Buffalo Bills: Grading The Offensive Line

Jul 28, 2013; Pittsford, NY, USA; Buffalo Bills head coach Doug Marrone working with the offensive line during training camp at St. John Fisher College. Mandatory Credit: Kevin Hoffman-USA TODAY Sports

The Buffalo Bills are in need of an upgrade at offensive line, which is one of the main priories this off-season.  They have already addressed it by bringing in Ritchie Incognito, but I do not think that they will stop with only one free agent signing.  Look for the Buffalo Bills to bring in at least one more lineman that can be ready to play day one.

The grading report that we will be looking at is from Pro Football Focus.  If you are not familiar with Pro Football Focus or at least with how they come up with their grading systems here is a quick look at how they do it and if you want a more comprehensive look into their grading system, you can go here.

"There are two main processes that are used to come up with the grades: player participation and the actual grading process. Player participation is more black and white as it consists of which players are on the field, where and general information about the actions they performed (rush the passer, drop into coverage, stay in to pass block, etc). This process is performed by two separate analysts on two separate spreadsheets. Each spreadsheet is then compared and any discrepancies are reviewed by a third analyst in order to ensure near-100 percent accuracy. We’ve found that both blind runs are generally at least 99.7% accurate and once the games are checked, we’re confident that our work is very close to 100% by mid-week (actually stands at 99.98%). As for the grading process, it starts as soon as a game is completed. Each play consists of two basic sections, one for the grading and one for stat collection, which would include detail such as (but by no means limited to) which gap the run goes through or which route was thrown on a pass. The grading for each game passes through three individuals (two who grade every player on every play) to ensure that the grading and stat collection is thoroughly checked and critiqued. This ensures that both our procedures and the interpretation of each play is rigorously checked and consistently applied. – Pro Football Focus"

Next: Breaking Down The Line