Big Cat Country
After Wednesday off, your Jacksonville Jaguars took to the Miller Electric practice fields on Thursday to kick off their preseason, week two, mid-week simulated scrimmage. As a note, a preseason week two scrimmage feels unique, and a first that I can recall in recent Jaguars’ offseason history. After a physical Tuesday practice, a Thursday, closed-to-the-public scrimmage may be the teams’ attempt to prepare for Sunday’s 1 P.M. matchup against the New Orleans Saints while also establishing a more physical culture in Jacksonville.
Here are our notes from Thursday’s Jacksonville Jaguars training camp scrimmage.
Practice Observations
The early arrow for the Jaguars’ starting offensive group seemed to be pointing up, as the offensive line unit kicked off the day with what was arguably their best period of OL vs DL 1-on-1s, with quality wins from Anton Harrison over Travon Walker and Josh Hines-Allen, Walker Little over Hines-Allen, Robert Hainsey over Davon Hamilton, and a few others. The day really seemed to be shaping up as a day belonging to the offense.
However, on the other field, Jaguars 1-on-1s were occurring between the receivers and defensive backs, where defense pretty convincingly won the day, with the best play coming from Travis Hunter versus Dyami Brown.
Trenton Irvin beat Christian Braswell for a touchdown catch. Otherwise, it was pretty much all defense, with Jarrian Jones forcing an incompletion to Brian Thomas Jr and Jourdan Lewis having similar success against Parker Washington.
At this point the scrimmage then kicked off with Lawrence’s opening pass to Brian Thomas Jr falling incomplete – a drop by Thomas, with a defending Travis Hunter in coverage. However, from this point on the starting offensive group would move quickly down the field via accurate throws from Lawrence sprinkling a heavy dose of Travis Etienne in the run and pass game. The early drive would end with a beautiful Tank Bigsby walk-in touchdown, using his vision to find the cut-back lane, with nothing but green grass in front of him.
However, from this point forward the day belonged to the defense and the referees with sacks from Josh Hines-Allen, Yasir Abdullah, Jordan Jefferson, Ethan Downs, & Danny Striggow (who had a sack last week vs Pittsburgh). To add to this list, Dawuane Smoot also had a sack that was called back for pass interference.
That didn’t stop the action with DT Austin Johnson securing a tipped ball interception off of Nick Mullens. S Daniel Thomas almost came away with a near interception as collided with WR Joshua Cephus, popping the Mullens’ pass in the air for the incompletion. Additionally, S Andrew Wingard had a diving Trevor Lawrence interception called back due to the defense jumping offsides, resulting in the free play pass attempt. The defensive highlight of the day had to have been CB Jarrian Jones wrapping up the day with a magnificent pass breakup on a deep, Brian Thomas Jr pass attempt from Lawrence where Thomas had Jones stacked yet Jarrian found a way to get his hand in...
