Five Quick Thoughts About: Bucs

There were a lot of things to see and feel on a day that was a roller coaster for most of Redskins Nation. After a dominant first half, and then nearly throwing it away in the second half, a knight in shining armor swooped in and saved the day – only our knight had a sleeve on his left arm.

RGIII – why not start where everyone will? The guy is just phenomenal. Every week, he reveals a new wrinkle to his game and or character, and he just keeps impressing everyone that knows anything about football. When Griffin took to the field with less than 2 minutes to go, with 1 timeout, and EVERY drop of momentum going Tampa’s way – I still believed that he would do it. I tweeted: 

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If Burgundy you Bleed, Then Vote For RGIII!

Not surprisingly, Robert Griffin III has been nominated for both player of the week and rookie of the week honors, after his impressive debut on Sunday against the New Orleans Saints.

If you haven’t already, you can choose RGIII as the NFL’s FedEx Air Player of the Week, and/or Pepsi Max Rookie of the Week at NFL.com. Don’t just stare at those links that I provided for you, click on them and vote for your new stud quarterback because your votes decide who wins. Winners will be announced Friday.

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All Green And Wrinkly

Remember when you were a wee lad and your running joke when somebody would say, “I feel like a million bucks,” was to quickly quip, “Yeah! All green and wrinkly! Nanny nanny poo poo.”

Well I’m all green and wrinkly this week, because I feel like a million bucks. Less than 48 hours removed from the 2012 Washington Redskins opener, and the debut of one Robert Griffin III, I STILL can’t get the smile off of my face.

Let me first clarify something, I am not an optimist – at least not by nature. I’m much more of a pragmatist with a hint of realism for the most part. I take my sports seriously – I take my Redskins even more seriously than that. I believe in supporting your team no matter what, but not necessarily blindly either. I am used to tempering both enthusiasm and malaise as a fan, but alas this week, I cannot temper my enthusiasm. We finally got ourselves an all-world player.

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Things I Think I Think I Know

Does my title confuse you? I am calling this things that I think I think I know, because they are preseason lamentations, and reaching solid conclusions from such vanilla observances, can often be sticky. They are things that I know that I saw, I just don’t know how much weight that can be granted, given the overall practice nature of the NFL’s preseason.

1) Kirk Cousins has a future in the NFL. He put on an impressive performance on Saturday night against the Bears, tossing three touchdowns, and shredding the Chicago defense time after time in the second half. Pretty impressive for a guy seeing his first real NFL game action. He looked poised and comfortable, and really seemed to have a firm grasp of his reads, and the Redskins offense.

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Game Thoughts: Bears

I absolutely hate preseason – I tweeted as much during the game – it’s like watching four Injury Bowls in a row. Unfortunately for the Redskins, their 33-31 loss to the Bears was no exception – Brian Orakpo and Brandon Meriweather left the game with first half injuries. MRIs for both players will likely tell a better story this week. Other than that, it was a typical preseason game – filled with highlights and lowlights. Here are some observations:

A lot of people were excited by Brandon Banks 91-yard punt return for a touchdown, and rightfully so, it was an exciting play. But many people in Redskins Nation seemed to believe that him doing so, guaranteed himself a roster spot. I don’t think so. Obviously, the return won’t hurt his claim any, but the Redskins already know that Banks can be a great return man – after all, it’s his third consecutive preseason with a return TD. The Redskins coaching staff told Banks he would have to take a wide receiver spot if he was going to make this team – returning a punt doesn’t do that. Banks definitely flashes brilliant play-making abilities at times, but will it be enough to make this team in 2012?

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Who Popped, Who Dropped?

The Washington Redskins kicked off their 2012 season last night, with a 7-6 victory over the Buffalo Bills in Buffalo. Pre-season games are usually littered with vanilla play-calling, and vanilla packages, but that doesn’t mean that players can’t help or hurt their chances of making a football team. Here are some guys that may have tipped the scale in one direction or another last night.

Popped

Robert Griffin III

Hard to believe that a guy riding the top of a see saw could actually raise his value even more, but the kid from Baylor just continues to prove that he truly has what it takes to not only play in this league, but perhaps one day be special. It isn’t that he did anything physically that blew the doors off or anything, but he most certainly did not look like some rookie tossed into the fire either. It’s hard to peg whether his poise, or his leadership was more impressive, but there is absolutely nothing about the number 10 to suggest that this is his first year in the league – other than public record of course.

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Tonight’s Top 5 Watch List

Everybody likes to watch different elements in the preseason. Here are the top 5 guys that I’ll have my eye on tonight:

RGIII

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He won’t play much… it might be vanilla… he might hand the ball off half the time or more. Does any of that really matter?

Absolutely not. A new era begins for Washington tonight. Regardless of the lack of importance of the performance or the results, don’t try to tell me that Robert Griffin III isn’t the numero uno thing to watch tonight.

I’ll be watching him even when he’s done playing and just standing on the sidelines. So will you.

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