Friday Morning Practice: OL sans Locklear and the 3-4

Sean Locklear wasn't practicing, and I didn't see him standing around watching, so I am guessing we will hear that he had the day off or maybe he was getting treatment in the training room, assuming the guys with access are doing their job.

The offense was practicing some running plays, and it was mainly accounting for the 3-4. You could tell because the guys "playing" DL wear blue covers on their helmets and the LBs wear green (secondary wears orange, but they aren't really involved). Steve Vallos looks like his only responsibility in practice is to pretend to be a DT.

Heller wasn't taking part and I didn't see him either. Stephens (the most reps), Pollard, and Newton (considerably less reps than the other two) were rotating in at tight end. They were putting the tight end in motion to counter the OLB.

The offensive line groups, left-to-right were:
Jones-Sims-Spencer-Gray-Ashworth
Alston-Wrotto-Ross-Willis-Williams

Kyle Williams has been the beneficiary when Walter Jones or Sean Locklear miss time because he gets to run with the second team at RT.

I imagine we won't see much of Jones against San Diego or Lock, especially depending on what was up with him today. That means Ashworth, Alston, and Williams will play a lot at tackle. It will be interesting to see how that rotation goes because I expect the starting interior guys (at least Sims and Spencer) will get more time than the tackles and probably Gray.

We could see any of the following:
Ashworth-Sims-Spencer-Willis-Alston
Ashworth-Sims-Spencer-Willis-Williams
Alston-Sims-Spencer-Willis-Ashworth

That could give us some idea of what they are thinking with the reserve tackles.

The offensive line was also working on a run drill to account for the ILBs in the 3-4. It was mostly the center needing to make sure he could get to the LB because the rest of the line could take care of the three down linemen, but also kind of chipping the DT on his way.