To our coaches - give Portis the damn ball!

hkHog · Post by **hkHog** » Sun Nov 14, 2004 8:33 pm

I never thought I would do this but I really have to question our coaching staff. Again, poor clock management and TERRIBLE play calling!

Why don't you give Portis, our best player and one of the best in the league, more carries when your passing game is non-existant and he is averaging over 5yds/carry in the game. This is the same as the Green Bay game. I didn't see his tounge hanging out, so give him the fricking ball! It's a complete waste not to give him the ball until they can stop him. Especially because it would have helped Ramsey out a lot in the first half.

Also Ramsey should have come in at least a couple weeks ago. Everyone knew that Brunell was no good, Gibbs waited too long. Now if Ramsey is the starter for the rest of the year look at who he gets to face in the next four weeks - Philly twice and Pittsburg! He played very well at the end of the game but now he is really being thrown in in a very bad spot. So much for bringing him along.

Now, I have faith in Gibbs. He will turn this team around but it is frustrating that we keep making the same mistakes week after week. Our team just looked horrible in the first half. I thought after last week we realized that we had to run Portis to be successful. But look at the statistics:

46 passing attempts to 20 rushing attempts!!!!!

Now that is rediculous! Three of those attempts were really QB runs as well. On so many series we just went three and out without even giving the ball to Portis once. Terrible, what were they thinking!

BTW, Sean Taylor is awesome!

hkHog · Post by **hkHog** » Sun Nov 14, 2004 8:39 pm

I also thing that Gibbs was making Brunell pass so much because he wanted to prove that Brunell still had an arm and he wanted to shut all the critics up. I think he was just being stubborn to say "I told you guys he could do it." Why weren't we running on the worst run D in the league. IMO we just threw that game away right from the very begining. What were the coaches thinking?

1niksder · Post by **1niksder** » Sun Nov 14, 2004 8:39 pm

It's hard to run the ball when you're down 17...Running the ball and playing catch up don't really go together. But those days are hopfully behind us. Gibbs said the plan was to let CP run today he felt he was going to have a big day. Then we got behind thanks to the $8 million dollar man

hkHog · Post by **hkHog** » Sun Nov 14, 2004 8:45 pm

1niksder wrote:It's hard to run the ball when you're down 17...Running the ball and playing catch up don't really go together. But those days are hopfully behind us. Gibbs said the plan was to let CP run today he felt he was going to have a big day. Then we got behind thanks to the $8 million dollar man

That's what I'm saying, why didn't he run Portis from the start of the game! Don't wait until you're down by 17! He did not run him at all in the first quarter. Every play was a Brunell pass (BTW, Brunell's passer rating was 0.0). I say, run him every play! WTF!?!?!? I just heard Charles Mann say the same thing. He had 17 carries against the WORST RUN DEFENSE IN THE NFL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Unacceptable!

Also, you have to remember that CP is a homerun threat. He can score a TD from anywhere. You can run him even when you're behind if you have some time left. Just look at this stat:

Avg yds per pass - 3.5

Avg yds per Portis carry - 4.8

He was over 5yds/carry until his final carry as well!

Irn-Bru · Post by **Irn-Bru** » Sun Nov 14, 2004 8:52 pm

It was strange to see us throw all those passes to start the game--I guess Gibbs thought that Marvin Lewis would be expecting the run? I wish I could have watched the game instead of listening to it.

Better luck next week, and now that Ramsey is in maybe we can all hope for a little upset to give us something to be happy about next week.

As for tonight and tomorrow, well, they're kind of ruined.

redskincity · Post by **redskincity** » Sun Nov 14, 2004 9:24 pm

Portis could have had an 150+ game today.

redskincity · Post by **redskincity** » Sun Nov 14, 2004 9:25 pm

FanfromAnnapolis wrote:It was strange to see us throw all those passes to start the game--I guess Gibbs thought that Marvin Lewis would be expecting the run? I wish I could have watched the game instead of listening to it.

Better luck next week, and now that Ramsey is in maybe we can all hope for a little upset to give us something to be happy about next week.

As for tonight and tomorrow, well, they're kind of ruined.

Samuels and Dock said they kept stacking the line and forced us to throw.

Champsturf · Post by **Champsturf** » Sun Nov 14, 2004 9:45 pm

That's been done to us for 9 weeks now. I don't think that had a thing to do with it. It was just flat out bad play calling.

jditty47 · Post by **jditty47** » Sun Nov 14, 2004 10:04 pm

ya i was quite shocked to see u guys throw so much. I dont think ppl realize that our secondary is actually good. Our run d is struggling and he coulda gotten double the yards if he woulda got more carries.

1niksder · Post by **1niksder** » Sun Nov 14, 2004 10:09 pm

Illy has no run defense show we were resting CP for next week :lol:

hkHog · Post by **hkHog** » Sun Nov 14, 2004 10:11 pm

redskincity wrote:Portis could have had an 150+ game today.

He would have if he had run 30 times. Maybe 200? They couldn't stop him even with 8 guys in the box and we obviously couldn't pass when they were stacking the line. Also, Cincy played A LOT of nickle after they went up 17.

The offense was so bad today mainly because our coaches made it so. Think about it-

We have one real weakness which we have known about all year and that is Brunell's passing game. Today it was even worse! So what do we do, go out and throw the ball while the other team racks up 17 pts.

This team has one real strength in Clinton Portis. He has been amazing the last few weeks and was unstoppable today (I didn't see Cincy stop him, did you?). So what do you do, throw the ball until you're 17 down, even though your guy is running well, put in a new QB and make him throw every play, even though your guy is running well, and then start to give him some carries with about 20mins to go when he starts to pick up first downs all of a sudden. Even then, after he picks up a couple in a row and cannot be stopped, you choose to throw the ball three times in a row and punt. (May I also add the the Redskins did not complete consecutive passes until the drive when D-Mac came in the game). And then, despite your best player playing well the entire game and not being used very much, you get to the end of the game and you can't give him the ball anymore because you have no time outs.

Basically, we had one aspect of our offense firing on all cylinders while the other couldn't even get started. So what did the coaches decide to do, they tried to win with our weakness and ignored our strength. Sounds like a good game plan to me!

hkHog · Post by **hkHog** » Mon Nov 15, 2004 3:24 pm

Sorry to keep beating this topic but I just saw this in the Post:

Gibbs failed to get running back Clinton Portis involved when the game was close -- Portis carried only eight times in the first half against the NFL's worst rushing defense -- and the offensive line collapsed by allowing five sacks.

Wow! I just can't believe it!!!!!!!!!

gregory smith · Post by **gregory smith** » Mon Nov 15, 2004 4:19 pm

Even down by 17, Portis would have given us the best chance to get back in the game. He has home run potential on any given play. We were down early and Gibbs abandoned the run. Hindsight is 20/20 but had we come out in the second half and run the ball we would have won the game. It was a horrible effort by the Redskins. Defense was flat, receivers dropped balls, playcalling was awful, and even taking the drops into consideration I am wondering if we even have an NFL quarterback on the roster. Had we won that game we would be very much alive and in the hunt. Now we're done. Heartbreaking. Is this like a 40 year curse or something?