Miss the Skins?

Miss the Redskins on Sunday?

Sunday’s TV listing called for three NFL games, Denver @ Baltimore, NY Giants @ Philly and Minnesota at Green Bay. All three games were well worth watching even if none ended up being close. Again, did we miss the Redskins not playing? Nooooooooo! Who needs the agony?

Who needs anymore of the talk radio on what’s wrong with the Redskins. We all know the solution. Dano needs to go out and hire the best football man available and let him run the team. Not a coach, a football general manager and let him choose the coach. Snyder needs to say to the GM I’ve got a $100 million, but not for new players. The money is for a new scouting staff to find talent and build a young successful team through the draft.

There is no reason to hold your breath until it happens. This is a pipe dream.

As one looks north to Baltimore in dreams that someday the Redskins could be run as well as the Ravens, what is obvious is the similarity between Dan Snyder and the Orioles’ owner Peter Angelos.

The comparison between the two is Halloween scary. Both made enough money to buy their favorite sports team. Each had visions of grandeur of leading them to glory. Both have followed similar paths of total failure.

Angelos started off with some success, hiring Pat Gillick (now of the 2008 World Champion Phillies) as General Manager. Gillick hired Davey Johnson as Manager and in 1996 made the playoffs and in 1997 won the AL East Title.

Then Angelos took over. Fired Gillick and hired yes-man Syd Thrift. Can we say Vinny? He backed second baseman Roberto Alomar in a dispute with manager Johnson despite the fact that Alomar committed baseball biggest No-No when he spit on an umpire. The 1997 playoffs ended with call strike three on Alomar.

The same year Angelos ran popular broadcaster Jon Miller out of town. Can we say Frank Herzog? Or, how about replacing professional RFK stadium announcer Phil Hochberg with some clown, who can only scream “Third and Looooooooonnng.”

In 1998 Angelos gave record money to Albert Belle, who didn’t run out grounds. The bust was the beginning of the end. Let’s shout Jeff George, Dion Sanders or Bruce Smith.

There may never be a comeback for the Orioles. With the Washington Nationals opening in 2005 the sellout crowds are now limited to Yankee and Red Sox games. The O’s may never have the money needed to contend with New York or Boston.

In the salary capped NFL, any team can be rebuilt into championship teams. All it takes is an owner who lets good football people run the show. Talk about a pipe dream.

Valium All Around

Valium all around!!!

Redskins’ football is depressing. This was supposed to have been happy times. Big dreams! The opening game loss to the Giants was expected, but the next five games were all winnable. Worst they should have come out with a 4-2 record not the opposite.

I do not live and die with the Redskins. This is not the early 70’s when George Allen make them yearly playoff contenders. Nor the 80’s when Joe Gibbs made them the team of the decade.

The depression is getting to me. I don’t want to write. Don’t want to talk about football, especially, the Redskins. I have Snyder Syndrome. The only know cure is cold beer & friends.

There is no hope for the season. The idea of changing the play calling to Sherman Lewis is a joke. It is purely a desperation move, because there is no rational logic on why someone would think a guy who has been with the team, oh, two weeks can call plays better than the person who established the offense.

The Redskins are miserable.

Many people I know are now watching and pulling for the Baltimore Ravens. When there were technical difficulties with last week’s TV broadcast and the game was switch to Minnesota/Baltimore there were no complaints where I was watching.

The Ravens are exactly the kind of team we wish the Redskins should become. They do not have an arrogant interfering owner, but one who let’s football people make the calls.

Ozzie Newsome is an outstanding General Manager. The offense has been built through the draft. Nine of the 11 starters were drafted including 4 of the 5 offensive linemen and the entire backfield.

Defense is more of the same with 8 of the players drafted including future Hall of Famer Ray Lewis, who wasn’t Baltimore’s first pick in 1996 draft. Offensive tackle Jonathan Ogden was picked 20 selections earlier. Four years later with Trent Dilfer, a so-so quarterback, the Ravens won the Super Bowl.

Ten years ago Ray Lewis was one of the few defensive players who was worth the price of an overpriced NFL ticket.

These days the Ravens are a little old on defense but the offense is young and exciting. Baltimore may not make the playoffs after the heart breaking 33-31 loss to undefeated Minnesota on Sunday when the game ended on a missed 44-yard field goal. They will be worth watching.

The same can not be said for the dismal Redskins, who audience is being reduced to just us die-hard fans.

Cash Cows

What was heard on FedEx on Sunday wasn’t booing, but Mooing. Dano Snyder’s favorite Cash Cows, known to other owners as fans, were milked dry and then put in a No-Touchdown Zone field. One wonders if Dano isn’t contemplating suing the fans for some sort of breach of contract. Have we checked the fine print on the back of tickets? Booing the Skins must be a sueable offense.

Dano is coming very close to breaking the Golden Calf. While technically a sellout, the house was not full on opening day. The Redskins maintain that there are 160,000 people on the waiting list, but everyone who has received phone calls from the Redskins trying to sell tickets thinks the list is bogus.

Here’s Snyder’s most recent good-will tour: sue fans and move the loyal tailgaters from their favorite spots.

Just who are the fans booing? Not the players, even though one never-heard-of linebacker took time to call them terrible fans. I’m sure Snyder has already called what’s his name and told him to never bad mouth sucker-fans in public.

Since Snyder is smart enough not to go out in public, they can’t boo the arrogant owner with the Napoleon Complex. So they booed his latest mistake. No I’m not talking about cornerback DeAngelo Hall, but head coach Jim Zorn.

In an interview after the game Redskins Hall of Fame quarterback Sonny Jurgensen told the coach he would have audibled out of the halfback option call. Zorn said he would have bench him. Maybe he would but the Redskins would probably have scored on Sonny’s play. Sonny did that to George Allen once. Came in for one play, when Billy Kilmer had to sit out a play because of an injury time out, Sonny was suppose to hand the ball off but instead threw a TD pass.

Jurgensen has forgotten more football than Zorn knows now. In eight quarters so far the Redskins have scored one offensive touchdown. The other came on a fake field goal, which is why the coach called the halfback option -- the Redskins do not have an offensive play inside the 10-yard line.

Let’s face it. Zorn is the coach because Book’em Dano ran off all of the real head coach candidates. We’re about to have another Dano search again with his famous all day & night interviews. Who is Dano kidding? He doesn’t know enough football to handle such a conversation.

One thing is for sure, Dano will ask the Cash Cows to pay for it.

For a quick laugh, watch this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1O7rs6dEdY

Fantasy Team Goes Down

Once again Book’em Dano’s fantasy team proved that they could not stay with a good football organization. This is why the NY Giants & Philly are thinking about the division title and possible trip to the Super Bowl. The Redskins are hoping for a wild card spot.

The talent gap between the two teams was decided years ago when Dano skipped the draft and went expensive big-name free agents. On offense the Giants started 9 players they picked on draft day while Washington had 5 free agents with another acquired by trade. Defense much the same with the Redskins built with 6 free agents including the whole defensive line; Giants with 8 drafted starters.

Which team seemed faster on Sunday? Redskin’s second biggest weakness, after lack of depth, is lack of speed.

After the game gut feeling: Redskins are not a playoff team, again.

Then you think, well, they were playing the Giants, who may be the best team in the NFC East. They were on the road. They never beat New York in New York and seldom look good losing there. Hey, they covered the 6 1/2 point spread.

By can your eyes and gut be wrong?

They had NO offense, until they scored that meaningless touchdown late in the game. The TD may not have been so meaningless if the offense had not wasted 2 of its time outs earlier. Campbell looked like he’s all arm and nothing else. Portis did nothing of importance. Or, was it the offensive line that couldn’t open a hole.

Who knew after all the money Dano spent on defense that it was for a bend-but-don’t-break style. Where was the pass rush? Can DeAngelo Hall cover a bad check? Before anyone jumps up and down about his interception, please, understand that his man was wide open, he just caught safety LaRon Landry’s defection.

Hope springs eternal and optimism comes in the form of the schedule. There are many NFL teams with bad organizations. In the last 3 years the Redskins record is 22-26. In the next 5 games we play three teams: Rams (13-35), Lions (10-38) and Kansas City (15-33); whose football building operations make Dano look good. The Skins MUST win all three of these games for playoffs to remain a dream. Also they play Tampa Bay (22-26) at FedEx field. This is a very winnable game. The only game in the 5-game stretch that looked like a sure loss was Carolina (27-21). However, it appears that Panther QB Jake Delhomme has lost his touch, which may turn this into a possible win.

Washington needs to win 4 of these games. If they only win 3, they do make not playoffs and if they only win 2, Jim Zorn will be unemployed.

Redskins 2009: The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

Let’s start with The Ugly, Book’em Dano Snyder got called out by the Washington Post for being outright greedy and proving once again he treats fans as Cash Cows whom he milks for every dollar. Maybe this does a disservice to the word ‘ugly’ and should be renamed: ‘Repulsive.’

Ok, I’m sorry; there is a reason to be positive and feel good. The season starts on Sunday. If you can’t be a believer before the season starts you might as well cash it in. But if you want to have hope you better pray for good health as that is the key to a successful season, and a successful season means making the playoffs.

The Good: the brightest light of hope is the defensive line. This should be the best D-Line since the glory years of the early 80’s. The addition of tackle Albert Haynesworth, end/linebacker Brian Orakpo and end Jeremy Jarmon all give the Redskins a pass rush. One of the keys to making the Super Bowl is sacks. Since 2000 only the Arizona Cardinals (last year) and the Indianapolis Colts (2007) have made the championship game with less than 40 sacks. Last year the Redskins had only 24.

The fresh blood could allow Andre Carter to have another banner year like 2007 when he had 10.5 sacks. Throw in veterans Cornelius Griffin and Phillip Daniels and the Redskins have good balance to stop the run and nice depth. This may be better than The Good, let’s be optimistic and call it The Great!

Speaking of nice depth, the Redskins also have it at Safety with Chris Horton & LaRon Landry starting with very capable back up by Reed Doughty. This is, also, The Good.

The Good would also go with the starting cornerbacks of DeAngelo Hall, Carlos Rogers and Fred Smoot. However, if one goes down we’re talking not so good and if they lose 2, then we’ve got The Ugly.

Finding The Good on offense may take Sherlock Holmes. Santana Moss is good, but right now supporting cast could be The Bad.

The starting offensive line could be The Good, or at least OK, but it must stay healthy for 16 games. If the injury bug bites again they become The Bad quickly and hopefully not The Ugly they were at the end of 2008.

It is time for quarterback Jason Campbell to step up and be The Good. If he doesn’t both he and Coach Zorn are gone. Zorn was hired to make Campbell an NFL playoff QB. It’s not a huge leap to get there. After all Rex Grossman, Rich Gannon, Brad Johnson, and Trent Dilfer all lead their teams to the Super Bowls in the last 10 years. No one is saving any of them wall space in Canton.

Let’s be optimistic. If the offense can average 17 to 20 points a game, the defense can set up another 6 to 10, then the schedule is such that they could win 10 games. This would be The Great!

The season starts on Sunday against the NY Giants. Normally this game is The Bad bordering on The Ugly. However, an upset and The Good season is off to a quick start.

The Real Seasons without the Redskins

Happy New Year!

The real football season is about to begin and the Redskins didn’t qualify. A fabulous start ended with disappointment.

It could have been worst. Imagine what Cowboy fans are feeling. They started the season as the NFC favorite to reach the Super Bowl. At times they looked unbeatable, stumbled when Romo was hurt, regrouped only to get blown out by Philly on Sunday. One must wonder how they feel in Tampa Bay. The Buccaneers were 9-3 heading into December with the Super Bowl being played on their home field. They didn’t win again and lost to Oakland at HOME on Sunday. How about the Jets, they beat New England and Tennessee both on the road, but go 1-4 down the stretch.

Let’s look at the NFC teams that made the playoffs. What is the difference? Quite frankly, they are better than Division winners Arizona and Minnesota. They beat one wild card team (Philly) twice. Atlanta is a better team. The playoffs could determine if the NFC South is a better division than the East. Unfortunately, if both Philly & Atlanta win their opening games, it would not be a match up of the East vs. South as Philly will play the Giants and Atlanta would play Carolina.

So with a 55-year old rookie coach and Vinny in control of football operations, the Redskins were in the hunt for 15 weeks. Most realistic fans would have taken an 8-8 season especially after they lost to the Giants to start the season.

Why so blue? The 2-6 finish to the seasons gives little hope for next year. Redskins fans are faced with the same questions they had after the loss to the Giants to start the season.
Can Zorn Coach? Certainly his play calling invites people to question his ability. A case can be made the season ended when we had a 3-&-1 on Cincinnati’s goal line and they handed off to Sellers twice. Why not Portis? Why not pass? During the last few games when the Redskins got into the Red Zone, they relied more on the run than the pass. West Coach Offense? We had a broken line and Portis was close to being beaten to death, why not pass?

This leads to questions about Campbell. Some say he is slow to deliver the ball. Others say he is slow, and they’re not talking foot speed. One has to wonder. After two years with offensive coordinator Al Saunders, Campbell was never allowed to run the whole playbook. We saw how well the playbook worked with Collins at quarterback. Zorn also did not install the complete playbook. Blaming Campbell for all of the offensive scoring problems would be a mistake. Our wide receivers are just average and the offensive line started the season old and by the end of the season, broken down.

On the defensive side Coach Greg Blache should be Defensive Coach of the Year, if there was such an award. To have the Redskins finish with the 4th best defense with no pass rush is almost miraculous. However, their linebackers are old and to expect another such performance next year seems like an impossible task.

So it’s up to Dano and Vinny to fix the team for next year. Those thoughts, next week.