Seahawks WR Branch will try to play Sunday
RENTON, Wash. -- Deion Branch had his knee reconstructed. Then came tedious, daily rehabilitation and aches of not being with his teammates.
Suddenly, he's pushing to see if he can play in the Seahawks' season opener Sunday -- seven months to the day he had the surgery that can take a year, or more, to overcome.
"It was refreshing, just to be back with the guys running around," Branch said Wednesday, cherishing a mini-milestone of catching passes out of a machine while in full pads for the first time since destroying the ACL in his left knee last January in a playoff loss at Green Bay.
Fighting through pain, doubt and frustration isn't the toughest thing Deion Branch has ever gone through. Not even close.
His son, Deiondre, a twin born premature at less than five pounds, contracted viral meningitis as an infant. Doctors told Branch his little boy would die in six months.
Deiondre is 7 years old now. The silent source of daily inspiration for the former Super Bowl MVP isn't able to talk or walk. He is able to make his Dad's eyes water and voice choke when Branch talks about him.
So this knee injury, which all of Seattle wants to end so Branch can return to save an ailing receiving corps, isn't such a huge deal to him.
"Yeah, he's going to have certain conditions the rest of his life. With the blessing of God he'll be able to walk one day, but he's not walking now," Branch said, with tears welling in his eyes. "He'll have certain conditions and such. He's doing good.
"That's my everything. That's my everything when I wake up. Thank God I'm able to do this, and I feel so helpless that my son can't do it. We complain about going out to practice when my son can't even do this. I can't complain about running 10 more extra 40s out there when my son can't even walk.
"This stuff is very minor. It's minor."
Branch is hosting a bowling event Sept. 9 in suburban Seattle to benefit to the Deion Branch Charitable Foundation, and specifically the treatment of meningitis.
He said whether he plays that other game, football, before then remains "up in the air."
Coach Mike Holmgren said Branch has not yet passed a physical to be cleared to play in a game, but that he will test his knee in practice before the team leaves for Buffalo Friday afternoon. If that goes well, he will play Sunday.
If not, Nate Burleson will be the only proven receiver to play against the Bills. Courtney Taylor, who has five career catches, will start opposite Burleson. Holmgren said backup quarterback Seneca Wallace is an option, too.
Bobby Engram is out until perhaps October with a broken shoulder after setting the team record with 94 receptions last season. Ben Obomanu went on injured reserve last weekend with a broken clavicle.
Branch, who has yet to fully realize the Seahawks' expectations when they traded a first-round pick to New England at the beginning of the 2006 season, called his a freak injury. It happened while running a routine route early in that playoff game against the Packers.
"The next big hurdle, I would say is up to him," Holmgren said. "With his ligament injury, it's been my experience with all the players I've had, particular at the wide receiver position ... they're nervous about it. They have to make cuts, and they have to do things that can tell them that they can do it.
"All of a sudden a defensive back engages him or he has to do something very quick -- he hasn't done that yet. ... He's going to have to tell us he feels good."
Branch wanted to take an even faster route back. He walked into the office of noted specialist Dr. James Andrews in Birmingham, Ala., last winter and asked him to put a cadaver ACL in his knee, because he heard the recovery time from that is quicker. Andrews told him he valued Branch too much to take that risk, that often bodies reject cadaver tendons within six months. Branch settled for the more conservative route of Andrews replacing the ACL with a patella tendon from Branch's knee.
Why rush back two months early from a surgery many believe takes a minimum of nine months to get over?
"I think I took the safer route, my surgery," he said. "It takes more time, but doctors find statistically this is a better way. So who knows if it's eight months? Like Dr. Andrews says, 'I can tell you when your knee is locked down, yeah. But I can't tell you when you can play football. That will be you."
Branch didn't sound convinced he'd be playing in Buffalo.
"There's a lot more work I've got to do. It's not just one thing -- it's pretty much everything," he said.
"I'm going to bounce back. I know I am. I'm going to be fine. I just have to make sure I do the right thing."
Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press
Pats' pass defense spotty
FOXBOROUGH, Mass. New England Patriots fans can bask in the glory of Tom Brady's nearly perfect performance. They can revel in their team's continued march to perfection as New England improved to 17-0 on Saturday night with a victory over the Jacksonville Jaguars.
What they can't take pleasure in was the awful pass defense displayed by the home team during a 31-20 victory at Gillette Stadium.
If Saturday night was any indication, the Indianapolis Colts better fall to the San Diego Chargers on Sunday or a serious snowstorm needs to wreak havoc on next Sunday's AFC Championship game to slow down Peyton Manning and his offense. If not, the game could come down to who gets the ball last.
The Patriots defense was out of sorts against a team that wasn't strong in the passing game (ranked 20th in the regular season). New England allowed Jacksonville quarterback David Garrard to complete 22 of 33 passes for 278 yards, two touchdowns and an interception.
Moreover, receivers like tight end Marcedes Lewis and wideouts Ernest Wilford, Reggie Williams and Matt Jones ran through and around the Pats defense much of the night. Finally, if Dennis Northcutt hadn't dropped an apparent 21-yard touchdown pass in the third quarter that forced Jacksonville to settle for a field goal to make it 21-17, the end game for the Patriots might have been substantially different.
That fact was obvious to anyone, particularly the Patriots themselves.
"We didn't play particularly well in the first half," said safety Rodney Harrison, who essentially ended the game with an interception with 4:08 remaining. "We let them have a lot of plays."
The truly dangerous part of that assessment is that this effort didn't come against the likes of the Colts, who have Manning, Reggie Wayne, Dallas Clark, Joseph Addai, Anthony Gonzalez and Marvin Harrison. Harrison is expected to return to the lineup against San Diego after missing 10 straight games with a left knee injury.
"We were just too excited early in the game. We had to calm down, especially me," New England linebacker Junior Seau said. "I had to settle down and let the game come to me instead of trying to force everything."
Seau couldn't pinpoint the reason for his and the rest of the squad's giddiness. For Seau, a lot of it was probably a combination of nerves (Seau was making his first appearance in the playoffs since the 1994 season).
As a whole, the defense's focus had been on stopping Jacksonville's AFC-best ground game a physical, between-the-tackles attack run behind a massive offensive line.
Jacksonville took advantage of that to hit several big plays off play-action throws. The Jags also took advantage of some softer coverage based on the fact that the Patriots were overplaying against the run.
Unfortunately for the Jaguars, they made too many critical mistakes, like the Northcutt drop and a first-quarter fumble by Garrard. Against a team like the Patriots, little mistakes get magnified because New England makes very few errors, particularly in strategy.
Thus, once New England built an 11-point lead in the second half after the Northcutt drop and subsequent touchdown pass from Brady to Benjamin Watson, Jacksonville was out of its game. Seven of Garrard's 11 incompletions were in the fourth quarter and the New England defense was able to play the kind of situational football it feasts on.
That leads to a good argument that the Patriots wouldn't play this kind of game if the Colts were in town. They wouldn't be so focused on stopping the running game, biting so hard on every play-action fake or taking that first step forward at the snap.
Still, that doesn't explain a lot of sloppy coverage. On a fourth-and-1 play in the first half, New England cornerback Asante Samuel let Lewis get behind him for a 34-yard gain, Lewis' longest of the season. Later, Samuel got beat on a very simple inside-out adjustment by Wilford for a 6-yard touchdown.
Finally, Jones was running so free through the New England secondary on one 29-yard gain that it was hard to figure out who was supposed to be covering him. Jones also caught an 8-yard touchdown in the first quarter to give Jacksonville a brief 7-0 lead. Jones was basically by himself on the play as the Jaguars caught cornerback Ellis Hobbs flat-footed.
While Hobbs agreed with Harrison's overall defensive assessment, he maintained that those coverage mistakes were all "correctable."
Maybe so, but it was hard not to wonder what might have happened in this game if Manning were chucking the ball on such a pleasant New England evening. Linebacker Adalius Thomas refused to even consider that question.
"If 'ifs' were fifths we'd all be drunk," Thomas said.
Thomas couldn't explain exactly what that meant, but here's a good way to look at it: If Manning sees this same defense the Patriots showed against Jacksonville, a lot of New England fans will be drinking away their sorrows a week from now.
Copyright 2008 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved.
Steelers' Hines Ward has right knee surgery
PITTSBURGH (AP) -- Steelers wide receiver Hines Ward underwent surgery to repair a partially torn meniscus in his right knee and will need about six weeks of recovery time before beginning offseason workouts.
The surgery was done Wednesday, but was not disclosed until coach Mike Tomlin's season-ending news conference Thursday.
Ward missed three games this season because of the injury, including the Dec. 30 game at Baltimore. He returned to make a game-high 10 catches for 135 yards in the Steelers' 31-29 AFC playoff loss to Jacksonville on Saturday.
Until this season, Ward had missed only three games due to injury during his 10-season NFL career. Ward has a team record 719 career catches.
Tomlin said Pro Bowl safety Troy Polamalu may need surgery on his right knee, but will wait to see if rest cures the problem.
Polamalu sat out five games after spraining his medial collateral ligament and posterior cruciate ligament earlier this season. He also had rib cage and shoulder injuries.
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
Giants DBs will try to prevent Moss from getting mark
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- Safety James Butler seemed to raise an eyebrow when asked how the young guys in the Giants' secondary might prevent Randy Moss and Tom Brady from setting single-season records for touchdown catches and TD passes.
"Man, you're trying to make it sound like I should be scared to play these guys," Butler said Wednesday after the Giants (10-5) practiced for Saturday night's game with the Patriots (15-0).
When told that some people might be afraid of Moss and Brady, Butler seemed ready to strut his courage. That is until cornerback Kevin Dockery called out from about 10 feet away.
"Don't fall into the trap! Don't give anything for the bulletin board," Dockery yelled.
Butler laughed and brought out the company line: The Giants are going to prepare, play hard and whatever happens, happens.
When it comes to the Patriots and their bid for perfection, defensive backs have found it almost impossible to stop Brady and Moss.
Brady's 48 touchdown passes are one shy of the record set by Peyton Manning in 2004, while Moss' 21 TD catches are one shy of the standard by Jerry Rice of the San Francisco 49ers in 12 games in 1987, a strike season.
Only Cleveland, Philadelphia and the Jets have prevented Moss and Brady from combining for a touchdown pass this season.
"He is an unbelievable receiver, and now he has found a quarterback who's not afraid to throw him the ball," veteran Giants cornerback Sam Madison said. "He's a quarterback who launches it, and he lets his receivers go and play."
Moss has resurrected his career after two subpar seasons in Oakland, where he had 11 touchdown catches combined.
"He just does it all," Butler said of Moss. "He is a good player, whether it is deep, short or midrange. He is just catching and going with it."
Veteran cornerback R.W. McQuarters said Moss has given the Patriots a deep threat for the first time in years.
"Any receiver can go deep, but when Moss comes into the picture, he is a deep threat," McQuarters said. "Now that they have a deep threat, everything else the Patriots do continues to work, and even better -- the underneath stuff, all of it. Randy Moss added another target, but deeper down the field."
McQuarters is familiar with Moss, having played against him twice a year during his five seasons with the Chicago Bears when Moss played for the Vikings.
"What we did with him in Chicago is what we see a lot of teams doing with him now, that's double him, hit him at the lines, those types of things," McQuarters said. "You want to slow him down. If you don't, the quarterback can wait until he gets 6 yards downfield and just launch it, and he'll run up under it. The Patriots do the same thing. Brady can just throw it up."
Against the Dolphins last weekend, McQuarters said Brady threw into double coverage a couple of times with New England comfortably ahead.
"They were just fine-tuning for the postseason," he said.
Before joining the Giants, Madison played against the Patriots twice a year for nine seasons while with Miami. Brady was New England's quarterback the last five.
"He's a competitor," Madison said. "It doesn't matter if he is playing golf at Dan Marino's tournament. I know he is a competitor, and he wants to win. He is going to go out there with that mind-set. We have to be ready to go."
With Butler and rookie cornerback Aaron Ross in the lineup, Brady will be facing two young defensive backs besides Madison and veteran safety Gibril Wilson. Nickel back Corey Webster has only three years experience.
With the secondary facing a tough test, the Giants' front seven will have to pressure Brady and slow down the run.
"We have to get in his face and hit him when he is getting rid of it," linebacker Kawika Mitchell said. "He is real comfortable back there. He gets a good presnap read on the defense and makes adjustments and gets the ball out. We have to be on our game."
If the Giants aren't, Moss and Brady could set all kinds of records this weekend.
Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press
Bills game could offer emotional reunion for Giants' Hixon
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. (AP) -- Domenik Hixon remembered it as one of the hardest hits he's ever received on a football field. Then he noticed the player who administered the blow lying on the ground, motionless.
"One of my teammates said, 'He's not getting up,"' Hixon recalled Thursday about his collision with Buffalo's Kevin Everett on Sept. 9 that initially left Everett paralyzed from the neck down. "I turned around and when they brought the ambulance out, I was hoping it was more precautionary than anything else."
Everett eventually regained the ability to walk, and the Bills have invited him to attend Sunday's home finale against the New York Giants, the team that picked up Hixon off waivers from Denver in October.
Plans were still incomplete Thursday, but Everett, who has been rehabilitating in Houston, told his teammates last month he hoped to attend the game.
Hixon said he looked forward to speaking to Everett about his recovery in what figures to be an emotional reunion for both men.
"I've been praying about it every day, hoping and wishing for the best," Hixon said. "From what I'm hearing he has a little bit to go, but it's very exciting that he's making progress."
The injury occurred in the teams' opener when Hixon was tackled by Everett on a kickoff return. The second-year wide receiver from Akron described the rest of the game and the immediate aftermath as a near out-of-body experience.
"It felt real fake," he said. "Even when I went home and saw it on the TV, I still couldn't believe it. After a couple of days, it really hit me that it happened."
Giants teammate Sinorice Moss played with Everett at the University of Miami and found out about the injury after New York's loss at Dallas.
"I always look on the Internet to see how all the guys I went to college with did that day, and I saw a headline that said, 'Everett suffers spinal injury,"' Moss said. "I thought to myself, 'How many other Everetts are there in the NFL?' Then the story popped up and I was just in a state of shock."
Hixon played three more games for the Broncos before being waived, and finished with unspectacular averages of 22.8 yards on 12 kickoff returns and 4.6 yards on seven punt returns.
He said he only fully realized the toll the incident took on him when he watched himself in game films.
"I looked at the way I played after it, and that wasn't me, it's not how I play," he said. "I was trying not to let it affect me, but it did, just the way I ran the ball. I looked tentative, like I was second-guessing every time."
In an ironic twist of sorts, Hixon has taken on the role of "gunner" on the Giants' punt return team, a role not that different from the one Everett filled for the Bills when he was injured.
While Everett's appearance at Sunday's game would provide a huge emotional lift for the Bills, it is the Giants who have the tangible goal of a playoff berth in their sights, while Buffalo lost that opportunity after an 8-0 loss at Cleveland last week.
Two trends appear to favor the Giants: New York has won six of seven road games this season, and a year ago when the Giants needed a win to get into the playoffs in the final week, they won 34-28 at Washington.
If they lose to Buffalo, the Giants could be forced to clinch a spot in the playoffs by defeating New England next Saturday at Giants Stadium, where they have lost three straight. And, of course, the Patriots are 14-0.
"I don't sense any panic in here," defensive end Michael Strahan said Thursday. "Everybody knows what's at hand. But as much as it is about getting into the playoffs, it's about gaining confidence, and you gain confidence from winning."
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
NFL disability plan altered to speed up process, but concerns remain
NEW YORK (AP) -- Changes in the disability plan for former NFL players will help speed up the process of applying for benefits. What won't change much is the process itself, which has received much criticism from retirees over how the decisions on whether to award benefits are made.
The league and the NFL Players Association formally announced a series of adjustments to the disability plan Wednesday. Ex-players have complained that the process of applying for and receiving benefits moved too slowly, and the new procedures address that.
"These changes will substantially improve the disability process and are another step in our commitment to address the medical needs of retired players," said NFL executive vice president of labor relations Harold Henderson.
But the way the retirement board determines whether applicants are eligible for benefits remains virtually the same. Former Baltimore Colts defensive back Bruce Laird, one of the ex-players who has been a critic of the treatment of retirees, called the changes "window dressing."
A medical director will be hired to consult with the two-person initial claims committee as well as the full retirement board, which hears appeals. The medical director will act in an advisory role and his or her recommendations will not be binding, NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said. The league and union will work with consultants to hire the medical director, possibly as soon as early January, Aiello said.
Laird expressed the same concern that he and others have raised about the selection of doctors who examine applicants for the retirement board. They question whether the physicians are chosen because they're more likely to reject applicants and say they deserve a voice in determining which doctors are used.
The league and union expect that the addition of the medical director will result in fewer applicants being rejected by the initial claims committee, which would mean that more cases are decided quickly.
Other announced changes are also aimed at streamlining the process. A claims specialist will be provided to help ex-players navigate the paperwork needed to apply. Physician panels will be established in major cities to reduce the need for applicants to travel to be examined by a specialist. The retirement board will decide appeals via e-mail ballots instead of waiting for the next scheduled meeting.
The changes also call for the status of retirees who are awarded benefits for total and permanent disability to be reviewed less frequently.
In addition to the adjustments to the disability plan, the league and union announced that they will provide retired players with a card to purchase prescription drugs at a discount.
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved
Rosenfels to start at QB for Texans
HOUSTON (Ticker) - Houston Texans coach Gary Kubiak expects Sage Rosenfels to start at quarterback Sunday against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Starter Matt Schaub suffered a dislocated shoulder in last week's 28-20 loss at Tennessee. On Wednesday, Kubiak said Schaub is improving but not enough to be ready for Sunday.
"He's still hurting pretty good," Kubiak said of Schaub. "Do I think there's a chance this week? I would say I don't think so at this point. We'll keep going and since it's not his throwing shoulder, it's a matter of when he gets comfortable and we know he can protect himself, he can get back on the field. But I don't see that right now."
Schaub was hurt with 3:11 to play in the first quarter of Sunday's game when he was sacked by Tennessee Titans defensive end Antwan Odom.
After kneeling on the ground for several minutes, Schaub was taken to the locker room.
"It's feeling a little better," Schaub said. "It's day-to-day, just trying to get range of motion and strength back in my shoulder. It's on the right track."
Rosenfels replaced Schaub and finished 17-of-30 for 185 yards, one touchdown and one interception. He will be backed up by Shane Boyd.
"We haven't really talked about it, but I'm going to prepare, just like always, as if I'm going to play," Rosenfels said. "Whether Matt is 100 percent healthy or whatever the situation he's in, I'm prepared to play. We'll see what happens at we practice this week."
Copyright 2007 PA SportsTicker. All Rights Reserved
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