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Out of the box: The regular season is here, ladies and gentlemen start your engines, the Redskins travel up the road to New York for an afternoon division clash to get it started in 2009.
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The story so far: Preseason is over, final cuts are in, the practice squad is formed, the depth chart is established, the schedule is reviewed. The Redskins are Jason Campbell's team. Let's play some football.
For the second season in a row the Redskins open the season at New York, last season was in primetime, a game that in retrospect does not look so bad, Washington hopes to show improvement everywhere, at quarterback, at the receiving positions, on defense and on special teams. The opposing New York Giants though will not be rolling over, Washington is 1-5 against the Giants over the past three seasons, these guys have Washington's number.
New faces: Albert Haynesworth is now the black hole around which the Redskins defense rotates. Marcus Mason is now the Redskins third, oops fourth tailback, Malcolm Kelly is the starting wideout opposite Santana Moss. Stephon Heyer is the new right tackle, Brian Orakpo is your new strongside linebacker slash defensive.
Old faces: Phillip Daniels is back from a season ending ACL injury last season, Derrick Dockery is back where he belongs at left guard after two seasons in Buffalo, Renaldo Wynn is back as a reserve defensive end after two seasons with other teams. For the entire 2009 season, the part of Shawn Springs will be played by DeAngelo Hall which is good because Shawn missed a number of performances anyway.
What it all winds up, or so we would hope, is a better defense, and the defense last season was pretty damn good, better mastery of the offense by Jason Campbell and well, just better Redskins football.
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Curly R aside: Much ado about nothing: as much as I would like to think practice squad signee former Giants quarterback Andre Woodson will give the Redskins the keys to winning this game, the fact is the Redskins probably have more just from scouting as they could get from Andre. And while everyone is wringing hands about the Redskins signing a Giants player right before the season opener, it went less noticed that the Giants signed former Redskins fullback Nehemiah Broughton (op. cit.), he was with the team four years, from 2005 to 2008. So everyone let's just STFU and play football KTHX.
Curly R aside continues: Head coach Jim Zorn listens to The Orb? That means we have similar tastes in music, awsum.
Curly R aside still continues: Anyone notice anything different around here? No dummy look up.
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Oppo research: That Super Bowl after the 2007 season must seem like a long time ago for Giants fans, in this preseason and training camp the Giants gave quarterback Eli Manning a huge contract, saw former receiver Plaxico Burress go to jail, released Super Bowl hero David Tyree and defensive end Osi Umenyiora came back from a knee injury that sidelined him for the entire 2008 season, prompting the Giants to beg like a little kid for retired defensive end Michael Strahan to come back for one more year. Osi's first order of business in 2009 camp? Get in a spat with new defensive coordinator Bill Sheridan and walk out of practice. He has since apologized (op. cit.) but it makes one wonder if that team will seriously miss former defensive coordinator and new Rams head coach Steve Spagnuolo.
That said this is still a loaded team and it is never easy to play them. As ever the Redskins will not only need to execute, they are going to need the Giants to make some mistakes, Washington is not good when opening the season against NFC Beast division rivals.
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Trainer's table: No injuries (op. cit.), even cornerback Carlos Rogers' calf is better, or so the injury report tells us. We will be watching Carlos as the game progresses.
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Gameplan: ITS THE GIANTS LINE EM UP AND KNOCK EM SOME HEADS. Seriously, what do you need to know about this gameplan?
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My take in 60 words or less: With everyone healthy there is no reason not to bring it, let's hear some pads popping, this is a great opponent to start with, go and get that season opening loss last season back.
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Washington Post interactive gameday, roster & lineup, keys to the game, key matchups, NFL preview. Broadcast coverage, geographically most of the nation will be watching this game.
This is a gameday open thread.
NFL helmet logos from here.
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