More so than anything -- more than watching the starters, more than feeling the excitement of rookies making their unofficial NFL debut, and certainly more than caring about the scoreboard -- coaches want to use the preseason to evaluate as much of their roster as possible. It's why the first stringers only play a series or two before ceding to backups and youngsters. It's these reps -- not the starters' -- that are invaluable as teams try to whittle their roster down from 90 to 53 in the coming weeks.

But Friday night, those priorities changed. Nothing mattered more than Morice Norris' health. The Detroit Lions cornerback suffered a serious injury when his head snapped backwards after colliding with the thigh/knee area of Atlanta Falcons running back Nathan Carter on the fir

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