Howdy folks,
Here's some updates and news from around the web.
Some good news for the Jags, it turns out that Middle Linebacker Mike Peterson's knee injury is just a mild sprain and, as Jaguars .com reports , should have him in the starting lineup for the season opener against Dallas. Mike's a solid MLB, so having him healthy is a big deal.
Some of our other injured players are returning to practice this week, though I highly doubt DT monster Marcus Stroud (heel) or 1st round TE Marcades Lewis (high ankle sprain) will see any time against Atlanta.
Speaking of Marcades Lewis, SI.com's Peter King had this to say...
Special Teams guru and backup Safety Nick Sorenson returned to practice today, as did undrafted ( and awesome ) linebacker Brian Iwuh.
Iwuh suffered from a Hip Pointer. What is a Hip pointer? emedx.com says
And now you know, and knowing is half the battle!
There is a great community of Jaguar fans out there on the web at Jagnation.com. These guys made a for fans/by fans site that really shows what passionate folks can do with a little motivation. This ain't no homer city either, as this critique of the Tampa Bay game shows.
I found one part of this article especially accurate
I tend to agree with this statement. Jacksonville is still a newbie to the NFL game. A lot of fans are learning about pro football on the fly after decades of Gator Bowls. I think a lot of the blame for this misguided understanding comes from the 24 hour news cycle propagated by the ESPN networks. For having a 24 hour network, they only show the huge pass plays and deep balls. Watch some Colt highlights, you'll see Peyton do a sick play action to a deep Reggie Wayne, but the don't show the 20 previous plays where they did a standard ole run play to set it up. Jack Del Rio is not a throw the ball deep guy, he's a Run the Ball Stop the Run coach. That's the sort of game we play. It's not the most TV friendly offense in the world, but it wins games.
Del Rio's obvious frustration with the Greg Jones injury reflects this mindset. Jones is a big pounder with really quick feet. I'd go so far as to say that Del Rio prefers Jones' style to Fred's. Greg hits the hole hard and runs with serious power. Losing him to a torn ACL defiantly hurts the Jags backfield.
Ok, that's all I got for now,
-Chris