You know, there were some things with Orlando Pace that you just could not replicate on the field regardless of your skill level because of the genetic component. And with someone like Marshall Yanda, you know, he's the everyday American hero. He's just a guy. He's the guy that you're going to go out with on the weekends and just drink beer with and That's my boy. That's Yonder. He's not going to blow you away in shorts and t-shirts. He's not going to blow you away in his athletic acumen. But when you put the pads on, that's when the football player shows up. And that's where offensive line athletes generally are going to make their mark. It's not necessarily in your genetic capacity. It's the work that you put into building your craft. That's what makes offensive line unique, is the fact that you don't have to run a 4-2, 4-3 to do it. You don't have to be a genetic freak to do it. You gotta be somebody that just puts the work in, and Marshall Yanda, in my opinion, is someone that represents skill at the highest level in the history of the National Football League. Now with that said, you're strong, you're powerful, you got skill, but is it sustainable? And what does it mean by being sustainable? Work capacity. I've seen players that can play great in the first quarter, but in the third and fourth quarter, you forget their names other than just seeing on the back of their jerseys. That's the only way you can identify them. You definitely can't identify them from their performance levels. And I think work capacity is really where you start to separate yourself as an offensive line athlete. And there's nobody that did it better than Willie Rolfe. At the intensity and the longevity in which he played, it's just— it's beyond impressive for a 330-pound man to bring the skill set that he brought, but not just do it for one quarter, but to do it for 2, 3, 4, overtime if need be. Obviously we're talking about someone that was an 11-time Pro Bowler, a Hall of Famer right now. He was a basketball player early and was actually gonna play basketball in college before football really took off for him. So maybe that's where the background came from in terms of the work, in terms of the work ethic capacity. But when your nickname is Nasty, you got to uphold that. And you can't do it and be labeled nasty for one quarter. Nasty is every single play, every single snap, every single quarter, every single game. That's how you build your reputation as an offensive line athlete. When you line up, you know what you're going to get out of me, but you know that you're going to keep getting it. It's the exact opposite of really being an elite-level pass rusher in today's game. You got some guys out here in the pass rushers that are great in instances, but— all right, when you run the ball at them, they disappear. Or one game against this particular player, they disappear. Because they're just hit or miss. When you're a great offensive lineman, you don't have that luxury. You gotta show up every single snap, and that's where your work capacity comes into play. And no, it's not just about being in shape A part of that is going to go into your mindset and how you approach your skill set, how you approach your training. All that bleeds over into one another. Then we get into the one thing that people love talking about with offensive linemen because it is just so true. It's like two things that are true about offensive linemen. Number one, they're all the best looking players on the field. That's number one. Number two, they're always the smartest. I heard, and maybe it's the rumor, but I heard that Bill Gates played Pop Warner, was an offensive lineman. I heard Charlie Munger was an offensive lineman. I heard your boy from Tesla, I heard that he was an offensive lineman, Elon Musk. I heard that he played a little center, a little guard. Maybe I just misread on their Wikipedias, but that's the rumor. But anywho, with that being said, the player that embodies Football IQ is Will Shields. You know, here's where we get in the football IQ in terms of defining it within the scope of what we believe here at OLP. Yeah, you can study. Great. And you spend so much time, we just watched so much film and hardly got any sleep. Okay, great. But you still go out there and get tore out the frame. What's the point of it? You still go out there and you're still not seeing what's happening with the safety on the hash. You're still missing cross dogs. You're still missing things that you should typically be picking up. So, what does that mean when you have a high level of football IQ? You're able to then, similar to power, take your knowledge and turn it into action. You're able to take that knowledge and turn it into anticipation. You're able to take that knowledge and then build a high level of focus. And that's something I think that Will Shields built— did for over 14 years, or 14 years, better than Anybody. At one point in time earlier in my career, I was trying to build my base, so to speak, and understand, okay, who am I going to be in this league and what do I need? What do I need to start putting into my bag? Okay, I understood the strength and I understood eating right, but it was this football acumen aspect, the football IQ. Okay, where do I go for that? How do I do that? Because, you know, the coaches can give you one thing, but it's different when you're seeing it amongst other players. And I was told Hey, study Will Shields. And I began studying his game, and I felt like the man was a freaking wizard. It's like, how the hell did you know this was gonna happen? And I don't necessarily know that he knew it was gonna happen, but his action and reactions to certain situations, there was no way that he was not prepared for that outside of the game. It was the time that he invested into his skillset, his craft, and the football IQ aspect that really set him apart. And the thing with, Will Shields that I think really allows every player with a high level of football IQ to be successful is the fact that they know the game is just a game. All right? Will Shields is one of the best people to ever put on an NFL uniform. And it's no accident that he also is our guy for football IQ. When you are generally a good person, you kind of, as they like to say, you get it. About life, football becomes very easy. It becomes really a simple, very simple game. It's X's and O's, literally. But when you understand that life is bigger than that, we're talking about someone in Will Shields, a Walter Payton Man of the Year. He also sent and have protected thousands of battered women through his foundation. He sent hundreds of kids to college through his foundations, and he's still working with young athletes today through his training institute up in Kansas. So I look at that and I say, man, this guy is not just a tremendous football player and a tremendously smart person, he's a good dude, a great person. And I think that's a part of what makes offensive line play unique is, yeah, you can be smart, you can be strong, you can be powerful, but there's a reason why everyone loves being in the offensive line room, because it's generally really good people in there. And those that are better people are going to be smarter players and everything else takes care of itself after that. So football IQ, Will Shields is our selection. Now we get to the meat and potatoes, what everybody loves talking about with O-line, and that's attitude. Who's got the attitude? And nobody had more attitude than Eric Williams. We're talking about a man who was a 4-time Pro Bowler, that would have been in the Hall of Fame had it not been for an unfortunate car wreck that damaged his knee and really cut his career relatively short. You know, we're talking about somebody that was a part of the Great Wall of Dallas, that was considered or still is considered the greatest offensive line to ever play. But what separates Eric Williams from everyone else is this key fact. It's the fact that Reggie White is probably your top 1, 2, 3 greatest defensive players ever. Reggie White could still put a uniform on today and still go out there and smash cats, still go out there and dominate the game, period. Fact. Not every player we can make that type of, or have that level of sentiment towards, because some guys just transcend errors, and Reggie White is that guy. So with that said, beyond being a great football player, Reggie White, known as the Minister of Defense, the Deacon of Defense, was one of the best humans to ever play this game. But Eric Williams found a way to piss him off. Constantly to the point that, as you would say, Reggie White got a bit outside of himself and wanted to fight. And Reggie didn't want to fight anybody, but he wanted to fight Eric Williams. And that's because Eric Williams, like every great offensive lineman, when you line up, you know it's an opportunity. You know that it's a, it's a chance for you to show your worth as a player. And it's even better when it's a guy like Reggie White. It's even better when it's a guy like Von Miller. It's even better when it's Aaron Donald. But far too often we you see guys that line up and play this game, and when it isn't Aaron Donald, you're beat on Monday. You're beat on, hell, Sunday after the last game. You're like, man, who we got? God, man, they got Aaron Donald. Whew, boy, my back tired, my knees kind of— You're already beat. And that's what a guy like an Eric Williams and every great player that puts this uniform on and plays this position, you take on those challenges, and it shows up in your performance. You don't back down. And I'm not talking about being dirty, and I'm not talking about starting fights. I'm talking about your attitude is gonna impact everything. If you go back and you talk about strength, your attitude impacts how you train. It's gonna impact your power. It's gonna impact your skill. It's gonna impact your work capacity. It's definitely gonna impact your football IQ, and thus it's gonna impact what you're capable of doing and how you perceive certain situations and matchups each and every week. So when Eric Williams lined up against Reggie White, Eric Williams is now known as the Reggie White stopper. He is known as Reggie White's kryptonite. There's no other player that can say that. So attitude, Eric Williams. If you're building a perfect offensive line athlete, that's the attitude that I want. That's the mentality that I want. Now, with that said, Something I think that we overlook, 'cause we typically stop at the attitude. I've seen a lot of really tough, strong, you know, guys with a bit of attitude and machismo about themselves get slapped in the mouth. Get slapped straight in the mouth, and then they tuck their tails and they want no más. No more of anything and anybody. But that's where your mental resiliency comes into play. You have to be somebody that can come out in that first quarter, and be as physical as you need to be to get the job done. But then you also understand this: you're gonna get beat. You're gonna give up a sack. Things aren't gonna go your way. How are you gonna respond? Are you gonna change your technique because you just got beat? Are you not gonna start looking to the sideline, blaming the coaches for, "Oh, I'm not getting slides my way." Are you gonna start doing that type of stuff? "Oh man, why we keep running the ball right here in these situ—?" Don't be that circumstantial tough guy. Mental resilient or mentally resilient players, they show up and show out regardless. So who am I talking about? Who represents mental resiliency better than anybody that's ever put this uniform on? Joe Thomas. You're talking about, you know, an athlete, a man that, yeah, probably your 1, 2, 3 best tackles to ever play. You know, it's like when you start talking who's the number one, number two, it's like, do you like vanilla, chocolate, or Neapolitan? I just like ice cream, so it really doesn't freaking matter. So just give me what you got. He's in that category, that echelon. 10-time Pro Bowler, yeah, cool. He's going to walk into Canton, probably can walk from Cleveland right to Canton, literally, and just be enshrined. Okay, yeah, that's great. But what— why is it that we feel that he's the most mentally resilient elite, or the player that most represents mental resiliency more so than anybody? To ever do this. Joe Thomas played for the Cleveland Browns, and Joe Thomas had probably 4 different owners, 450 head coaches, 735 offensive coordinators, 922— hold on— 923 quarterbacks that he had to play with. Joe Thomas played in a situation that was, as many would say, not exactly desirable. But never have we seen Joe Thomas's consistency waver. Have we never seen Joe Thomas's approach to the game waver? Not once did we ever hear Joe Thomas complain. Never did he, even late in his career, request a trade or try to move on to another team or not sign a new contract with the organization. He never did that. Some will say, well, he was just being loyal. No, it had nothing to do with that because it's not like he was taking less than what he was worth. He was getting well compensated, but even still, it comes to a point when everyone, you know, you want a little bit of joy to come with you picking up your checks. But Joe Thomas was the type of player, or is the type of player, that represents what it means to be mentally resilient. When things aren't going your way, how do you respond? Especially for someone like a left tackle to have You know, I don't even know exactly how many quarterbacks Joe Thomas had to play with, but I just know this: just as many zeros he had on his checks, he probably had just as many quarterbacks he had to deal with, maybe in the course of every 2-3 weeks in the course of a season, because that's just the turnover rate that they had going on in Cleveland. Thank God it's seemingly starting to get some things worked out, but irony is Joe Thomas is no longer there, unfortunately. But mental resiliency is what's going to set you up for long-term success as a player. When things aren't going your way, how are you going to respond? Now, key point: mental resiliency has nothing to do with, you know, being coachable, or, you know, how a player allows a coach to yell at them or talk down to them or whatever it may be. You see that stuff happen a lot in today's game. That's not being mental resilient. Remember, we're talking about what players can control, how you respond to building yourself as an athlete. Your mental resiliency is what's gonna get you over the hump. It's gonna be what allows you as a player to take every element of what's important that you can control and actually see it come to fruition. That's what this list is all about. It's about building the perfect the perfect offensive line athlete. Not the most submissive, coachable player. The perfect offensive line athlete. And as I said, mental resiliency, that's key. Joe Thomas, there's nobody in the history of the National Football League that's played this position that represents it better than he did. Now, with this said, we're going to get into centers, we're going to get into guards, and we're also going to get into tackles. But with these other positions, it's going to be more so of the players of today. But with each position, there's going to be called— we call— what we call a performance linchpin. The thing that makes a center unique. The thing that makes a tackle unique. A thing or the thing that makes the guard unique. Outside of these traits, every one of these positions has a performance linchpin. So stay tuned. We're going to come back with more content, more fun, more entertainment, and more of, you know, good-looking, smart offensive lineman athletes. Take care.