Olu Fashanu's 1st Start: Jets Film Breakdown

[Music] in this video we're breaking down Olu Fu's first preseason game I thought fosu and Tyler gon were the two best rookie tackles at least that I've watched fosu played 25 snaps uh 62.8 PFF grade but didn't allow a pressure and really his one true negative rep that's significantly dropping his grade wasn't even a play it was this false start when it comes to what he actually showed in live action I thought he had one slight negative rep and outside of that it was very clean tape now the preseason I feel like most people know this but still feel the need to remind everyone the level of competition is nothing like what he's going to see if he actually gets put in the game in the regular season most of his reps were against either javante Jean Baptist who is a seventh round pick or Jamon Davis who's been a linebacker for his entire career and is being moved to the edge this year it's the same Dynamic with every player but really the way that I view preseason is that it's concerning if you're back in the preseason but being good in the preseason doesn't really mean much just kind of like avoiding a disaster but with that being said we haven't had any new tape for months so let's get into it this is at least more valuable than his college tape it's still better competition I'm actually going to start with his one negative rep and then the rest of the video is going to be positive this was very early in the game Frankie louu number four starts to threaten inside through the B Gap he's got this drag hand extended because the start of this rep is looking like a potential ET stunt if louu penetrates to the guard and then Cleland Ferell Loops outside he wants to have that right hand engaged and ready to pick up the stunt but he stays engaged with the drag hand for a tick too long ends up giving up a slightly short Corner still does a solid job recovering but Tyrod Taylor gets flushed out of the pocket everything else though I thought was very solid this was probably his best rep in pass Pro great example of flashing and baiting a cross chop he gets into his 45° set flashes the outside hand a lot of tackles here are coming in with an aggressive outside hand punch and as a pass rusher you can counter that by cross chopping defeating the outside hand and then the tackle has no way of recovering the outside so he flashes the hand that gets the rusher to chop with the inside hand but then he pulls back that punch replaces his punch with the inside hand that causes the rushers move to whiff and it allows fosu to establish contact unobstructed this alone is something that regardless of competition like there are highly drafted tackles in this class that aren't capable of executing this technique at least based on what they showed in college Tois fuaga for example would just throw his outside hand there was no ability to retreat and protect the corner this technique plays in the NL regardless of who you're going up against all of the best tackles are able to execute this good example here of just the importance of arm length for an offensive tackle Fu doesn't even have crazy length 34in arms is about average for an offensive tackle but you can see on this rep how important arm length is for being able to make contact and protect your frame Jamon Davis has 33in arms which is solid length for an edge rusher he tries to go in with the long arm but fos is able to pull back protect his frame and then establish contact reaching pretty far outside of his body cylinder he doesn't have to get right up on him to create a firm point of contact he can kind of sit back protect that comfortable breathing room and still have an impactful punch probably my biggest issue with fashanu as a prospect is there were times he would be a little bit late to punch a bull rush and he would allow unnecessary contact into his frame at the college level that almost never resulted in a pressure he was just stronger and a better athlete than everyone he was facing and you saw that same Dynamic show up in week one of the preseason there were a couple reps where you'd like him to have tighter hand placement do a better job getting his hands inside but as far as the result he was still able to set his anchor and resist the bull rush this play you see he's going in with the flash bait technique that we talked about earlier with the outside hand but this time the edge rusher is going speed to power if you're trying to play patient but the pass rusher is taking the fight directly to you he's probably going to get hands on your frame and win the rep if at least initially so you'd like fosu to probably not overextend as much here and go in with this bait punch a second earlier so that he still got more space between himself and the rusher you don't want to be in the situation where you've got an exposed frame to just accept speed to power but he does do a great job on two key elements here that allow him to recover first of all he has his inside hand activated ready to meet power with power he's overextending a bit with the outside hand but the inside hand is tucked tight ready to land a punch ideally you meet speed to power with a firm twoand punch but one is better than zero and then what he's always had is the lower half flexibility to set an anchor quickly redirect that Force into the ground despite getting off to kind of a rough start he's able to finish the rep find his anchor flush him out of the pocket so the rep we just talked about it's like you throw your outside hand right when he goes speed to power you could execute it all more cleanly but that kind of stuff is going to happen you've got to be able to recover and he did a good job of that this rep is something that I would want to see fosu completely eliminate from his game as much as possible at least he still wins the rep but you know we're trying to project against better competition by the time he gets into the third step of his kick slide so outside foot inside foot and he's landing on the outside foot for the third step he should have a much better idea of what move the pass rusher is using and when he sees him start to Lunge forward and get into a speed to power he needs to be a lot quicker to hit him back with a tight two-hand punch but he's still just a little bit late and wide with his punch it ends up being more of a bear hug where you can see he's making contact on the shoulder pads the hand placement isn't doing anything to separate the rusher from his frame and it's also a lot easier to slip off and release contact again he still got the play strength and the agility to end up winning the rep I mean this is exactly what his college tape looked like it was a lot of plays like this where you know I can sit here and nitpick the technique but the results are really good watching him at Pin State now in the preseason it's been the exact same sequence of events so I'm trying to evaluate the process even though the results are good I still think if this is Greg rouso or Bradley chub the results are probably going to be a bit different so that's it for the pass Pro um comparing this first start to my college Scouting Report I feel like it kind of lined up with my expectations rare movement skills can play with independent hands really skilled hand usage and when it comes to play strength footwork lower body flexibility he's got all the natural traits to have a really good anchor main thing is he's just got to get his hands inside and needs to find a better balance between playing patient but being on time with his punch and the Run blocking I'm really interested to see how this looks in the NFL watching his 2022 tape and some of the earlier games in 2023 I viewed him as I would say a poor run blocking Prospect it never really made much sense because he's got the fluidity and lateral movement skills that you see in pass Pro to theoretically be a good Zone blocker that just never translated to his tape but when I finished up the rest of his tape and you watch him over the second half of the Season uh Maryland Michigan Michigan State you really started to see flashes of what he can be as a run blocker specifically a Zone blocker and I think the arrow is pointed up for him in that phase again 11 run blocking snaps we're not making any sweeping conclusions here but what he showed in his first preseason game I thought was really promising this play climbs to the second level connects to the linebacker on the backside does a good job staying attached bringing his feet with him eventually puts him on the ground this play they're running a toss with a split block basically outside Zone blocking rules here fosu and the left guard have an overtake combo where the guard's going to give him a quick shove to to assist him securing the block and you can see the hip flexibility to work to the playside shoulder and then wrap around and seal him off to the backside poorly designed and executed play where the Right Guard isn't able to disengage and pick up the linebacker blitzing and even if he was the center was climbing to the second level also so you'd have an unblocked defensive tackle in that case but from fashanu standpoint good to see the athletic ability here for Zone blocking and then final play we've got outside Zone against the six-man front so basically just one-on ones across the board fosu connects to the D end good job getting his hands inside drives his legs displaces him about 5 to six yards off the line of scrimmage so that's about as thorough of a breakdown as I can do for 25 plays hope you enjoyed the video I definitely think Olu has a bright future as a tackle in the NFL and it was overall an impressive performance felt a little bit more negative than my actual opinion of what he did I just think there's that one technical thing getting his hands inside being on time with his punch that he's got to fix when he faces NFL competition but he's going to have hopefully plenty of time to incubate and develop and learn from one of the best in the business in Tyron Smith [Music] [Music]