Doug Marrone's Offseason Misstep Is Boon for Jaguars' Young Offensive Line

Two unfortunate scenarios blended together on Tuesday, as former Bills head coach Doug Marrone accepted an assistant head coaching gig focusing on the offensive line with the Jacksonville Jaguars. The hope in Jacksonville, as it usually is, is that a potentially undervalued commodity can help turn the direction of this franchise around. 

Marrone's quest to find another head coaching gig after opting out of a lame-duck situation in Buffalo led him to interviews for lead gigs all over the NFL, but without the sheen of the "hot new candidate," like Seattle defensive coordinator Dan Quinn, he was forced to settle for less. Meanwhile, the Jaguars still have no offensive coordinator after firing Jedd Fisch, and offensive line coach George Yarno was unavailable last season as he battled cancer. 

The quote I found telling about Marrone came from MMQB's Peter King, via SI.com, who mentioned as Marrone was tabbed for Buffalo's head coaching gig that he knew one team that liked Marrone "was interested as much for his ability to walk in and handle and discipline underachieving pro players as how smart he was."

This did not really happen in Buffalo last season—the Bills offensive line declined precipitously as tackle Seantrel Henderson and guard Erik Pears were fed to the wolves. But there's an argument to be made that head coaching duties detract from your ability to fix individual problems, and the Jaguars have a whole lot of underachieving to fix. 

Player	Position	QB Sacks Allowed (2014)	Hurries Allowed (2014)	PFF Rating (2014)
Luke Joeckel	LT	8	29	-15.8
Zane Beadles	LG	2	12	+1.9
Luke Bowanko	C	4	16	-9.2
Brandon Linder	RG	5	8	+16.6
Austin Pastzor	RT	4	12	-7.8

Guard Brandon Lindner was a revelation in his first season, and free-agent signee Zane Beadles held his own at guard. The rest of the offensive line ranged from inconsistent to a train wreck, depending on the week and the injuries at hand. 

The biggest task for Marrone will be to turn around tackle Luke Joeckel. The first-round pick was seen as a lead-pipe lock to be an All-Pro by most of the draftnik consensus coming out in 2013, but he has been a train wreck in his first two seasons. Some of that can be explained by injury, but the Jaguars can't hide behind that excuse forever. 

Marrone has experience at the NFL level in this role: He coached the offensive line for Herm Edwards' Jets from 2002-2005. That was mostly a veteran line—this was the Kevin Mawae-era Jets, for reference—but Marrone also broke in some young solid starters like Kareem McKenzie and Brandon Moore.

Less pertinent to the job he'll do for the Jaguars, but still pertinent to his overall resume, is his work as New Orleans Saints offensive coordinator prior to joining Syracuse. All-Pro Saints guard Jahri Evans credited Marrone as a strong factor in his growth as a player:

"

Coming out of college I was real raw. I was raw in my technique and knowledge of the game and defenses. What Doug would always preach to me was that I could be a good player but had to take the proper steps and improve in my technique. He would never let me slide in that. Even though I made a block and succeeded, he still let me know if my technique was bad and stressed for me to work on it. He would always want improvement. When you look back at it, it really helped me improve as a player when he stressed technique and worked with me after practice, showing me what I needed to do and making sure I did it right. He was a coach that I needed out of Division 2. He really got my career going.

"

The Jets offensive line under Marrone had its ups and downs, almost mirroring the team as a whole. I leave the stats in your hands, though I don't think there's much of a conclusion to draw from them. 

Year	Adjusted Line Yards (Rk)	Adjusted Sack Rate (Rk)	Power Success (Rk)
2002	4.09 (16)	6.5% (16)	52% (30)
2003	4.10 (17)	5.9% (12)	65% (18)
2004	4.79 (2)	6.7% (15)	84% (1)
2005	3.80 (24)	10.3% (31)	71% (7)

I can't find anything especially galling about this move. The Jaguars needed an offensive line coach badly and managed to hire one that may very well apply for the Peter Principle. I'm sure Marrone hopes Jacksonville is a short-term stop for him, but other than that I don't see any real downside here for the Jaguars. 

As a more statistically inclined writer, I don't have a lot of evidence to suggest Marrone is a great line coach. But I also don't know that there's really a good way to deem what makes a "great line coach" outside of anecdotes, preparation and things that we can't numerically account for that happen off the field. 

In short: I think this is a solid start for the Jaguars on building an offensive braintrust. I like that they have someone else with offensive coordinator experience on staff to bounce ideas off of. Next step: finding a coordinator who can save quarterback Blake Bortles. 

Rivers McCown is the AFC South Lead Writer for Bleacher Report and the co-host of the Three-Cone Drill podcast. His work has also appeared on Football Outsiders and ESPN.com. Follow him on Twitter at @riversmccown.