<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'> Right tackle Jon Jansen will undergo surgery to repair his fractured fibula and dislocated right ankle this week, an injury the Washington Redskins expect to effectively end his season. Coach Joe Gibbs said yesterday he has not decided whether veteran Todd Wade or undrafted rookie Stephon Heyer will take Jansen's spot Monday night in Philadelphia.</p> Jansen, a second-round draft pick in 1999 and the longest-serving player on the roster, was hurt early in the second quarter of the Redskins' season-opening 16-13 victory Sunday, when Miami Dolphins linebacker Zach Thomas fell on his legs. The severity of the injury was immediately apparent, Jansen said, and excruciatingly painful.</p> Although doctors reset the ankle on the field, the extent of the ligament damage will not be known until surgery, which will take place tomorrow or Thursday. Jansen's ankle was twisted in the wrong direction after the injury.</div></p> </p> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...7091002497.html</p> </p> This is really bad to hear that we lost one of our best players on the first game of the season. Stephon Heyer out of Maryland will look like his number will get called earlier than he expected and the Redskins need to make sure he's prepared for these next 15 games. Teams will start pressuring the run more often and send double teams towards Heyer because of lack of experience, so we just have to hope he steps up. </p> </p>
This guy has terrible luck when it comes to injuries....basically, Zach Thomas rolled up the back of his leg and you could tell it was bad immediately
It seems like the 6'8 guard Todd Wade will get the start.</p> <div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'>In the parlance of athletes, it's known as "The Nod," a brief-but-unmistakable tilting of the head, from coach to player, that means "strap on your helmet, it's time to get out there." After seven seasons in the NFL, tackle Todd Wade knows The Nod when he sees it, and following Jon Jansen's season-ending injury Sunday, Wade says he got it twice in rapid succession, a certain indication that he would be Washington's new starting right tackle.</p> Nothing was spoken, but when Wade locked eyes with Coach Joe Gibbs and associate head coach-offense Al Saunders on Sunday, he assumed his time had come. This is why he worked so hard to overcome major knee surgery a few years back, why he received a $6.2 million contract in the offseason, why he was so willing to attempt a doomed conversion to guard in the preseason at the team's behest. He was ready to do anything for the chance to get back on the field with regularity.</p> Gibbs acknowledged the exchange but when asked about it Monday claimed this particular nod meant only that Wade was "going to play a huge role for us," and not necessarily start, implying an uncertainty existed whether to replace Jansen with Wade, 30, a longtime starter and veteran of 109 NFL games, or undrafted rookie free agent Stephon Heyer, 23. So by yesterday Wade was a little anxious, knowing he was the logical choice but not totally certain he was the starter until he stepped into the office of offensive line coach Joe Bugel in mid-afternoon.</p> "I've been waiting to get in there, so I went to his office and asked Coach Bugel, and that was the deal," Wade said. "It's weird, the last couple of years since I left Houston [in 2005], you kind of get a fresh look at the season and I spent training camp [in 2006] just rehabbing and all that stuff, and now I'm finally at a place in the season where I can actually start a number of games and really get back out there and get after it and help this team win some games."</div></p>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...7091101958.html </p> </p> </p>
