System of a Caleb Downs: The NFL’s Most Improved Position Groups

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
Most protein drinks ask you to choose between results and taste. Up decided, that's a ridiculous trade-off.
Up makes lightly carbonated protein drinks, 25 grams of protein per can, clear protein, not milky or thick, and they taste so good, that 25 grams of protein almost feels like a bonus.
Up is so confident you'll love their drinks, they're giving away an island vacation just to prove it. That's the kind of brand this is. No purchase necessary. Giveaway ends May 30th. Enter and find your closest Up at buckedupenergy.com. Grab a Up and feel like a million bucks.

**Mina Kimes** (0:43)
The Mina Kimes Show featuring Lenny. Only NFL podcast. One of the hosts thinks Bland is how he describes the medically approved food he had to eat this weekend after eating an entire chocolate bar. That's Lenny on Mina Kimes.
Deron Bland is the player we're going to be talking about today, Bill.

**Bill Barnwell** (0:58)
He's built different, just like Lenny.

**Mina Kimes** (1:02)
Lenny just completely does not care anymore. Like he actually ate, have you ever seen those bear protein bars that they sometimes have around ESPN? He ate an entire bear protein bar.

**Bill Barnwell** (1:15)
He ate it out of your bag. It was not like he climbed into a place where chocolate bars are stored. Like he just got it out of your...

**Mina Kimes** (1:22)
He unzipped the bag, found it in the bag, opened the protein bar, didn't eat any of the wrapper. Some might say he should be applauded for his ingenuity.
I would beg to differ. Okay. So yes, we are going to talk about Deron Bland.
Today, I am doing... That's Bill Barnwell, by the way, hosted the Bill Barnwell show. We're doing something that I don't think I've done before after the draft, and I thought would be fun, which is talk about the most improved position groups in the NFL. And then the ones we still have pretty big question marks. Left out a few, I think, of the ones that I've been talking about over in the aftermath of the draft, the Raiders, receivers, your lack thereof, the Bears, pass rush. So, but we are getting to some, and I'm excited because we're actually talking about some teams I haven't really been talking about.

**Bill Barnwell** (2:11)
Yeah. Raiders quarterbacks are better than they were last year. You don't need us to tell you that.

**Mina Kimes** (2:15)
Exactly.
All right. So I'm going to go first, and I'm going to talk about one that I feel like I haven't talked about at all. And I didn't really talk about this team a lot in the aftermath of the draft. But when I took a stick back and I looked at, I was looking at different depth charts, just kind of that's how I feel. I felt pretty strongly about this one. The Panthers offensive line, to me, has the potential to take a big jump, in part because they were incredibly banged up last season.
Rich Rebar at Sharp Analytics does the rankings of the teams that have had the fewest number of reps of the starting offensive line playing together. One might come up a little bit later. But the Panthers were 29th in this metric, in part because Robert Hunt, who was their big money guard, suffered a torn biceps in week two. They, Ippie Kiwanu, who's a left tackle, got injured in the postseason. They made one of my favorite signings of the entire offseason bringing in Rashid Walker on a one-year deal. But then they weren't done there. They also drafted Monroe Freeling out of Georgia. I feel like they just were like, we are not going to be on an island here or out to sea rather with our tackles.

**Bill Barnwell** (3:34)
You have to go out to sea to get onto the island, so that checks out.

**Mina Kimes** (3:37)
When you're on an island, you're okay. I feel like if you're on an island, being on an island can be a good thing.

**Bill Barnwell** (3:42)
Sure.

**Mina Kimes** (3:43)
Depending on what kind of left tackle you are, I suppose.
Then, so Hunt is going to be back, so he got injured in the beginning of the season. Damian Lewis is the other guard, but they also went from Cade Mays to Luke Fortner. Looking at just some of these rankings in pass block win, which isn't a perfect metric for offensive line play, Mays was 20th, Fortner was 11th for New Orleans, Quanu was 50th, Rashid Walker was 11th. I also really liked Monroe Freeling, who I haven't really talked about much. I thought getting him where they did in the draft made a ton of sense. At the time, I think everybody was thinking like, oh, they're going to go receiver or maybe add a pass rusher. Yeah, but when I took a step back and I looked at this offensive line, I thought about the importance of creating better conditions for Bryce Young. It made a lot of sense to me and I think it's very likely that this group is going to be much better than what we saw last year.