Seahawks offensive line coach Tom Cable said “this year is probably the most excited I have been in a long time’’ about the prospects of line during an interview Wednesday afternoon on KJR-AM on The Ian Furness Show.
Cable also touched on a few other topics concerning the line — specifically, who will line up where — during the roughly 10-minute interview.
Here are five takeaways from that interview, in no particular order:
1, Right tackle is shaping up as a battle between Germain Ifedi and Ethan Pocic.
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Cable offered what might be the most clarity yet about where Pocic — a second-round pick out of LSU –– will begin his Seattle career.
Specifically, he said Ifedi and Pocic will battle it out at right tackle to begin camp. He also said the loser of that battle doesn’t necessarily become a backup, implying instead they want to see which of those two players is the best fit at right tackle and then take it from there.
“Ethan, he’s going to start at right tackle with Germain,’’ Cable said. “Those two guys are going to compete and obviously what you hope is that they prove to us day in and day out that they are two of the best five and then you’ve got to move one of them somewhere, and that’s a good problem to have.’’ Pocic was primarily a center at LSU but the Seahawks have said from the minute he was drafted he would likely begin his NFL career at guard or tackle.
2, Mark Glowinski is going back to right guard to compete with Oday Aboushi.
Glowinski started at left guard last season. But Cable noted that Glowinski played right guard most of his career until last year, including a 2015 game at Arizona as a rookie. Cable said the reason to move Glowinski to the left side last year was because Ifedi — the the team’s first-round pick in 2016 — had “never been a left-handed player’’ either and the thought was “to take the guy who is a year older’’ and have him make the switch in sides, meaning Glowinski. So that had Ifedi playing right guard and Glowinski on the left. But now with Ifedi at right tackle, the team can move Glowinski back to right guard to compete with Aboushi, a free agent signee.
3, Luke Joeckel, George Fant and Rees Odhiambo appear set to battle for the two left-side spots.
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With the other four on the right side, this appears to be the set up on the left with Cable saying Justin Britt, Joey Hunt and Will Pericak will be the centers. That also leaves rookie Justin Senior to be on the left side at tackle. Also, it appears Robert Myers will remain a right tackle and that UDFA Jordan Roos may start out on the left — Cable referred to having “five on the left, five on the right’’ along with the centers.
4, Fant and Odhaimbo have gotten a lot bigger.
The presumption has been that Joeckel will likely win the left tackle spot with Fant moving to a backup role in his second year, which apparently could leave left guard for Odhiambo (though with lots of options depending on how the other spots shake out).
But Cable waxed about as enthusiastic as he could about what Fant — who made the roster last season as an undrafted free agent after having been primarily a basketball player at Western Kentucky — has done in the off-season.
Cable said Fant “left here about 293 (pounds) and he’s 320 (now). He looks like a lineman. He doesn’t look like a power forward.’’
Cable said Fant also spent the off-season trying to learn as much as he could about left tackle talking to teammates and anyone he could, saying he “wanted to reach out and expand his knowledge of football. … he approached it like a pro football player.’’
Cable said Odhiambo, a third-round pick out of Boise State a year ago, has also made a physical transformation.
“He left here about 304, 305,’’ Cable said. “And I think he’s at 316 now. When we needed him (last season) he went in and played. This is an opportunity now for him to just take off.’’
5, Cable says the line is “night and day’’ better than at this time a year ago.
Simply put, Cable said he thinks the offensive line is much better now than 12 months ago.
“If you compare apples to apples, last year at the end of April first of May compared to this year, it’s night and day,’’ he said. “So like I said, I’m the guy having probably the most fun right now of anybody because of the way the group has come together, the way the group acts, the way they work, the integrity. They go at it.’’
Bob Condotta: 206-515-5699 or
bcondotta@seattletimes.com; on Twitter: @bcondotta. Bob Condotta covers the Seahawks for the Seattle Times. He provides daily coverage of the team throughout the year.
