Bengals Film Breakdown: Analyzing Orlando Brown's Strengths and Weaknesses Following Blockbuster Signing in Free Agency

Cincinnati signed Brown to a four-year, $64 million contract.

Author:
Mike Santagata
Publish date:
Mar 17, 2023 9:06 AM EDT

In this story:

On paper, Orlando Brown Jr. is the best offensive tackle to play for the Bengals since Andrew Whitworth. He’s a highly unorthodox offensive tackle that wins due to his size and length creating a massive margin for error.

At 6-8, 363 pounds, Brown is a massive unit at left tackle, making him both figuratively and literally the biggest signing for the Bengals in free agency this year.

The Positives in Pass Protection

There are essentially three ways to defeat a tackle in pass protection. The defender can go around them, inside of them, or through them. Due to Brown’s length and strength, it’s very difficult to run through him.

At his mammoth size, Brown is very effective at taking away the defender’s ability to run through them. Most of the defenders that attempt to run through him are stuck pumping their feet and pushing into a brick wall.

Brown knows that he's very effective at taking away power from the defense and even allows some guys to go into his chest so that he can use his strength and power to become an immovable object.

Watch on this play how Brown purposefully keeps his hands wide and allows the defender to come into him. He then lowers his anchor to take on the power rush and finishes with a Hamilton maneuver to remove the long arm and make the defender fall down. Speaking of his Hamilton maneuver, it’s something he showed multiple times last year as a defense against long arm techniques.

Against the Chargers and Khalil Mack, he showed that this was just a part of his repertoire. This technique from Brown is designed to lift the arm of the defender who is trying to use a long arm bull rush.

By taking away the arm, Brown effectively ends the rush for the defender as they have lost all power and are up close making it difficult to have a counter move. Brown’s hands are one of the better areas of his pass protection to go with his anchor. His length and power makes his punch very effective when it lands. He has the ability to stop a rush entirely with one swing of his hands.

Brown’s punch is extremely strong and will move defenders when he can land it. When you consider how long he is, it becomes fairly difficult to avoid taking on his powerful hands as he will attempt to make first meaningful contact.

Brown combines all of this physical talent with a very high football IQ and processing against stunts and movement up front. He had fantastic rapport with his left guard Joe Thuney in Kansas City when it came to picking up different stunts.

This ability to anticipate, communicate, and work with his teammates on stunts and games is something that will help second-year guard Cordell Volson as well.

Brown does a great job of staying inside-out on the defense, is extremely difficult to run through, and has high end length, strength, and intelligence. All of these abilities give him quite a bit of margin for error. He’s going to take away the defender’s options to run through him and to the inside on most plays, making them go the longest route around the outside.

There are plenty of positives, but he’s not a perfect player in pass protection.

Brown’s Issues In Pass Protection

Brown comes with some issues in pass protection. He’s essentially the definition of winning ugly at times. While there are no bonus points for looking good while winning, it does feel like a more repeatable way to pass block.

Brown simply does not remain balanced in his set and his footwork completely breaks down such as on this play.

This positioning is typically not a winning business model, but because of Brown’s length and strength, he can overcome that. On one hand, Brown has been playing long enough that this is just who he is. He’s going to do this type of stuff in pass protection and there is probably not much chance that he corrects it.

On the other hand, he’s winning while doing this. He has a long pattern of being a high end left tackle while still doing this type of stuff in pass protection meaning that this is most likely repeatable for him. However, at times, he does have issues with his base in pass protection. He allows his base to get too narrow and he puts all of his weight on one foot and then the other. Because he does not keep his weight on the midline, does not stay balanced, and does not keep a consistent base, a well timed strike will knock him off balance.

These instances of losing balance to the defender typically require a very well timed and placed strike to take advantage of Brown’s weight distribution and base in pass protection. If he is struck just as his base is too tight, then he had some issues staying upright and taking on those pass rushers. There’s not much that a team can do to help him out with this. This gives defenders a glimmer of hope when it comes to running through Brown. If he is knocked off-balance, then he is giving up that straight line path to the quarterback. The main way that defenses were able to win against Brown was around his outside.

This is how a lot of Brown’s losses occur. He is unable to take away the outside and a defender will run the hoop for a pressure or hit on the quarterback. There are plenty of instances where Brown is able to push them beyond the pocket, but if the defender has good bend, then they typically give him trouble. He’s just not athletic or technically sound enough with his feet to protect the outside against speed rushes.

Relying on length and strength instead to attempt to push those players around the outside. These areas are keeping him from entering the cream of the crop offensive tackles in pass protection and they are common enough that the Bengals will need to look to the Chiefs to see how they helped him out.

How The Chiefs Minimized His Shortcomings In Pass Protection

The Chiefs had Brown for two years and by the end of it, they knew how to help him out so that he can have his outside protected. With his outside protected, defenders have to try to run through Brown or to his inside, which are the two paths to the quarterback that he does a great job of protecting. There are two main ways that the Chiefs schemed up Brown’s shortcomings.

To help him with his limited athleticism, when he was on the open side of plays (no tight end attached) they would give him a wider split than everyone else. This is also what the Bengals did with La’el Collins last year to make sure that his limited athleticism did not become an issue.

Orlando Brown extra wide split on open side

This extra wide split makes the rusher have to widen out even more. The edge rusher’s alignment is typically going to be based off of the tackle’s positioning when there is no tight end to his side. With the wider split, that moves the end out further away from the quarterback and Brown moves potentially closer to them. It becomes more difficult to play extra wide for the defense.

The Chiefs also would send running backs off of his outside or align the tight end just outside of him often.

These plays essentially create a funnel for the defense that forces them to attempt to go through or inside of Brown. The alignment of the tight end really limits the defender’s get-off so that they cannot fly up field and challenge Brown around the outside.

While they typically did not ask the running back to block the end with Brown, they would send him around the outside and ask him to give some late chip help at times.

This again helps against a defender who wants to fly up field and then bend around the edge to get to the quarterback. It just creates a funnel into Brown by creating obstacles for the defense to attempt to go through if they want to challenge him around the outside. It would behoove the Bengals to follow these methods and force defenses to play into Brown’s strengths rather than to allow opponents to challenge his weaknesses.

Run Blocking

Brown is able to move defenders with ease in the run game. When he lands his hands on the defender he has overwhelming power. His strengths and weaknesses in the run game are fairly similar to what he provides as a pass protector. He has great power and intelligence, but his lack of athleticism holds him back at times.

When it comes to his power it helps in two ways. The first is that he can drive guys all by his own and move them wherever he wants.

This is fairly rare strength for an offensive tackle and one of the best attributes to Brown’s game.

Offensive line coaching legend Howard Mudd once said that you’re generally looking for stalemates in the run game. Both sides are evenly powerful so you try to stalemate your one on one blocks while getting movement on the double teams. Brown is able to provide movement with his one-on-one blocks however and that is something the Bengals can utilize.

His strength also helps him on double teams. He does a good job of working with his adjacent teammates at driving defenders on these double teams.

These double teams and his strength as a run blocker are a big reason why he works out very well as a schematic fit for the Bengals' shotgun power/gap run game.

He does a great job at displacing defenders vertically and trying to move them. His issues come from being asked to do athletic feats such as reach blocking a 3-technique on the backside of wide zone. Luckily for him, the Bengals have pretty much scrapped the wide zone concept from their playbook.

Instead he will be asked to move guys vertically more often on power and gap schemes. He also will most likely be asked to block tight/inside zone, but that generally moves more vertically than it does laterally for the Bengals. His run blocking is better than his pass blocking in my opinion and should be a welcome change at the left tackle spot.

Overall, Brown is a schematic fit for the run game and will provide something that the Bengals did not have before in that area. He is familiar with an offense that throws the ball early and often coming from the Chiefs so while he has some shortcomings there, he’s still a solid pass protector and the Bengals can take steps to help him out.

If the Bengals follow the Chiefs blueprint on how to best utilize Brown, then they will have a steal of a signing.

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