Earlier this week I broke down TCU guard/center prospect Steve Avila as a possible option on the second day of the draft for the Washington Commanders. It’s possible that Avila could end up getting drafted before the Commanders’ second-round pick, however, so I figured I’d take a look at another center prospect that could fit what Washington needs on the interior of its offensive line. Wisconsin center Joe Tippmann is an intriguing prospect to me because he has links to the organization already.
This offseason, the Commanders hired Bobby Engram to be their wide receivers coach under Eric Bieniemy’s new offensive regime. While he’s now a receivers coach in Washington, Engram spent the 2022 season as the offensive coordinator of Wisconsin, where Tippmann was the starting center. So the Commanders should in theory have a strong idea of Tippmann’s character and ability thanks to the hire of Engram.
Tippmann isn’t only interesting due to his link to Washington though. He’s a good prospect in his own right. He’s perhaps a little taller than you’d ideally like a center to be at 6-foot-6 but is a good athlete for his size, weighing in at 313 pounds at the combine back in February. Those measurements are actually very similar to Nick Gates (listed at 6-foot-5, 312 pounds) who the Commanders just signed in free agency. Like Gates, Tippmann’s athleticism is a stand out trait that is noticeable right away.
This play against Ohio State is a great example of Tippmann’s athletic ability in the run game. Wisconsin fake a run to the left and have Tippmann pull from his center position with the fullback following him to the right. Tippmann gets to the edge and locks onto his target, a smaller defensive back in space. These can appear like easy blocks but in actuality, it’s quite tough for an offensive lineman to reach and engage with smaller, more agile defensive backs in space. Tippmann does a great job closing the gap and initiating contact, getting his hands on the defender. It’s also noteworthy that he doesn’t just lunge and throw his body at the defender, expecting his size to just overpower him. Instead he uses technique to get his hands on the defender and block him correctly, forcing him out towards the sideline before shoving him over.
Unfortunately on that play, the rest of the blocking scheme didn’t hold up, but Tippmann did his part and did it very well. Having that type of athleticism from the center position opens up all sorts of run schemes from the offense. That play against Ohio State was like a counter scheme, but very rarely do you see counter run with a center instead of a guard. Being able to pull the center instead of the guard can mess with the run keys a defense has. Because of that, Wisconsin made use of Tippmann’s athleticism to pull quite a lot.
This time we see Wisconsin run a sweep play, with both Tippmann and the right guard pulling to the edge. The right guard does a nice job kicking out the defender on the edge, which leaves Tippmann to follow and wrap around for the trailing linebacker. Tippmann does just that, reaching the linebacker while also giving the defensive lineman a nudge on the way past to help out his teammate. Once he engages with the linebacker, Tippmann gets play side of him and seals him off inside, giving the running back a clear path to the edge.
As I mentioned in the Avila post earlier this week, having a center that’s capable of pulling to the edge opens up a lot of options not just in the run game, but also in the play-action game. Having another lineman that can pull is just another run key for the defense to read, and having one that doesn’t typically pull can help make the play-action fake that much more effective.
This play came against Purdue after a number of different run schemes that involved Tippmann pulling. Finally Wisconsin attempted to hit them with a play-action. Tippmann pulls to the left side of the line, which makes him responsible for the defender rushing off the edge. He has no issues pulling and getting in position quickly to pick up the block, despite the defender having an opportunity to burst up the field having initially been left unblocked. However, the fake plays into that because once the defender spots Tippmann pulling, he starts to read run and slows down his rush, allowing Tippmann to absorb the rush and win the block before the defender can transition back into a pass rush.
On top of Tippmann making the block, you can see the impact of him pulling had on the linebacker to that side. Linebacker 37 bit up heavily on the run fake despite the running back immediately abandoning any fake hand off to pick up a blitzer off the edge. Having that pulling center is such a strong run key that the linebacker bit up anyway. That left a huge gap behind him for the crossing tight end, but unfortunately the quarterback didn’t spot him in time before pressure arrived from the other side of the line.
Tippmann’s athleticism makes him a strong option as a puller and in the zone scheme. However, he does have a slight weakness in the run game. He’s not great at maintaining downblocks, which is something he’d need to do often in any type of gap scheme system.
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