Bob Wylie to be new O-Line coach - Confirmed

[Stickem]

I'm sure Wylie will extract as much as he can from our current o line guys. I look for a definite improvement, as to what degree remains to be seen. He definitely has the credentials to improve our group and I hope he is front and centre along with Walters when we pick our o line guy(s) in the draft. I certainly feel a whole lot better with Mr. Wylie on staff.

[Jpan85]

Here is a great article from San Fransisco Gate from 2011 when Wylie was in Oakland http://www.sfgate.com/raiders/tafur/article/Raiders-coach-Bob-Wylie-boosts-offensive-line-2328642.php#page-2

 

 

Most offensive-line coaches have pictures of offensive linemen on the walls of their office. Bob Wylie has one of David Copperfield.

And Copperfield, who once shared a stage with Wylie, would be proud of Wylie's biggest trick after 25 years of doing magic: turning a ragtag Raiders offensive line into one of the best in the league after three games.

Oakland goes into today's tilt against New England with the No. 1 running game in the league, and it's third in sacks allowed, with two. This after the Raiders gave up 44 sacks (sixth most) last season, not to mention 121 quarterback hits.

"They're blocking like you have never seen," Oakland head coach Hue Jackson said.

Wylie, like any great magician, is not going to tell you exactly how he and assistant offensive line coach Steve Wisniewski pulled off this act.

There must be some mirrors involved. After all, the Raiders had 12 guys vying for starting spots and a new coach in Wylie just two months ago in training camp.

Two of the three returning starters - center Samson Satele and guard Cooper Carlisle - were "zone-blocking specialists" who would struggle with head coach Tom Cable gone. The rookie, Stefen Wisniewski (Steve's nephew), was moved from center to guard halfway through camp, and tackle Khalif Barnes had started only five games his first two years in Oakland.

"Yeah, I didn't know exactly what five were going to be (starters), but their work habits, they did a really good job," Wylie said. "It doesn't take a lick of ability to give effort, and once you give effort, you've got a chance that it's going to turn the way you want it to."

Especially if you use Wylie's tips on how to maximize leverage and strength with the positioning of your body and movement of your arms and legs. He demonstrated on a reporter by pushing his arm down, and then having a much harder time when the reporter turned his arm and pointed his thumb up.

"You feel stronger?" Wylie said. "I made you stronger and you didn't lift a weight. There are probably 10 or 12 of those little things that you do with the body that shows them if you keep your body angles in the right direction and you bend your knees and you create the leverage concepts, segmenting the upper-body power angle from the lower-body power angle, then we have a chance. And that's all we can ask for is to get a chance."

Satele, pegged as undersized at 6-feet-3, 300 pounds, lost his center job to Jared Veldheer (now the left tackle) last year and again to Wisniewski after the draft this season. Both times he has returned to the lineup better than ever, and he credits Wylie's 30 years of coaching experience - last year with the Broncos - and the elder Wisniewski's playing experience.

"It helps a lot," Satele said. "Technique-wise, they both teach us double-unders and different techniques I haven't even done before, and it works. Technique-wise, they're really great."

The younger Wisniewski said Wylie is a master of footwork.

"He can show you your next step and tell you exactly how it's going to affect you five steps down the road," Wisniewski said.

Then ... just when the meetings bog down and detailed-out players start to lose focus, Wylie will bust out a card trick that "will blow your mind," Wisniewski said.

"Every offensive-line coach I have ever had until now has been boring," Wisniewski said. "O-line kind of attracts that personality, all-business. But Wyles breaks it up, tells a great story, does some sleight of hand. We appreciate that an hour into a meeting. We're people."

Wylie, 60, picked up magic 25 years ago as a way to entertain sick children in the hospital.

In 1999, Copperfield made Wylie and 11 other patrons disappear at a Chicago show, and they couldn't leave the dressing room until everybody else had gone home. In the down time, Wylie told Copperfield he was an amateur magician and Copperfield taught him a card trick.

Now he has 150 magic videos and books to his credit, as well as a great coaching device.

"Sometimes I make something appear, make something disappear," Wylie said. "It keeps their attention, keeps them going, keeps it a little light in there instead of always pounding them, pounding them, pounding them, you know what I mean?"

The older, more serious Wisniewski and Wylie work well together, something that Jackson anticipated when he put them together for the first time this offseason. And to his credit, Jackson didn't worry about this offensive line, though many outsiders saw it as one of the team's biggest problem areas.

"The players trust" Wylie, Jackson said. "Anytime you have an older veteran coach (and a) young, ambitious coach, they work together on bringing that group together. And then you take some very talented players who are motivated and want to be good, you come up with something great, and that's what those guys have done."

Quarterback Jason Campbell has the most to gain from all this, and he has been very comfortable with the protection. He credits Wylie with improving the line's confidence as well as fostering an open line of dialogue.

"The one thing they do very well is communicate," he said. "That's very important because everyone has to be on the same page."

Even if that page is out of a magician's book.

Today, Wylie will try to make 325-pound nose tackle Vince Wilfork disappear.

[DR. CFL]

The great part about April is everyone is a hero and nobody has lost a game yet.

[MOBomberFan]

The great part about April is everyone is a hero and nobody has lost a game yet.

Yet we couldn't squeeze an ounce of optimism out of you if we tried 

[TrueBlue]

If Wylie can't squeeze every ounce out of our current hogs, then in all honesty no one can.  

[robynjt]

There's no way anyone can NOT like this hire. 

 

I feel like it would be hard for the OL NOT to improve with coaching.  You can improve strength, you can improve technique, and you can improve footwork.