Pre Season Finale

As the end of the preseason approaches teams are narrowing down the cuts in order to get down to 53.

What position battle is still in a dead heat besides the Mare Coutu saga?

You might have guessed it already; its the very heated WR battle. Now for the 5th spot.

Courtney Taylor and Ben Obamanu are in a close heat for the 5th and final WR spot on the 53 man roster.

John Morgan over at Fieldgulls has a great little write up on this pointing out a number of factors that add pzazz to this battle. I especially like the direct comparisons he references...

"Both receivers have positives and negatives. Taylor is most recently healthy, but Obomanu's injury was fluky and he owns better overall health. Obomanu has been with the team longer, but Taylor is better integrated into the offense. Obomanu has more experience as a returner, but Taylor is the better gunner. Taylor is better insurance for Deion Branch, but Obomanu is better insurance for Nate Burleson." 

John Morgan is doing great things with screen shots to help the non football laden with terminolgy and offense and defensive packages.

Ben Obamanu and Courtney Taylor both need to step up their game tomorrow night in order to make this squad. I think we shall see a lot of them against the Raiders defense. As JM points out, Seneca did not practice this week so Mike Teel should be taking the bulk of snaps under center. Matt Hasselbeck may play a series or two but, in my opinion, Mora should bench him for this game. I don't see any reason why Matt needs to play other than to stay loose. We as fans don't want to have a repeat of last year when Hasselbeck went down with what was thought to be a knee injury at the time but ended up being a bulging disc in his back, effectively destroying Hasselbecks season. In addition, when Hasselbeck was believed to be healthy, he wasn't and Holmgren played Matt ultimately making his injury worse. So, most likely with Teel slinging the pigskin tomorrow we should see plenty of Taylor and Obamanu as they try to relive that team mate rivalry they shared together at Auburn. These two Tigers turned Hawks should be flying all over the field. Should be fun to watch. END.