I've been a Redskins fan since first grade, when I was taught by raving Redskins fan and former Redskins employee Mrs. Morrison. But this year I'm facing an existential question- am I really a Redskins fan when I don't plan to watch the games and am rooting against the coach, quarterback, and running back? I'm sure I'm not alone in my significant loss of interest towards the Redskins. I'm starting to think that Dan Snyder and Mike Shanahan have made it their mission to eliminate as much fan interest in their team as possible, because there's no way they could have been so spectacularly successful by accident.
I could handle the years of losing, because there was always one young player at one of the star positions who I could latch onto. While I couldn't always cheer for the team, there was always a player I could cheer for. Not anymore. With the advent of the My Way Mike coaching era, any player who you could possibly rally behind is gone. Jason Campbell? Gone (okay I understand but don't support that one). His replacement, future Pro-bowler Donovan Mcnabb? Gone. Clinton Portis, Malcolm Kelly, Devin Thomas? Gone. My favorite player last year was actually Brandon Banks and I don't think I was alone in this. This year, Banks almost got cut. The fact that this was even a possibility is infuriating and an example of what is wrong with Mike Shanahan as a head coach. Now we're left with Rex Grossman and Tim Hightower to try to cheer for. And Snyder is wondering where all the fans went?
Hightower and Grossman are two of the main reasons for my apathy towards the team this year. Does anybody else realize that at the two most important positions in the game- quarterback and running back, the Redskins are starting two players who have already failed on much better teams? Is this a formula for success? This team sucks, and yet no one seems to realize it. There is no talk of rebuilding. There is no quarterback of the future. There is no running back of the future (unless Roy Helu turns out to be as good in the regular season as he was in the preseason). There is probably not even a single wide receiver of the future. Callers on 106.7 The Fan are arguing about how the Redskins are going to be 5-11, not 2-14. And yet you have quotes like this from Santana Moss: "When you’re going into a year when you’re trying to win now, you’re trying to do some things, you want to be solid at the QB position." As a team and as an organization, the Redskins are completely deluded, and until they wake up, I don't see any reason to care.
It was a smarter move by shanahan to rebuild in the other positions and to find the qb of the future in next yrs draft class, where the qbs (landry jones, andrew luck, and matt barkley) are much more accurate qbs. We have ryan torain, roy helu, and tim hightower who are relatively young rbs. There is also niles paul, leonard hankerson, and anthony armstrong at wr. At cb, we have josh wilson and kevin barnes and at safety we drafted dejon gomes. The fact is that the roster is much younger compared to last year and despite the fact that this was preseason, hightower and grossman did plenty to infuse optimism about the team. Hightower posted a whopping 6.0+ ypc and grossman a 90+ qb rating. When Shanahan had signed on as coach of the skins, he had warned dan snyder that this would be a 5-year rebuilding process. I am finally glad that someone in the ownership is finally trying to do what we should have done within the last 10 years.
ReplyDeleteBut Amit, you don't actually think that Grossman, Hightower, and Helu will actually play as well in the regular season as they did in the preseason? Do you remember that one preseason where the Redskins went 4-0 under Spurrier (or maybe 3-1, I don't remember), and sucked? Also, I don't consider Paul or Hankerson as WRs to be built around, because neither has been very impressive so far, and I think both barely even made the cut for the Redskins. I can agree with your QB of the future point though.
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