Clearly, McNabb is on a one-year trial. [Mike]?Shanahan is taking McNabb for a test drive.

But Shanahan undermined McNabb's ability to lead this team (by benching him last week with 1:50 to go and trailing the Lions by six). How can McNabb trust him? Will it happen again? Unless McNabb plays lights-out the second half of the season, I find it hard to believe he will be back in Washington next year.

"I'm just excited about this opportunity to give us a chance of getting back on track," McNabb said yesterday.

"For me to sit here and try to explain how my emotions may be or what might be going through my mind, I think it's just - as Mike Tyson said - ludicrous," McNabb said. "The thing about it is, I think I can respond to that better when the game is over. For me to try to come up with something wouldn't be right.

Two team sources said Haynesworth probably would have had a key role, even if he did not start, against the Cowboys this week if he had fared well in the preseason finale against the Arizona Cardinals. Haynesworth's play was described as "awful" by the sources, who said it wasn't as much a matter of blown assignments (Haynesworth did not have many) as his lack of effort and failure to adhere to the principles of Washington's new 3-4 scheme.

Practice was closed to the media Saturday, but a team source said Haynesworth participated in few plays. After lining up primarily at right end recently, Haynesworth was moved back to nose tackle. And in an even more telling sign about Haynesworth's standing on the team, the two-time all-pro was taken out of the nickel package. He had started in that defensive alignment for the final two weeks of the preseason.Meanwhile, head coach Mike Shanahan is confident that quarterback Donovan McNabb (ankle) will start the opener.

"A really grand statistic every year in the league is your turnover ratio and how that kind of relates to winning and losing," linebacker Keith Brooking said. "All the teams that are plus in the turnovers... tend to kind of favor being really good, successful and being in the playoffs year in and year out. That's something we didn't do well last year defensively."

Why would the Eagles trade Donovan McNabb to the Redskins?

To many, the trade makes no sense. The NFC East had a specific pecking order, one which had the Redskins on the outside looking in. Now, with the addition of a franchise quarterback, Washington is back inside with a better seat at the table.