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Sunday, July 29, 2007

Goal line ending

Mike Tomlin called the troops together before the final session of Sunday afternoon's practice. As has been the case throughout this camp, we’re not quite sure what to expect in these situations. In this instance, he was calling the boys together to let them know to keep things clean in their final drill - goal line.

Setting up at the 2, the first-team offense tried a dive by Willie Parker. He was stuffed cold by nose tackle Casey Hampton for no gain.

On the second attempt, the pitch went to Parker, running left, who made it into the end zone untouched.

Next, it was Najeh Davenport’s turn. He took the handoff off right tackle and was stopped intially by the duo of Ryan Clark and Ike Taylor – high and low – before the rest of the defense came in to clean things up.

Hampton made the big move after that, switching over to offense, where he lined up at fullback in front of Davenport. The play went behind right guard and Hampton hit the hole full speed, running into linebacker Clint Kriewaldt. It was a wasted effort as Davenport was stopped at the 1.

After that, it was defensive end Brett Keisel’s turn to line up with the other side. Keisel set up on next to left tackle and ran a drag across the end zone and Batch lofted a pass that Keisel hauled in along the back line with two defenders in tow.

With the defense ahead three stops to two scores, the next play went to Carey Davis. Davis took the pitch to the right, but was stopped by Rian Wallace and William Gay at the 1.

James Harrison missed practice today with what Tomlin deemed a rib injury. Interestingly enough, instead of moving Arnold Harrison into the starting lineup, the team decided instead to move Clark Haggans to right outside linebacker and insert LaMarr Woodley in at left outside linebacker.

6 comments:

  1. Guess Tomlin's staying true to his comment about moving people out of their comfort zones... Big Snack at FB definitely fits that bill, although it will (hopefully) never happen in a real game. At least Keisel running routes makes some sense, as it seems to work alright in NE with Vrabel....

    I was hoping for some information on Russell when I saw the headline. Did he not receive any reps in the drill?

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  2. I believe during Tomlin's tenure with TB they had Sapp line up on offense, so this does not surprise me.

    It seems like alot of players are in a fit due to the hard work, and a good amount of injuries too.

    Last year it seemed like they were underconditioned, so the fact Tomlin has them working hard is a breath a fresh air.

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  3. Russell did not get any goal line carries. Nor did Kevan Barlow, despite the fluff piece on him in the Post Gazette today. Readers of this blog know that Barlow has little chance of making this team. He's a bad guy, he tip-toes through the hole and he can't pass block. Other than that, he's great.

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  4. I gathered as much about Barlow from Wexell's article at SCI yesterday "Barlow's blues" If any of the FA or UDFA pickups outperform him (Davis, Russell, Croom) it's all for the better.

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  5. Anonymous6:15 PM

    Is this blog still going to be active throughout the rest of training camp? I always check in daily, but it has not been updated in over a week now. Just wondering, because I really enjoyed the inside scoop! Thanks!

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  6. Anonymous5:20 PM

    ruthlessberger:
    I kept checking for updates and was wondering what happened too. I just found out that the blog was moved to:
    http://nflfromthesidelines.blogspot.com

    ReplyDelete