Moderator: LyricalRico
“We’ll go into the season with Robert as the No. 1 guy,” Gruden said Wednesday at the NFL scouting combine. “It’s up to Robert to continue to grow and mature as a quarterback. In the future, we want to see some improvement, and it’s up to us as a staff to get the most out of him.”
Let’s examine the chain of events and see whether we can figure out what happened. At the end of a 4-12 season, Gruden announced about his quarterback, “Until that position is earned, you have to have a competition.” Griffin hadn’t earned it: He was still struggling to master the offense and make reads and needed a ton of work on his mechanics, which left the door open for Kirk Cousins or Colt McCoy.
But just a few days later, Griffin gave an interview to ESPN 980 that showed he and his coach were not at all on the same page about that. During Super Bowl week, Griffin was asked what made Tom Brady and Russell Wilson great. Hit rewind and listen. He didn’t focus on their mechanics. Or the intelligence of their reads. Or their exhaustive film study. Here was his answer. “I think it just comes with the organizational support that they have as well to be the players they are, to understand that this is our guy no matter what,” he said.
He then cited Wilson throwing four interceptions in the NFC championship game yet coming back to beat the Packers. “I think that guy knows in the back of his head that the entire team has his back and the entire organization has his back. And I think that’s important. . . . I can take different pieces of their game, but I also understand the situations that they’re in and try to take that as well and know that this is how you build a winner. This is how you build a family-like atmosphere. And that’s what we’re trying to do with the Redskins, and that’s what I want to be a part of.”
An oft-injured quarterback who just turned 25 — who has gone 5-15 as a starter over his past two seasons and has glaring weaknesses in both physical performance and temperament — believed the main thing separating him from Brady and Wilson was organizational support. And he wanted a similar unconditional commitment from his team.
Guess what? He got it.
He got it just two days after a report surfaced that Cousins was spending time studying with Jon Gruden, brother-analyst of the head coach, in order to grasp the system better and compete for the starting job.
This is how the franchise operates under owner Dan Snyder and why nothing ever gets any better. Behind every nonsensical, destructive decision, you find Snyder empowering exactly the wrong person because he is his pet.
A day after Washington Redskins general manager Scot McCloughan wouldn't rule out drafting a quarterback with the No. 5 overall pick, coach Jay Gruden reiterated there would be no hesitation to snag a signal-caller if there was consensus in the draft room.
"It's something we have to talk about in-house," Gruden said Wednesday at the NFL Annual Meeting when asked if taking a quarterback would be starting over at the game's most important position, per CSN Washington. "If we think it's worth the risk to hit the reset button, if he's that good of a football player, if we decide in the building that he's that good of a football player that we think we should do that, then we should do that."
FreeBalling wrote:There were comments on the Wizards board about the Redskins. Basketball fans talking football. Who ever that mod was that forced change.
I told you so...
LyricalRico wrote:FreeBalling wrote:There were comments on the Wizards board about the Redskins. Basketball fans talking football. Who ever that mod was that forced change.
I told you so...
Take it up with Howard Mass and RealGM management. They went through the trouble and expense of building out these separate forums for the other sports, so it's understandable that they would implement policies aimed at driving traffic where they want it to go.
Even taking my moderator role out of it, I've always thought it was silly that people would stop posting just because it takes literally one more click to go to a different screen. And the same exact people will continue to post in all types of places (General Board, Trade Board, etc.) that require them to go somewhere other than the Wizards forum to discuss certain topics. Completely and indefensibly silly IMO.
Ruzious wrote:As for QB, the team is going about it the way I would. There were no top QBs in the draft, so the draft wasn't really an option this offseason, and going for a veteran wouldn't have made much sense unless your goal was to try to be a .500 team. Do I think RG3 is the answer for the future? Probably not, but possibly yes. It doesn't hurt to give him one more year - considering the options. In the meantime, they're building the infrastructure - if you will - so that if they draft a top QB prospect next year, that QB will have a better chance at success.
FreeBalling wrote:RG3 is a tier 4 QB, 28 out of 32. I'm surprised he's still starting. I guess Dan needs another season of Robert to show the fan how wrong we are.
How can we have the same 3 qb's? Jay wants McCoy, Dan wants RG and a large section of the fans wants Cousins... Talk about messed up.
Colt McCoy had an impressive touchdown pass from inside the red zone as well. He got a bad shotgun snap, and the ball hit the ground. McCoy scooped up the ball, then quickly threw back across his body to rookie receiver Evan Spencer, who made a diving catch in the front of the end zone.
Wizardspride wrote:[tweet]https://twitter.com/ESPNRadio980/status/631235177033764864[/tweet]
[tweet]https://twitter.com/ESPNRadio980/status/631234048560529408[/tweet]
[tweet]https://twitter.com/ESPNRadio980/status/631234287841325056[/tweet]
Ruzious wrote:Wizardspride wrote:[tweet]https://twitter.com/ESPNRadio980/status/631235177033764864[/tweet]
[tweet]https://twitter.com/ESPNRadio980/status/631234048560529408[/tweet]
[tweet]https://twitter.com/ESPNRadio980/status/631234287841325056[/tweet]
Interesting stuff. Jay understands the situation - and that he made his bed last year by being negative. Being negative was a disaster, so let's try being overwhelmingly positive. There's nothing to lose. If it doesn't work (and it probably won't), he can at least legitimately say he gave it every chance to work. He tried everything.
Ruzious wrote:I just hope that's the way it stays, but it's not likely a QB who seemed so fundamentally flawed last year can become a good QB the next - playing in basically the same system. I would LOVE to be wrong.
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