Washington Redskins

THE CUTS
It's quite surprising that Bauman and Upshaw were both cut. It would seem that the Skins need more than 4 healthy CBs. Apparently, extra DBs for 5 WR sets will come in the form of safeties.

Upshaw's release is particularly puzzling without any rave reviews about the understudies at the DE position (Demetric Evans and Ron Warner).

On the other hand, while everyone knew that Gibbs would have a plethora of candidates for the H-back position during the preseason, it's a puzzle that he kept five players rather than four. If anything, I would have figured Sellers, Kozlowski, or Rasby to fight for two spots.

I'm extremely glad that Ladell Betts made the cut because in the long run he should help the team immensely, assuming he's stays healthy. It seems that he had the injury bug at an unfortunate time and was starting to get the injury-prone label despite a very healthy college career. Gibbs likely sees Betts in the mold of his typical power back and a more than capable backup to Portis (knock on wood). Betts runs with authority and has shown that he can pound it between the tackles.

The Redskins should make a move to pick up Kato Serwanga, who was released by the Colts today. He was a star special teams player for the Skins a few years ago.

There's hope that Bugel can mold Mark Wilson (5th round pick) and Jim Molinaro (6th round pick) into the Hogs of tomorrow. In the short term, though, we'll have to cross our fingers that one of them can adjust to the speed of the pro game should Kenyatta Jones falter or Chris Samuels get injured. With Joe Bugel captaining the O-line ship, though, the OL should be in the best shape of any group on the team.

The LB corps will be critical in providing the badly needed pass rush. As with the Marvin Lewis scheme, Arrington should replace one of the DTs on the D-line on passing downs, with Wynn moving inside. The Skins can still afford to scan the waiver wire for a DE upgrade.

THE EAGLES
Now for some speculation about the Redskins' main competition in the NFC East. RB is a big weakness for the Eagles. It's a big question mark as to whether Brian Westbrook can hold up as the main tailback for an entire season. If he gets injured, can an unknown like Reno Mahe carry the load?

The losses of Bobby Taylor and Troy Vincent were made to be a big deal but the Eagles had to make the move considering two main factors: 1) salary cap, and 2) rule enforcement of the 5-yard illegal contact rule. As physical CBs, Taylor and Vincent would have been far less effective with the officials throwing more flags for illegal contact.

With Koy Detmer and Jeff Blake behind McNabb, the Eagles are set at QB. At WR, there doesn't ever to be any risk of losing TO to injury but if he does goes down, then there is the dramatic dropoff to last year's talent level of Pinkston and Freddie Mitchell.

Philly's biggest asset is the consistency of the coaching regime with Andy Reid's staff in place for as long as it's been. The players don't have to learn new schemes every year, which the Redskins have had to do.