George Fant about to make his second start, his first was promising

George Fant’s first start since he was in middle school wasn’t the disaster many predicted. He played well, but there is definitely room for improvement.

George Fant started at left tackle for the Seattle Seahawks last week. It was the college basketball players first start in a football game since he was in eighth grade. Quite surprisingly, the undrafted rookie didn’t embarrass himself out there.

Corbin Smith of the Legion of 12 Radio show put together a great video showing some of the positives and negatives from Fant’s first start. Smith concluded that the performance of fairly positive overall.

There are a couple of things that need to be added. A pair of the failed blocks shown here were great examples of Tom Cable not setting his players up to be successful. Asking the LT to reach block on a defender that’s lined up on the inside shoulder of the LG is a recipe for disaster.

This is one of the issues discussed earlier this week when I pointed out that Seattle’s coaches were part of the problem on offense. It is true that Fant didn’t execute the blocks correctly. It is also true that he never should have been asked to reach that far to make that block either.

I also think Smith undersells Fant’s performance in pass protection. Were there mistakes? definitely, but that isn’t the entire point that needs to be made here.

In my opinion Fant needs to be judged, not vs a Walter Jones-esque level or perfection, but against the performance of the guy he’s replacing. The context of Bradley Sowell’s ineptness shows us that Seattle’s offense wasn’t help back because of Fant’s pass blocking.

When I watched the coaches tape to study Fant’s performance, it was clear that Fant was not a downgrade from Sowell. He also wasn’t an upgrade, but Fant at least has upside.

Next: Seahawks week 9 DVOA preview

Overall, Fant’s performance last week was extremely promising. It wasn’t good, per se, but it was promising. The Seahawks need to use the rest of this season to see if perhaps Fant can become a long-term solution at offensive tackle.