D-line suffers more injuries; Lack of bye week that big of a deal?

It’s a small note today, but it’s a big hit- the Cougs have suffered a loss to injury to projected starting DE Matt Mullennix. He has a right hand fracture and is out indefinitely. He was #1 on the depth chart opposite Bruce at DE, but now the job is open until he can come back. But even one of the backups, speed rusher Mike Graise, has a hip pointer so we’ll see how that goes. Losing Paul Stevens to suspension could end up hurting the team more than we thought.

Maybe this totally opens the door for Lance Broadus to show what he can do? If you remember, Broadus was a highly touted speed guy coming out of high school in 2003 and was a surprise get for the Cougs last summer. He signed with Oregon out of high school, choosing the Ducks over USC, Oklahoma and Arizona among others, but academics didn’t work out.

D-line suffers more injuries; Lack of bye week that big of a deal?
Aaron Johnson is also down with a bad hammy. Don’t know how severe it is, but the term “out indefinitely” is being used, so not exactly good either.

Also, Arkelon Hall has a broken fibia, so that clinches the #2 spot for Gary Rogers. Even if Hall was healthy, the odds were strongly in favor for Rogers to be the backup. I have to say, I’m starting to wonder when you look at all the QB’s on the roster and the fact that Brink is still just a junior if we will ever see Hall play a meaningful down at WSU. With the way kids transfer these days, you would think that if not Hall, then someone is going to transfer. Even with the loss of Swogger, there are 5 QB’s on the roster (Brink, Rogers, Hall, Morgan and Lopina). It should be interesting how it all plays out.

As usual, Glenn covers the Cougs from all angles and is the best read going. Some good reader e-mails, including the interesting tidbit about the lack of bye weeks. Did you know UW and WSU are the only two Pac-10 schools without a bye week??? Great.

http://www.spokesmanreview.com/blogs/wsu/

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