The Bryant McKinnie saga that played out Tuesday at the Under Armour Performance Center and across the Twitterverse — is the left tackle on the team or isn’t he? — underscored what has been one pretty constant storyline throughout training camp: The Ravens offensive line remains a pretty substantial question mark.
McKinnie, at 6-foot-8 and 354 pounds (officially), just happens to be the largest of them.
Remember, this line returned four starters from last year. Find a replacement for the departed Ben Grubbs — admittedly a sizable task — and things are all set. Except it hasn’t gone quite that smoothly.
Jah Reid was thought to be an internal candidate to replace Grubbs, but he was sidelined most of training camp by a calf injury. Veteran Bobbie Williams, 35, crossed enemy lines, joining the Ravens from the Bengals, and was expected to slide into that left guard role. But he’s been slowed while recovering from off-season ankle surgery.
Rookie Kelechi Osemele could move into the starting left guard spot, except it appeared that he might be needed to play right tackle. That, of course, was if Michael Oher, the right tackle, had to move to the left side to replace McKinnie, who as of noon yesterday appeared to be on the way out of town.
