Texas A&M football's offensive shift demonstrates why OL improvement is so vital

Texas A&M football fans were ready for a big change after six years of Jimbo Fisher's offense. When it was announced that Mike Elko would be taking up the mantle of head coach, the Aggie faithful watchfully anticipated the announcement of his offensive coordinator— whoever that would be.

There were a lot of names thrown around, but the hire eventually ended up being Collin Klein, known mostly to Aggie fans as the guy who finished runner-up to Johnny Football in the Heisman race in 2012. However, he was also one of the most highly-sought-after coordinators in the sport, and had turned down several big time jobs to remain at Kansas State.

Elko was able to pull him away from his alma mater, however, and bring him in to begin an overhaul of the Aggie offense. This overhaul certainly ended up making the offense look a lot different, but as you might expect, there was still no shortage of complaints about this or that.

Klein's run-heavy scheme for Texas A&M football will pay dividends with improved OL play

The reality is that Klein's innovative run scheme had the Aggie offense improving by leaps and bounds over the course of the season, especially compared to what had come beforehand and even more especially when you consider what he had to work with. The chart below showcases just how much the Aggies increased their share of runs as opposed to last year:

This would not have been effective without some huge improvement up front— which is exactly what Texas A&M football fans saw out of the team. Through some key transfers and the efforts of Adam Cushing, the Aggies became a far better run blocking team than they had been previously— this was seen in no more stark light than in the Florida game and the second half of LSU.

The Aggies are set to improve even more, as a matter of fact:

The experience that Adam Cushing will be able to leverage, combined with Klein's scheme, will make the Aggies one of the best rushing teams in the entire nation this upcoming year. If they can control the line of scrimmage and generate some explosive pass plays with their new corps of receivers, then this will be one of the most lethal overall offenses in the nation.