Luft’s Locker Room

Reports have it that the MRI results on Tarvaris Jackson came back with a right sprained medial collateral knee ligament.  The damage was supposedly done on the second hit, when Jackson was being brought to the ground.  The good news is that this injury is considered minor.  He will at least miss next week’s preseason game 3 against the Steelers, and to be safe, also the last preseason game against the Cowboys.  He will be ready for the opener in Green Bay on Monday Night September 8th.

Jackson has been extremely sharp in action to date and with the first two preseason games in the books is carrying over a 127 quarterback rating.  He’ll obviously be watching tons of film between now and then, and we’ll have a least a full week of practice after the Dallas game to get his his and body’s timing back and in sync with the rest of the team.

Access Vikings / ESPN

I had thought the damage was done with Ray Lewis’ hit. To me it looked like his left over extended when it hit the ground, kind of like when ground is a little further down than you thought and you land stiff legged already moving forward but your knee doesn’t want to bend that way. I was wrong…

It was the hit that took him to the ground or while he was on the ground and it was the right knee.

The rumble from the team is that this is minor and he will only have to sit out a week. Just happens to be, that week is week 3 of the preseason, the tradition dress rehearsal game for the season. This year it just happens to be against the Steelers who are coached by former Minnesota Vikings defensive coordinator Mike Tomlin. It would have been good to see how Jackson would have done against a coach that knew him.

Gus Frerotte will get the start and a chance to persuade any doubting Thomas’ that he is indeed the right man for the backup job and can still go out there against a good team and lead the Vikings to a win [at least as long as Childress has him in the game]. Then again against Dallas if T-Jack is still sitting at that time.

It also gives more opportunity for the #3 and #4 quarterbacks to cement management’s decision on whether to keep Bollinger and try to slide Booty to the practice squad [a move that failed and lost Tyler Thigpen to the Chiefs last year] or release Brooks Bollinger.

Would Brooks be picked up by another team or would his career as a player be done? If the answer is the later, I hope that he goes into coaching and hopefully as an intern with the Vikes, he has the lineage and skills for it.

For now, we wait and see how long Jackson will miss action. It is not quite the bruise that coach Childress had claimed last night, but it looks like it won’t impact the season either. Every day it will now run through Tarvaris’ mind what the coaches and other players were saying, “protect yourself and stay healthy so you can lead the team.”

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