Brandon Jackson Head Injury

[Thunder Muscle]

Cover story of JSOnline...

Took a blow to the head and was unable to finish practice. Appeared pretty foggy afterwards. It appears he may be out this week and could be longer if the problem lingers.

Plus the NFL I believe is starting to take head injuries with more precaution.

[Thunder Muscle]

Green Bay - The Green Bay Packers have traveled a long, winding road in their quest this summer to put a competent running game on the field.

If second-round pick and current starter Brandon Jackson is out for an extended period of time, the Packers could find themselves seriously short-handed in the backfield heading into the season.

And just 13 days before the season opener against Philadelphia the twists and turns keep coming, leaving the Packers' running game as hard to read as a wet map.

On Sunday, rookie Brandon Jackson went down hard after a collision with another player during a 2-minute drill, and after taking a few more snaps in a non-contact 7-on-7 drill was unable to finish practice. Jackson, according to other players, suffered a blow to the head that most thought wasn't serious.

After practice, however, the usually affable Jackson looked to be in a fog as he prepared to walk from his locker to the training room and did not respond to questions about his injury. Coach Mike McCarthy was unaware of the extent of Jackson's injury immediately after practice, so it's unclear whether Jackson suffered a concussion.

"Any time a guy lays down like that, that's not a positive sign," McCarthy said. "Hopefully he'll be OK."

If he has suffered a concussion, his status for the exhibition finale is in question, especially considering the extra attention head injuries are being given around the NFL after recent criticism aimed at the league. The Packers are generally conservative about allowing players who suffer head injuries back on the field, so there's no telling when he'll be back.

Even if the injury is minor, it's just another example of how tenuous and unsettled the Packers' running game remains.

With Jackson out, the only healthy running backs were veteran Noah Herron, rookie free agent Corey White and seventh-round pick DeShawn Wynn, who was making his first appearance in practice after missing 18 days with a strained right thigh muscle. Veteran Vernand Morency still hasn't practiced since hurting his knee the first day of camp and is a question mark for the start of the regular season.

Wynn's return is the best news the Packers have had with regard to their backfield in some time, but it's questionable whether he can make up enough ground in the next two weeks to be anything more than a complement come the start of the regular season. Though he looked heavier, the 5-foot-10 Wynn said he weighed in at 227 pounds, 6 pounds less than he weighed before he got injured.

"I felt pretty good," Wynn said. "It definitely felt good to get the runs in and get the football conditioning back in. Coach (Edgar) Bennett gave me a lot just to get prepared for the game Thursday. I think he's going to continue doing it the rest of the week, and I'm looking forward to getting those extra reps in against the defense in a game-time situation."

Wynn has better size and power than the 5-10, 212-pound Jackson, and yet moves almost as quickly. One thing he was able to do was stay on top of the offense while he was out, attending meetings daily and taking assignment quizzes before every game. He said he did not make many assignment errors in his first practice back.

The Packers need Wynn's help. In three exhibition games, they have averaged just 3.5 yards per carry and have only one rush of at least 20 yards. Jackson and White, the two leading rushers with 40 and 32 attempts, respectively, are both averaging 3.3 yards per carry.

"You have to have some concern," tackle Mark Tauscher said. "But it (working on the run game) is tough for what we do. You're not live tackling, you're not live cutting.

"With the system we have in place you want to always look good, but when you can't really cut a guy, you just want to get your reads and get in a good rhythm showing the running back where his reads are. We're not in mid-season form from a cutting standpoint. We have a ways to go."

Cut-blocking is a basic element of the zone run scheme and is used primarily on the back side of a run play to knock down pursuing defensive ends and tackles. It keeps those defenders from tying up the guards and center, whose job often is to push forward and block a linebacker.

Jacksonville slanted its defensive line so that it could rub out the guard and mess up the running lanes, essentially forcing the back to run outside the tackles every time. The Packers insist that if it were a regular-season game they would have done something to counter that strategy.

"We've got a very minimal part of the running game going on in the games," guard Daryn Colledge said. "We're doing fundamental stuff: outside, inside, left and right. When we have the ability to put in everything - we have our fakes and our counters and our nakeds (bootlegs) and our full run game - we'll have a lot more success in the run game.

"Right now people know we're running a very vanilla run game. Linebackers can just fill and fill and fill and it makes it real easy (to stop the run)."

Tauscher insisted that if the line did its job, the running back situation wouldn't be as dire as some perceive it to be. He said the experience of having all five starters together for the 2006 season would start to show benefits when the real games begin.

"I don't think there's any question we have our hands full and we're expected to be a lot better running the football," Tauscher said. "That will come with playing together and trusting each other a little more. I think you have to hold your judgment (in the exhibition season). I think we're going to be able to run the ball much more effectively than last year."

Maybe so, but time is running out to show it.

[ReasonablySober]

Wynn's gonna see a ton of carries. I hope he does well.

[deep throat]

Wynn's gonna see a ton of carries. I hope he does well.

White had some moments in the last game. I kind of think they have pretty much written off Wynn. Maybe a PS position. More than likely it's BJ-Morency and Noah. I think the kid from Boise could make ar FB.

[Ayt]

I guess we'll know if we have anything in Wynn after this next game.