The Gap at Tackle Is Large, but the Season Isn't Over Just Yet
By Thomas Boswell
Wednesday, August 11, 2004; Page D01
Some Redskins sign autographs after training camp practice even when they're exhausted and so soaked with sweat they look like they've been drenched with a fire hose. Plenty don't. Or they sign one or two and split the scene.
Last week, Jon Jansen worked the long line of kids who were pressed against the restraining ropes. In a T-shirt, his arms looked like the size of a normal man's legs. At one point, a row of waist-high thorn bushes prevented players from reaching out to the crowd to grab scorecards and footballs to sign. Seeing a natural excuse to head for the showers, they would end their signing.
Except for Jansen. The 305-pound tackle, who in his sixth season is the senior Redskin in time of service, squeezed deep into the thorn bushes until he had reached as far as he could and signed every object that every child could stick in his hand.
In everything as a Redskin, Jansen went the extra mile. Or inch. Whatever the occasion required. That's why, now that he is out for the season with a torn Achilles' tendon, his presence will be missed just as much as his run blocks at right tackle. Though never a Pro Bowl selection in five seasons, Jansen was known as "The Rock," since he never missed a game in his career. While perhaps only an excellent player, not a great one, he was still a central character on a team with little character to spare.
By this season, after the ritual decimations that the Redskins inflicted on themselves three times in the past four years, Jansen was one of only three players left who felt like true long-term Redskins. Few franchises are ever this bereft of team identity or institutional memory. But the Redskins came perilously close to being an aggregation of virtual strangers.
"Jon, Chris [Samuels] and I have talked about how we're like the Last of the Mohicans on this team. We have to be the ones to set the tone," said LaVar Arrington, still stunned after seeing Jansen's season end in the first quarter of the first preseason game Monday. "When I saw what had happened, I just said, 'Wow, Jansen. He never gets hurt.' That one was tough to swallow."
If it is tough for his teammates, it will be almost unbearable for Jansen. He saw the return of Joe Gibbs and his much-decorated coaching staff as a chance to revitalize a Redskins career that had featured only two playoff games, way back in his rookie season of '99. "I've seen some good and a lot of bad since I got here," said Jansen, who got the flavor of winning as part of a national championship team at Michigan. "How many guys can say they played for a Hall of Fame coach? Oh, now that [Gibbs] is here, this is going to be a great career, if I can be around for some of the real good times."
Jansen won't be on the field this season, though Gibbs considers him so valuable as a leader that "we want to get him back as soon as possible just so he can be around the team. . . . He's going to be a Redskin forever." Interestingly, Gibbs showed great concern about Jansen's health in future seasons, but none whatsoever about him returning quickly to play this year. Does that perhaps show that Gibbs -- unlike Steve Spurrier -- plans to fulfill his five-year contract?
While Jansen's injury will cause Joe Bugel to scramble in restructuring his offensive line, you would think, from the hysterical local reactions, that the Redskins had just lost multiple future Hall of Famers on Monday night. In fact, one veteran Post photographer's reaction to seeing Jansen hurt was to say instantly, "The season is over."
Redskins Country is a bizarre place of exaggerated emotion and violent overreaction to every conceivable event. We're like the fanatic Red Sox Nation, but without the Calvinist preference for eternal damnation. Since the Redskins won NFL titles as far back as the '30s and '40s and Super Bowls as recently as the '80s and '90s, we assume that the franchise would be a champion again if only the bete noire of the moment (owner Daniel Snyder in recent years) would just stop messing things up.
It has been this way my entire adult life, since the day Vince Lombardi came to town in 1969 to restore the team's glory. Since then, a condition of manic elation or depression has almost always been in place. Yet I never get over my sense of wonder at the phenomenon. Even my late father, who came to town in Sammy Baugh's heyday, abandoned his usual scrupulous judgments whenever the Redskins were the subject of conversation. Defeat was improper, abnormal.
So, in this atmosphere, Jansen's injury can't simply mean that the Redskins will have to figure out whether Derrick Dockery or Kenyatta Jones moves into the right tackle spot. No, it has to be the End of the Redskins' World as We Know It.
Actually, the Redskins' front office has constructed an enormously expensive team that is, nevertheless, painfully thin at some key spots. If running back Clinton Portis were out for the season, his backups would be pitiful. If wide receiver Laveranues Coles or a couple of defensive linemen were hurt, that would create voids.
But depth in the offensive line isn't one of the problems. Bugel has been scratching his head about having six players with the ability to start at five positions. Backup center Cory Raymer, coming back from a ruptured Achilles' last year, was the odd 300-pounder left out. Now he may be back in.
If the 345-pound Dockery moves to right tackle, then Raymer takes over at center and current center Lennie Friedman would move to left guard. Confusing, yes. But at least in that case, the overall talent level of the Dirtbags might not fall as much as many assume. It's a rare 5-11 team that has such decent choices after losing a player as good as Jansen. Of course, it's a rare 5-11 team that has the highest payroll in history. So with Snyder's wallet wide open, there's never an excuse for a bare cupboard.
In NFL towns a thousand miles from the nation's capital, the injury to Jansen is probably seen in more sensible perspective. If Gibbs and his AARP coaching staff still have their touch, and if all the team's high-salaried offseason additions are as good as advertised, then the loss of one lineman who has never been a Pro Bowler should be the kind of injury that a quality team can surmount. If it starts to unravel the whole plan, then how good were the Redskins of Gibbs II going to be anyway?
So come in off the ledge.
After all, you don't want to jump before we find out whether plucky Tim Hasselbeck beats out bewildered Patrick Ramsey for backup quarterback -- a position of influence in Washington that ranks somewhere between secretary of state and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
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Already the NFL's Largest, FedEx Adds 5,000 Seats
Stadium Undergoes $23 Million Expansion
By Thomas Heath
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 11, 2004; Page D07
Washington Redskins owner Daniel Snyder has found a way to make the biggest stadium in the NFL even bigger, squeezing another 5,000-plus seats into FedEx Field in time for Saturday's preseason game marking the return of Coach Joe Gibbs.
FedEx Field's capacity is 91,665, up from 86,484 last year. The new seats range from about 4,000 lower-level general admission seats, some with partially obscured views, to 300 more "dream seats" ringing the field to another 500 luxury loge seats. Both the dream seats and loge seats cost about $3,500 per seat per season, according to Redskins spokesman Karl Swanson. Another 150 or so seats that accompany the 11 new Owner's Club suites have been added.
The $23 million expansion was originally planned as part of the team's bid to land the 2008 Super Bowl, which was given to the Arizona Cardinals. When the team brought back three-time Super Bowl winner Gibbs, ticket demand led to the expansion.
"We would not have done this had Coach Gibbs not come back," Swanson said.
Club-level fans also will see a new Hooters restaurant and the loge level includes an expansive bar and flat-screen televisions. There's even an experimental "Forward Pass" debit card program that allows cardholders to circumvent cash-only concession lines.
The Redskins added the seats by stretching the balcony to add two rows to the loge section, which rings the end zone above the club level, at one end of the stadium.
The 4,000 new general admission seats, priced at $69 each, were created by adding 10 rows to the back of the lower bowl section that rings the north half of the stadium and are tucked under the premium club seats. Giant pillars block the view from a number of the new seats, which are built on metal risers. Dozens of flat screen televisions and speakers have been installed to compensate.
"We did full disclosure and told people to come look at these seats and see if you want them," said Swanson. "There are definitely trade-offs."
Unlike many taxpayer-funded stadiums, the Redskins' was privately built in 1997 at a cost of about $250 million. Snyder, who bought the team and stadium in 1999 for $800 million, has labored to increase revenue from the facility and team, ranging from parking to premium seating to opening Redskins retail stores throughout the Washington area.
As a result, the Redskins are one of the most powerful economic engines in sports, earning revenues estimated at well over $200 million annually. That's going to get bigger with Gibbs's return.
"Dan Snyder has taken one of the strongest sports brands in the country and added the nostalgia factor of Joe Gibbs," said sports marketer Marc S. Ganis, president of Chicago-based SportsCorp Ltd.
The latest increase means Snyder has added approximately 12,000 seats since he bought the team, increasing the number of luxury suites from 199 to around 243. He has spent more than $100 million on stadium improvements, including better plumbing, a wind screen, sound systems, sight-line enhancements and escalators.
During one stadium upgrade in 2000, Snyder unearthed $10 million in new revenue streams, including the installation of 500 more loge seats, establishment of an Owner's Club class of super suites, the addition of 1,500 general admission seats and the initial placement of more than 1,100 dream seats.
Snyder has increased general seat ticket prices twice, in 2000 and '02, when he added $4 to the price in order to cover the cost of increased security in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The Redskins had the second-highest average general admission ticket price in the NFL at $68.06 per ticket last season, according to Team Marketing Report.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/ar ... Aug10.html
Redskins Moving On Without Jansen
Surgery Scheduled for Today; Jones Gets 1st Shot to Fill Hole at Right Tackle
By Jason La Canfora
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 11, 2004; Page D01
With his season over and surgery scheduled for today, offensive lineman Jon Jansen returned yesterday to Redskins Park with a bulky cast on his left leg as the Washington Redskins began the process of replacing him. As Jansen hobbled on crutches because of a ruptured Achilles' tendon, reserve lineman Kenyatta Jones was picked, at least for the moment, to fill his spot when practice resumes today.
Joe Bugel, assistant head coach for offense, said Jones will take Jansen's place at right tackle at this afternoon's workout "rather than shaking up the football team" by switching various linemen.
"Kenyatta Jones actually started 11 games with New England at right tackle in their Super Bowl year [2002], so rather than move the left side over to the right side and this and that, maybe moving one guy would be very settling there," Bugel said. "And I talked to him [Monday] night and he's eager to do that."
League sources said the Redskins have contacted a handful of journeymen linemen, inviting two or three to Redskins Park today to work out with the team. The players, if signed, would be for depth purposes and team officials concede that it will be difficult if not impossible to find an impact player to replace Jansen on the trade or free agent market given the timing of the injury.
"What you had in Jon was kind of a mainstay there," Coach Joe Gibbs said. "I didn't even give a thought to worrying about right tackle, you know what I mean, because I knew his history and [being healthy for] every play in college and every play since he's been here, so you don't even give it a thought. I guess that goes to show you in pro sports anything can happen. So when Jon went down it was a big deal for us. He was a leader and kind of a mainstay for us. We're just praying for him."
Jansen was injured on Washington's second offensive series of a 20-17 victory over the Denver Broncos in the exhibition opener in Canton, Ohio, and his loss is a significant blow to an offensive line that struggled last season.
"It's not a very painful injury," Jansen said. "But for me the pain has never been really physical; it was really emotional for me. It's frustrating because we tread water for three or four years and then things really start to look up and now you've got to watch it from the sidelines. That's the part that hurts the most."
The return of Gibbs and Bugel had excited Jansen, who was selected 37th overall in 1999 and is Washington's longest-serving player. With lefty quarterback Mark Brunell vying for the starting job, Jansen's position on the right side of the line was even more important to the team's success, and he had difficulty sleeping Monday night knowing his season was over.
Jansen said he felt his ankle buckle in the first quarter Monday -- he is unsure if the synthetic field turf recently installed in Fawcett Stadium in Canton had anything to do with the freakish injury -- and quickly realized it was serious. He was helped to the sideline and consoled by teammates on the bench before being carted off. Jansen, 28, had never missed a game in the 80 starts of his pro career and prided himself on his durability.
"Everybody who knows me," Jansen said, "they don't expect Jon Jansen to be laying on the ground and having to be helped off the field. At first you feel just like you let everybody down, but then you realize that there's really nothing you could have done about it. . . . It's unfortunate, and it's something I have to deal with and the Redskins have to deal with, and obviously we'll all deal with it together."
Jansen said he will now focus on helping his teammates, lending advice and taking part in meetings. "By no means is this year over for me in terms of being part of the team," Jansen said. "But it is in terms of being on the field." He will likely be in close contact with Jones, a three-year veteran signed in 2003 from New England.
Randy Thomas, a projected starter at right guard, could return from rib and knee injuries this week, Bugel said, which would bolster the line, while rookies Mark Wilson and Jim Molinaro should get more playing time as well.
"We're going to have to have somebody else be a hero," Gibbs said. "We're going to have to find somebody there, and this will be an opportunity to really help the team and step up and make a career for themselves there, I hope."
Bugel said: "To go out and try to get a starting offensive tackle off the streets is almost impossible. Hopefully, within the next four weeks someone is going to rise to the top on our team."
Jansen, meantime, will spend the next six weeks in a non-weight bearing cast and hopes to be able to begin jogging three months from now. His size -- 6 feet 6, 305 pounds -- could push those projections back given the nature of this injury, but Jansen would like to be able to begin practicing in four months, allowing him to get into shape for the start of offseason workouts.
"I've always been a quick mender," Jansen said. "I don't swell very much and there wasn't very much swelling in it today, so I'm shooting for the four-month mark. . . . It's just a pain in the butt for a while and I'll be back next year."
Redskins Notes: League sources confirmed that rookie safety Sean Taylor, who had two interceptions and a touchdown Monday night ("Last week he really lit it up," Gibbs said, "not only in the game but in practice.") officially submitted paperwork with the NFL Players Association making Drew Rosenhaus his new agent. Taylor fired Rosenhaus two days after being taken with the fifth overall pick, used agents Jeffrey Moorad and Eugene Mato to negotiate his contract and then fired them last week and rehired Rosenhaus. Taylor, whose six-year deal includes $13 million in bonus money and could be worth a maximum of $40 million, was upset about the higher bonuses other top picks received after his deal was signed and is seeking to renegotiate, although the contract cannot be altered for one year. Taylor's appeal of his $25,000 fine for leaving the mandatory NFL rookie symposium remains under review and no decision has been made, sources said. . . . The Redskins have canceled today's 9 a.m. practice and the team's final open practice will be today at 4:30 p.m. The rest of camp is closed to the public. . . . Gibbs said linebacker Mike Barrow (tendinitis in left knee) is day-to-day, while defensive end Phillip Daniels (abdominal strain) is out indefinitely. . . . Gibbs called the offensive performance Monday night "rough," but was more concerned with the nine penalties his team committed. "That's a big deal," Gibbs said. "We've been working really hard on that and that upsets you."
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