FanHouse Mike Rumph

Well, Clinton Portis is back, but Shawn Springs is going to miss another game this weekend after straining his groin when he tried practicing Wednesday afternoon. Springs had surgery Aug. 14 to repair an abdominal muscle that had torn from the pelvic bone. The injury Wednesday did not aggravate that injury, but how much better is it to have two injuries?

Through the first two games so far, the Redskins' defense allowed two aging QBs to shine, Mark Brunell not one of them. Brad Johnson consistently picked apart the secondary, specifically picking on Carlos Rogers, making sure no one in Minnesota is missing Daunte Culpepper (actually, Culpepper is doing that himself). Then just when Tony Romo was gearing up to be the next Cowboys QB, Drew Bledsoe had a consistent game, stayed off his back and threw his way to a victory at the expense of the Redskins' secondary. And that was without an effective T.O.

Without Springs, the corners will be manned by Carlos Rogers, Kenny Wright and Mike Rumph. Adam Archuleta is going to have to figure out how to play pass defense, Marcus Washington is going to have to keep pace covering TEs and the defensive line is going to have to put some heat on David Carr.

Springs may return week four, but there are no guarantees even that will happen. An MRI revealed an abductor sprain, ummm, whatever that means. All I know is they said something about a groin problem. That can't be good.

All week I've been hearing and reading stuff about the upcoming Redskins-Cowboys game about how the Redskins secondary looked so bad against Minnesota that they should make Bledsoe look good again. The theory is that second-year CB Carlos Rogers won't be able to maintain T.O., let alone Kenny Wright or Mike Rumph.

Looking back at the Vikings game, Gregg Williams did not employ a lot of blitz packages. Brad Johnson was pretty much given a break because of the injuries suffered on our defensive side of the ball. With Pierson Prioleau going down early in the game and Shawn Springs still nursing his injury, that left zero depth in the secondary. If you blitz Rogers and Taylor, you have recently acquired Mike Rumph covering one-on-one with only Adam Archuleta covering the top. Not a good idea. The backup safeties are Vernon Fox and Reed Doughty, neither of whom has proven anything yet.

With Gregg Williams holding back on bringing the heat we're used to seeing, that left the pressure up to an injured Cornelius Griffin, Phillip Daniels and Renaldo Wynn. And where in the world is Andre Carter? Going against Steve Hutchinson, Matt Birk and Bryant McKinnie, you HAVE to bring some heat.

We all know that Nolan is the Monty Hall of the NFL, and that if he had the opportunity to trade his grandmother, he would. I wanted to take a look around the league and see how the crop of players Nolan traded away have fared through the first week of the season. We'll continue to check periodically throughout the season to see who ended up with the better end of the deals, so far the advantage goes to the 49ers.

Kevan Barlow: Barlow was perhaps the only player to actually contribute anything worthwhile to his team. He finished the day against the Titans with a whopping 35 yards and one touchdown. It was nice to see he kept his rushing average right around three yards per carry.

Ken Dorsey: Sunday against the Saints, Dorsey was 3 for 3 in origami swans, and managed to stay within the lines while coloring.

Brandon Lloyd: Lloyd opened the season on primetime, his chance to shine. He finished the evening with zero catches, but he did manage to write some new verses for his next rap album.

Cody Pickett: Well considering he didn't make the Texans squad, the 49ers didn't receive anything, so in a sense he was released. Pickett is currently working as a rodeo clown, and bussing tables at the local Bob's Big Boy.

Tim Rattay: Sunday against the Ravens, Rattay was inactive. Rumors are he gave Gruden's Hummer a nice detailing.

Mike Rumph: Rumph also opened the season on primetime, he managed to record three tackles and not get hurt.

Jamie Winborn: Winborn did see some action against the Ravens, but he produced nothing, however he did help out Rattay and rotated Gruden's tires.

Rashaun Woods: Woods is currently out of football, he was seen over the weekend participating in Turtle Wax's Bass Fishing 3000. He finished fourth by the way.

After watching the 49ers performance on Sunday, the early consensus is that the 49ers haven't lost out on trading away any of these players. Now if they could somehow manage to trade Kwame Harris...

Mike Nolan is the Monty Hall of the NFL. In just under two years Mike Nolan has been a trading fool. During that span he has traded away a total of nine players, that is unheard of in today's NFL. The last time the Niners traded a player for player was back in 1988, if my math is correct that is 17 years, and in two, Nolan has done it nine times. I bet Nolan would trade his grandmother for the right price. The humor in all of this is that those nine players were all drafted by former general manager, Terry Donahue. I guess it is safe to say that Donahue sucked at his job. Of course we already knew that didn't we Niner fans? We didn't need Mike Nolan to trade away players in order for us to see that, but I will not get into the whole Donahue thing, that is a story all in itself.

Now let's take a look closer at those drafts and see who got the better end of the deal.

- John Engelberger for Willie Middlebrooks. Denver won out on this one. Mainly because Engelberger actually produced something. Middlebrooks spent more time getting cut than playing.

- Jamie Winborn for a seventh-round pick. Too early to tell on this deal. Nolan took this seventh-round pick combined it with another and used it to move up in the draft and draft Melvin Oliver. The funny thing about this is that Nolan traded the seventh he received from Jacksonville back to them to move up.

Looks like we may be getting a really good look at Jason Campbell these last two preseason games. Mark Brunell says he was injured Tuesday, practiced some on Wednesday then missed most of Thursday's practice with a sore groin. Yet another injury before the season starts. This is in addition to his bruised calf earlier in training camp and a broken finger on his throwing hand during the offseason.

The depth at key positions has unexpectedly started mounting up as we get closer to the regular season. With Clinton Portis, Shawn Springs, Phillip Daniels and Cornelius Griffin going down (not to mention Kerry Carter and Chris Clemons who were both lost for the year), the Redskins have suffered a dent on the first team squads. The trade for TJ Duckett has eyebrows raised over Portis' shoulder. The trade for Mike Rumph should do the same for Shawn Springs' injury. So far no defensive linemen have been traded for, but we still have two more weeks left in the preseason.

As the questions stack up at depth, maybe Jason Campbell will come around and make Brunell's seemingly consistent injuries a moot point. Perhaps if Campbell performs well enough, he will either hold it down until Brunell gets back to 100% or even inherent the starting position.