FSU Football gets big body of need with OL grad transfer

FSU football continues to go after maybe the biggest position of need in the program’s history with another lineman they saw recently.

By now, the cat is out of the bag that the FSU football team is in desperate need of help to change what took place last year with what may have arguably been the worst offensive line in not just the history of the program but maybe the entire sport of college football – heck, at times it looked like five people from the stands would have blocked better.

Since the end of the 2018 season, head coach Willie Taggart has made it clear that the position would be addressed – doing so during the early signing period by bringing in several recruits including JuCo star Jay Williams and several high school talents that included four star recruit Dontae Lucas.

Now, FSU football has another warm body to trot out there in 2019 with the news that Ryan Roberts, a grad transfer who played the first part of his career with the Northern Illinois Huskies, will head down to Tallahassee for his final season of football.

Now, I get that he isn’t the second coming of Walter Jones or any of the great former Noles who have played on the line – as he started just 10 games for the Huskies over the last two seasons – but Roberts coming in has plenty of benefits for Taggart and the entire program.

First off, he’s a big body at 6’6″ and nearly 300 lbs. who has the length to compete with athletic defensive ends across the ACC and at other programs on the schedule for the Seminoles next season that include Boise State and Florida.

Much of the press about Roberts so far has been that in this year’s game between Northern Illinois and the Noles, he held All-American defensive end Brian Burns to just three tackles and essentially kept him away from even sniffing the quarterback the entire game. To me, anyone who can do that must be doing something right.

Second of all – and we’re all friends here, so we can be honest – the offensive line for the Seminoles was beyond desperation mode at this point, so getting another player in can’t hurt at all. If Roberts is average as a player, it’s a one year flyer that doesn’t hurt because quite frankly it really can’t get much worse that what we saw last season.

FSU football is still looking to bring in several more lineman during the February signing period, so there will at least be plenty of options this coming season for Taggart and whoever the offensive line coach ends up being.