Well, that worked.
As you know, Eric Mangini attempted to keep the identity of his starting quarterback for this Sunday's game a secret. I called it what it was: Mangini doing an impression of Brad Childress doing an impression of Bill Belichick. Indeed, it gave us a brief flashback to the days not long ago when the Vikings lacked a clear starting quarterback. And as expected, this worked out just as well for Mangini as when Chilly has tried keeping the starting quarterback a secret.
Why? Because the secret's out. Mike Florio's been reporting all week that Brady Quinn would be the starter on Sunday, and Mary Kay Cabot, the Browns beat writer for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, confirmed it today. For some reason, Terrell Owens made a congratulatory tweet to Quinn earlier today which continued ruining the "secret."
Whatever minuscule advantage the Anderson/Quinn mystery gave Cleveland has now been thrown out the window. (And I think those who were playing it up as any sort of significant advantage were seriously misguided.) True, maintaining the secret would have made the Vikings' pregame prep a bit more complex, but we're not talking about two outstanding quarterbacks here. I would hardly have been worried even if everyone's lips remained sealed -- which is a completely unrealistic expectation in today's NFL, given the increasingly intense media climate.
But none of that matters now because, predictably, people in the know couldn't stop themselves from blabbing to the media -- and, of course, T.O. couldn't help but do some blabbing on Twitter. The Vikings have just one quarterback to prepare for, even if Mangini had hoped he could add to their preparation time for the week.