Oli Udoh got 1st team snaps at Right Tackle; Allen: “LG & RT are still open. Penning is progressing but Udoh will get a look at RT.”

St. Widge said
I took his post as could have done more to be prepared in case Penning wasn't ready to play RT this year. They could not have known last year was it for Ram until late last season at the earliest. That being said, they have known that Ram has a degenerative knee condition for several years so they knew it was coming at some point they just didn't know it would be this year. But, I agree this is why you don't draft a guy like Spears who has a limited shelf life that could end at any time.

But, for example, they could have signed an average vet RT in free agency this year for Penning to compete with for the job so that at worst you have an average starter at RT. And the time to do that was a few days to a week into free agency. Or they could have taken another Tackle in the draft by using some of their picks to move up in a deep OT draft. I'm not sure that guy is out there right now unless there is a trade available.

To be fair, I'm not sure who that average vet RT was, but I suspect there were better players than Udoh available earlier in free agency since Udoh is really more of swing guy that can adequately play Guard and Tackle rather than a real RT.

I think ( and let me know if you agree) that our OL issues really began before the 22 season. I'll leave Marrone out because you know my feelings on him. It started with the ridiculous pursuit of Watson from the Texans. From what I have been able to gather that prolonged pursuit of him prevented us from resigning Armstead. He wanted to come back but because we were not able to make him a legit offer due to Watson stringing us along TA signed with Miami.
In 21 out OL was Armstead, Peat, McCoy, Ruiz and Ram. How would you like to have that OL right now? the fault of not resigning TA rests solely on the FO, in no way should we have been chasing Watson and thank all the stars in heaven he went with Cleveland.
That put us in scramble mode @ LT. So we draft Penning, I'm not going to debate if we should have drafted him other than to say he was drafted just about where almost EVERY mock/ scout said he should be.
What I think we got wrong is that EVERYONE knew that TP was not pro-ready especially in pass-pro to start day one. What we should have done was sign a decent LT in FA ( and there were several available) to be a bridge starter @ LT until TP was ready, Which if he had been healthy maybe end of rookie yr or possibly yr 2. TP was thrust into the starting lineup WAY too early without having gotten hardly any work in his 1st season or the 2nd offseason.
22 was not a good yr for O linemen. While the Olave trade was fine to trade away future picks looking for quality OL especially OTs was not a wise choice. Almost every OL taken in the 1st 2-3 rds have been underwhelming, even the ones at the top part of the draft. We were most likely not going to find a ready to start OT in 22 the whole trade to get a 2nd 1st rd pick hurt us and not because we took TP but because it diminished our drafts for the next 2 yrs