Luft’s Locker Room

Posts Tagged ‘Dallas Cowboys’

This was written to the AP story, Goodell says expanded NFL season good for quality over at The Sporting News.  It has caused quite a stir.  Here is my opinion:

Yes, the 17th game at a neutral or semi neutral sight [like Toronto for the Bills]. The NFL is a multi-billion dollar game that is looking for expanded markets. Here in the good old US of A they own the market, so why not get some of the pounds, euros, yen, etc. coming this way? We import oil, why not export football and get money flowing back?

“Bills owner Ralph Wilson Jr. had petitioned the league to play one home game in Toronto to strengthen its Canadian fan base.”

I read that and wondered if the Vikings might go north of the border for their 17th game of the season for the same reason? Say roll up to Winnipeg and play in the Blue Bombers stadium and strengthen our Canadian fan base. It sounds like a good plan plus would provide more opportunity for the fans up in North Dakota and northern Minnesota to see a game.

And just to keep things fair, the Seachickens could head up to Vancouver to play in the BC Lions’ stadium. That would give three NFL teams international homes away from home and would build up there Canadian fan bases.

You can have Dallas with a game in Mexico City, San Francisco can play in China or Japan. East coast teams can go to Europe, etc…

The talk is of expanding the season to 17 regular season games for each team, with one of them being played overseas, outside the US (Canada and Mexico). For those teams not going overseas, use some neutral site like a 100,000 seat college stadium halfway between two arch rivals. The idea is to spread the love of the game and subsequently increase the fan base, resulting in a growth in the sport and in revenues.

In my opinion this is a great idea! The only drawback is that as of the thinking now, the 17 game will replace one preseason game, cutting the preseason schedule to 3 games. Many people complain that the preseason is too long anyway.

The only game lost would be that one home preseason contest every other year. The season ticket holders buy 10 games now will complain that they only get 9 in the off years. They complain already about paying full price for preseason games where the starters may not even play and definitely mean nothing in the standings. Simple, for the cost of expanding, the clubs only charge for 9 games on the 9 home game season. They can also sweeten the pot by giving preference if the fan want to go to the “overseas” location or discounts on merchandise, complimentary Sunday Ticket or something. They can gift their season ticket holders with something special that could make the fan happy, yet still get the revenue increase from full 80 to 110 thousand seated stadiums and the increased merchandise sales from those new fans will more than make up for that once every other year loss of a preseason game.

This is the greatest sport ever invented, so why not make it even greater?

Our good friend, Anthony Hall over at Vikings War Cry today doesn’t think Tarvaris falls into the “china doll” category, but wonders if he is one of those players that everything must be 100% before he steps back onto the field.

I’ve wondered if he has a low [football-wise] threshold for pain. Then I think, “How could he, he’s a quarterback and they take all sorts of abuse since day 1 in Pop Warner.”

I’m not so convinced that he falls into the, “I’ve got to be 100%” category either. He did play last year [though not well] with the groin injury healing. But that should be a playable injury. A pulled groin as long as it is stretched and warmed up well will allow a player to play.

There were 3 injuries causing him to miss 4 games last year, groin, thumb and concussion. He missed at least 1 game each time.

Maybe Childress is pushing him to play Saturday against the Steelers, to get him over that mental hump and see that he can play with minor injuries like this the sprain, even all season if necessary. It will be interesting to see and if T-Jack ends up earning the reputation of being fragile or if this is just a recurrent stretch of the injury bug.

As well as Jackson has played so far this preseason, and you have to admit he has been sharp, I don’t think scratching him from playing against the Steelers or even the Cowboys will hurt his performance on Monday night the 8th against the Packers and their “fragile” quarterback. I also think, that getting ready to play Saturday is not necessarily a bad thing either and may build that confidence Childress is looking for.

For the rest of the sick and wounded, getting an update takes scouring the web. Head coach Brad Childress has said many time that he doesn’t have to report injuries in the preseason. He is already into the full blown secretive mind-game playing mode of an NFL head coach. So, here is what I was able to pick up as of today.

As of 20 Aug:

sick, restricted, held back and healing:

FS Madieu Williams (neck) Probably back about week 3 or 4.
OT Drew Radovich (dislocated left shoulder) limited practice today.
DE Brian Robison (leg) ready for last preseason game or week 1; was stretching and doing footwork drills today.
TE Garrett Mills (ankle) he can run in a straight line, it is when he cuts that it causes pain. After seeing the specialist again, they are saying it should be just a few more days.
WR Bernard Berrian (turf toe right foot) doing pool work – may miss the Steelers game.
WR Sydney Rice (stomach virus – same as Birk’s last week)
C John Sullivan (concussion)
OT Tim Mattran (ankle)
QB Tarvaris Jackson (sprained right knee) limited.
PUP list:

None
IR:

DE Kenechi Udeze (leukemia)
LB Heath Farwell (knee)
DE Jayme Mitchell (knee)
OG Mike Jones (unknown, still)
DT Kenderick Allen (hand/wrist)

Possibly hurt:

No rumors
Back to work:

OT Marcus Johnson (knee) returned to practice today.

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.”