Jacksonville Jaguars Training Camp 2010: Redemption Road

Earlier in the off season there were concerns about the Jacksonville Jaguars interior offensive line. It was a unit that many felt the team would address in the draft, but the team only selected one offensive player in the 2010 draft, and that was runningback Deji Karim.

The Jaguars traded for veteran offensive guard Justin Smiley during organized team activities and many thought that would put the pressure on guard Vince Manuwai. Early in camp there were concerns Manuwai still was not fully recovered from his knee injury in 2008, but once the pads went on, those worries disappeared.

For the second straight practice in full pads, Vince Manuwai looked just fine playing at the right guard spot with the first team unit. He had no trouble moving defenders off the ball when it was snapped. Vinny still has his hobble when he walks that initially I was trying to discern if it was just how Vinny walked, or if he was still favoring the knee.

Turns out, it's just how he walks.

As I mentioned before, so far in each full pads practice Vince Manuwai has looked just fine. Any talk of Manuwai not making the roster at this point is exceedingly pre-mature. Manuwai is set to make $3.5 million this season, and with the injury history of Justin Smiley and another veteran like Kynan Forney sitting out a few practices already, he's not too expensive to keep even as a back up. The Jaguars don't have the kind of depth on their line at this point to be parting ways with a player like Manuwai.

Manuwai didn't participate in the Oklahoma drills on Sunday night, but he's got a match up waiting for him according to head coach Jack Del Rio, "... he has somebody that's from his neighborhood that has requested an oppurtunity. So I'm going to honor that request. Mr. Vince Manuwai would like to welcome him."

The Good - Kassim Osgood

The past two days Osgood has looked better and better at wide receiver.  Today he made multiple plays that displayed his potential YAC ability as a wide receiver.

The Bad - Red Zone Defense

The practice concluded with quarterback Luke McCown hitting three touchdown passes in the redzone drill. He also forced Kirk Morrison into a pass interference call on tight end Zach Miller.

The Ugly - The Option

The team ran some option type plays today, using Zach Miller quite a bit under center. I'm sure everyone knows how much I hate the Wild Cat, but McCown running the option wasn't very pretty.

Quick Notes:

David Garrard was given a rest day today. The entire practice we were trying to figure out why he didn't have any pads on, but afterwards he informed the media that he was given a veteran rest day, the first in his 9 year career.

Third round pick D'Anthony Smith went down with an undisclosed ankle injury and carted off. It isn't believed to be serious, however.