Buccaneers' Rodrigo Blankenship: Pushing McLaughlin in job battle

Blankenship and his competitor for the Buccaneers' placekicking job, Chase McLaughlin, have been running very close in their training camp competition heading into Friday's preseason opener against the Steelers, Scott Smith of the team's official site reports.

Blankenship has 56 career regular-season field-goal attempts on his resume and has been displaying impressive leg strength during training camp, so he's believed to be just as viable a candidate as the player who actually replaced him in Indianapolis a year ago, McLaughlin. The job battle between the two young veterans could well extend all the way through the third preseason game, and Smith reports that Wednesday's dead-even kicking derby in practice -- which saw both players go a perfect 4-for-4 on attempts of varying distances -- was a microcosm of the dead heat the job battle has been heading into Friday night's exhibition opener.