Pancakes aren’t normally served for Thanksgiving, but some NFL offensive lineman didn’t get the memo. This week’s Disrespectful Blocks of the Week is outstanding. It has some excellent knockdowns and possibly my favorite of the year!
Starting in Dallas with all-world left tackle Tyron Smith — he’s battled through some injuries and the Cowboys offense has struggled without him. He was back on Thanksgiving against the Chargers. The offense wasn’t any better, but Smith was his usual self.
Here he quarters a linebacker and knocks him straight off his feet. Quartering is essentially hitting the linebacker on a quarter of his body, the quarter that presents itself. You just run right through it, like Tyron does here.
We have thought about giving a year-end award for the lineman who has the most disrespectful blocks of the season. Clearly in the lead is Raiders left guard Kelechi Osemele. This is my favorite block of the year.
The defensive tackle goes to jump on Osemele. Not only does Osemele punch his lights out, he then carries him forward about 5 yards and dumps him. LOL! It’s fantastic.
Next up we move to Atlanta and the Tampa Bay Bucs. The Bucs right tackle out of UCLA, my childhood team, Caleb Benenoch, is pulling on a G play. Not only does he block his guy, he throws him off the field. When coaches say “play through the whistle,” this is playing through the whistle!
Moving right along to Bears right guard Kyle Long, who had a bear of a day (get it?) against the Eagles excellent defensive tackle Fletcher Cox. Long didn’t win every battle, but he won here. Look at this strength. He just sumo tosses Cox aside like Cox is some backup playing his first game.
I’ve often said that long runs, or in this case, a successful run, often rely on skill position players making that extra block. It’s no different for the Vikings run game. Here is tight end David Morgan just straight up rolling up the entire side of the Lions defensive line with this pancake. This wasn’t the only pancake Morgan had either. Morgan was a monster!