ANALYSIS : Touch of Tenderness Makes Line Thrive

Why sure, it’s like we’ve been writing all along: The only thing these lubberly linemen on offense needed was a little time and some tender loving criticism.

And we’ve been only so glad to oblige:

There’s a cemetery across the street from the practice field, and had the Cardinals been allowed to tackle quarterback Billy Joe Tolliver, he might now be resting there.

And . . .

Down to their third left tackle, the Chargers might as well tell their young quarterback to go stand in the middle of Interstate 5.

And . . .

The line makes monsters of Butts & Bernstine, but Vincent Price could get to the quarterback the way these pushovers pass block.

“The negative criticism will definitely motivate you,” tackle Broderick Thompson said. “Hearing all that stuff just brought up a little something extra. We rallied around it, got together and said nobody believes in us but ourselves.”

Yes, we did our part to help, thank you. And while it may be a while before the boys in the trenches get around to passing on their appreciation, we can dwell on what we’ve accomplished together:

--Running back Marion Butts leads the NFL in rushing with 713 yards.

--Butts and Rod Bernstine have combined for more rushing yardage (1,106) than any other tandem in the league.

--Only the Dolphins have surrendered fewer sacks (six), than the Chargers (11).

“Some of it’s luck, some of it’s planned, but most of it has been their effort,” offensive line coach Alex Gibbs said. “They’ve just decided it’s not time to be the beaten puppy. When a guy decides it, then that’s it, he won’t let it happen again.”

In the past two games, the line we came to ridicule just a few short weeks ago, has not allowed a sack. The Chargers haven’t gone two games in a row in the same season without a sack since 1982. In only three of the team’s nine games this season has the line allowed more than one sack.

“Alex Gibbs has made a huge difference,” guard David Richards said. “In past years we’ve been the beaten-down guys. We were blamed for everything, and rightfully so if your quarterback doesn’t have time to throw.

“But Alex has just gone and fought for us; he’s put us in a system that works well. The rules that we follow are simple and we protect one another. We’ve all gotten beat bad this year, just like in years past, but now there’s always someone there to back you up and pick up that guy for you.”

OK, so besides the well-meaning criticism, maybe Gibbs also has had something to do with the turnaround of this offensive line.

“That’s what Joe Bugel did (in Washington),” General Manager Bobby Beathard said. “I’m telling you, Bugel took a bunch of nothings . . . if you had seen Joe Jacoby when we signed him--Jacoby was embarrassing. He was just a big stiff guy, and Bugel really made him into something.”

Bugel, who has moved on to become the head coach of the Cardinals, assembled the “Hogs” in 1982, and the Redskins went on to win the Super Bowl that year.

Tampa Bay here we come.

“Gibbs believes in a close-knit group,” Thompson said. “I don’t know what you would call him: a great communicator; a leader of people; or something. I don’t know what it is, but he’s got the right touch to bring a group of ‘slugs’ together.”

Slugs. Stiffs. Lugs. Walking dead men. Pushovers. Oafs. You name them, and we’ve called them it, and we’ve played right into Gibbs’ motivational plans.

“Football is not what I do with these guys,” Gibbs said. “I make them feel better about themselves. Their self-esteem is my job.”

After all that was said and written this exhibition season about these dead weights, the Reconstruction of the South was nothing compared to what Gibbs had to do to rebuild this line’s psyche.

“We’re kind of like a sharing group,” Gibbs said. “We’re a lot like a group from Alcoholics Anonymous or your local hug group from church. We share and it’s very personal, and we don’t let other people into that.”

In Denver, Gibbs took a similar group of lost souls and molded them into a sturdy wall in front of John Elway.

So sturdy that it allowed the Broncos to advance to the Super Bowl a la the Washington Redskins with players such as Dave Studdard, Keith Bishop and Paul Howard, who were on their way out of the game.

“It was a different kind of system in Denver,” Gibbs said. “We were a trapping, draw, less power and more pushing into people team, sliding around and doing fake plays. We had to make it that way because we didn’t have big, strong backs.

“So theirs was more a mental thing than it was a physical thing. These guys have been able to combine both and they are really playing rough and tough. They are really banging people.”

And Gibbs is yelling.

“They have trouble with that, too,” he said.

Doesn’t the emphasis on self-esteem come in direct conflict with Gibbs’ sideline verbal bashings?

“There is a war-zone time that everything is kind of forgiven,” Gibbs said. “That occurs on Sunday. Our moms and our girlfriends and wives would not understand what goes on in our world.

“We’re not proud of it. We’re not pleased with it and the public could never understand it. And we will not be that way in other parts of our lives. It’s nasty . . . but during the week we joke, we’re buddies. We drink, we go out together, they’re in my home.”

Like a speed reading course, whatever, it works.

“I’m teaching the same stuff everyone else is teaching,” Gibbs said, “because I’m stealing all mine from every guy I’ve ever worked for. I don’t have any secrets.

“I’m just making them feel better about themselves, and when I push them for a better performance and harder effort, they respond. They respond because of them, not because of me. I work for them; they don’t work for me.”

Sure, it’s like we were saying this preseason, all we needed to do was give these behemoths some confidence.

Unless the team’s 45-man roster is ravaged by a deadly disease, Eric Floyd does not figure to be here when the regular season begins.

And we weren’t alone . . .

“We were at a point with Pinky Floyd that we didn’t care if he came back this year,” Beathard said. “And here now I look and think that was a really dumb mistake, because here’s a kid eager to learn. He probably never had anybody that coached him like this. Alex has drilled him, gotten on him, and he’s been critical of him, and at same time he knows how to give encouragement.

“This is a great kid. And he’s going to be a really good football player. He’s not just a guy to get by with. I think he’s going to end up being our left guard.”

We knew that.

“If a person hasn’t improved himself, you can only speculate on what he can do,” said Floyd, who made his fifth start of the season last week at left tackle. “I hadn’t played, I hadn’t really gotten a chance to show my potential. But once I got it, I didn’t blow it. Thank God for that, because it could have gone the other way and the critics could have been right.”

In going out of their way to prove the critics wrong, the Chargers’ offensive line has turned around this team’s season.

They are playing “bully ball” for the benefit of Butts, Bernstine and Tolliver. Their power running game has taken the heat off Tolliver. It has allowed Butts and Bernstine to control the ball, and as a result, keep the defense off the field.

“To me it’s been the brightest area offensively from an improvement standpoint,” quarterbacks coach Ted Tollner said, “Because we can stay in games with the style that we have to use right now until we grow enough that we can do more things.”

Thompson and Richards have paved the way for steady gains on the right side of the line, while Courtney Hall has gone where the action is from his left guard post.

Floyd, Leo Goeas and Joel Patten have blended their abilities at left tackle, and rookie Frank Cornish has hung tough at center.

“Gibbs has done a tremendous job, and they as a group are taking great pride in what they are accomplishing,” Tollner said. “And that gives you a chance. That group has given us a chance to have an offensive identity. That’s being physical, and tough, and aggressive, and we’re going to run the football.”

That’s just what we expected all along.

“It only takes one game,” Richards said, “and we’ll be getting criticized again.”

Oui, oui.