I don’t know if I’ll be able to watch tonight’s game, as NFL preseason games are very much hit-and-miss for TV coverage (especially in Canada). It is likely to be even more sloppy for both teams than first preseason games usually are, due to the disruption through the lockout earlier this year. Both teams have new head coaches, new starting quarterbacks, drafted their respective “quarterback of the future” in the first round, and are still trying to sort out their playbooks. Due to the lockout, neither coach got the additional organized team activities before training camp that they would have been allowed to have in a normal year.
For the Vikings, one of the big question marks will be how well new left tackle Charlie Johnson will perform: he’s filling the very big shoes of Bryant McKinnie, who was cut from the team after arriving at camp nearly fifty pounds overweight and suffering from high cholesterol issues. Johnson is not a rookie — he spent the last couple of seasons protecting Peyton Manning’s blind side — but he looked distressingly vulnerable to pass rushes during training camp. It could be just that Jared Allen is having a great start to the year, or it could mean that the Colts got rid of Johnson because his skills were no longer sufficient for the job. If he doesn’t improve rapidly, the Vikings could end up starting Rhett Bomar as their quarterback for the regular season, due to accumulated blindside hits on Donovan McNabb, Joe Webb, and Christian Ponder.
McNabb is hoping to use this season to prove that last year was an just unlucky fluke and not the real McNabb. He’s signed for 2011 and will be a free agent next year. Christian Ponder, the Vikings’ first round draft pick, will be the third string quarterback for this game, and Joe Webb will be the second string. Although most pundits expect Ponder to move ahead of Webb on the depth chart, it’s still a tight race between the two.
Other changes include the replacement of Sidney Rice as number 1 wide receiver by Bernard Berrian (not a popular guy among the fanbase for his lack of production over the last two seasons) and the replacement of pass rusher Ray Edwards by Brian Robison (he’d backed up Edwards and signed a contract extension before the lockout).
The new coaching staff also means a change in the offensive play book: we’ve been told to expect a lot of two tight end sets to take advantage of the pass-catching abilities of Visanthe Shiancoe and second round pick Kyle Rudolph. The defence has less change, as the new defensive co-ordinator was with the team last year.
Tonight’s game will only feature the starting line-ups of the two teams for a couple of series, to be quickly followed by the second and third string players. Even the first quarter won’t be quality football, but expect the second half to be very sloppy indeed, as the players with only a faint chance of making their respective teams try to catch the eye of the coaches on big plays.
Update: Just checked in to Twitter, to see what the various Vikings media outlets are reporting. It’s halftime, with the score Titans 14, Vikings 0. McNabb came through fine, with some nice play in limited exposure. Berrian lived down to expectations by dropping a pass from McNabb. Asher Allen (starting for Antoine Winfield) was burned on the very first play from scrimmage. A fumble by Booker set up the first Titans score, and an interception of Webb (made worse by a holding call on Marcus Sherels) set up the second.
