The-Hogs.net - Washington Football Discussion, Redskins to Commanders Era

As Joe Gibbs would say, "to be quite truthful" I'm a little concerned about how this coaching search is unraveling. However...

I'm going to play devil's advocate.

Why is everyone so enamoured with the status quo? I know wholesale changes harkin back to the Norv/Robiskie/Marty/Ball Coach carousel of unstability...BUT...as much as I love Joe Gibbs, I have been very frustrated over the course of the last four seasons.

There is not a true, die-hard fan on this board that can't honestly admit the last four seasons have been, on the whole, extremely dissapointing.

We needed miracle finishes in 05 and 07 to qualify as the 6th seed following seasons of repeated close losses and second-half collapses. 04 and 06 were awful and extremely dissapointing. Look up and down the Redskin roster and tell me that this team is lacking in talent???

I'm not sure that GW is the answer...I'm not sure that he's not. However, based on results...the Redskins have underachieved the last four seasons and that's the truth. Looking outside for the next coach is not something that is completely unwarranted.

Now the way the search is going....well, that's another story.

The way I see it, the team has a lot of talent. And I don't think that that's blatant homerism; I really believe we have the talent on both sides of the ball to compete.

The thing is, is that our players and especially our QB have never gotten into any kind of rhythm in terms of knowing their system and their roles. And when that keeps changing every year, they're never going to be comfortable. Continuity allows the players to learn the system and get comfortable in it.

In my opinion.

I think the last four seasons were disapointing because of the Norv/Martyball/SS dibacle and only now is this team begining to get its footing under it. If Snyder and Co, continue to want to blow things up and start from scratch, this franchise will continue to be adfrit amoungst the NFL's bottom feeders.

Gibbs even said as he was leaving that he felt this team is close to doing something special, why dystroy that?

There is certainly a case to be made for continuity. I think you see successful teams like the Cowher Steelers, Belichick Patriots and to a lesser degree, the Fisher Titans as proof of that.

However, Four years in the NFL is an enternity. You invariably have a lot of player movement over that time period regardless of who's coaching.

I think if you can't get to the next level in four years, something is wrong.

Look at the Packers...McCarthy and Thompson went in and took an aging team going nowhere fast and completely turned them around going 8-8 in year one to 13-3 this year and the brink of the SB.

Why so long for the Redskins?? 6-10, 10-6, 5-11 and 9-7 is a yo-yo up and down deal that doesn't breed a lot of confidence that this is the right direction. Can someone help me understand?

hogproud wrote:As Joe Gibbs would say, "to be quite truthful" I'm a little concerned about how this coaching search is unraveling. However...

I'm going to play devil's advocate.

Why is everyone so enamoured with the status quo? I know wholesale changes harkin back to the Norv/Robiskie/Marty/Ball Coach carousel of unstability...BUT...as much as I love Joe Gibbs, I have been very frustrated over the course of the last four seasons.

There is not a true, die-hard fan on this board that can't honestly admit the last four seasons have been, on the whole, extremely disappointing.

We needed miracle finishes in 05 and 07 to qualify as the 6th seed following seasons of repeated close losses and second-half collapses. 04 and 06 were awful and extremely disappointing. Look up and down the Redskin roster and tell me that this team is lacking in talent???

I'm not sure that GW is the answer...I'm not sure that he's not. However, based on results...the Redskins have underachieved the last four seasons and that's the truth. Looking outside for the next coach is not something that is completely unwarranted.

Now the way the search is going....well, that's another story.

Every bit of what you said is true. Here are somethings are equally as true:

- In the twelve years prior to Gibbs coming back the Skins made the playoffs once and won one playoff game.
- In the fours Gibbs was back he made the playoffs twice and won one game.
- From 29 December 1996 until now the Cowturds have won Zero playoff games (That doesn't really apply to this thread - it is just fun to point out )

I'll take two trips to the playoffs in 4 years over 1 in 12.

That being said, I don't think the Skins would make the playoffs at all with GW at the helm. If they didn't do it next year they never would. Without Gibbs here keeping this team "in it all together" they would never have made the playoff.

I don't like the idea of Fassel as the HC, but there is no denying he was a much more successful coach his first time as HC than GW was.

Could we please get a guy that isn't e retread. And like Riggo pointed out, the MOST SUCCESFUL HC available is Marty. If we are going to go with a retread why not get the retread of all retreads!

hogproud wrote:I'm not sure that GW is the answer...I'm not sure that he's not. However, based on results...the Redskins have underachieved the last four seasons and that's the truth. Looking outside for the next coach is not something that is completely unwarranted.

Now the way the search is going....well, that's another story.

Good point hogproud. What's particularly funny is I spent last season arguing with the GW bashers that he was a very good D coordinator and shouldn't be fired. This year he's become the site automatic for head coach. I thought he would get the job. Obviously Snyder gave him every chance, but the fact is if Snyder didn't feel he was his guy he had to go elsewhere. In the end whether I trust Snyder or not Snyder has to trust Snyder. Following the sentiments of raving fans makes no more sense then throwing money at big names. If he's ever going to win he's going to have to do it his way.

hogproud wrote:I'm not sure that GW is the answer...I'm not sure that he's not. However, based on results...the Redskins have underachieved the last four seasons and that's the truth. Looking outside for the next coach is not something that is completely unwarranted.

Now the way the search is going....well, that's another story.

Yeah, this team had underachieved during the past 4 years!

How many teams in the playoffs had less talent than us in 05 and this year. I don't think any. I am open to here arguments.

In 05 we made it w/MB#8 at the helm and by the time we made it we were missing R Thomas, every WR except Moss, and we had a D that was playing great with smoke and mirrors.

In 07 we lost 3/5 of our OL from 06 (and two of their backups), we had our best player killed, and we were missing starters at FS (obviously), CB, WLB, LG, LG, LT, our #3 WR, and QB. We were in a division that the worst team was 8-8, had the #1 seed, and the NFC champion. We play the second hardest schedule in the NFL.

Our team is SO talented we have sent 7 players to the pro-bowl in 4 years. ST twice, Samuals twice, The red snapper, ey, and Marcus.

Almost every national mag picked this team to go 6-10 or 7-9 and finish last in the NFC East and that was If we stayed healthy.

So tell me how have we underachieved?

Skinsfan33...let me point out how the Redskins underachieved in the past four seasons.

04 and 06 are self explanatory.

As for 05 and 07...yes, the Redskins made the playoffs and that's nice. But needing miracle finishes to get in both times to secure the last seed is certainly not "over" achieving.

Injuries are part of the game. The Giants are in the Super Bowl despite being VERY banged up. Some players have managed to continue contributing, including Brandon Jacobs, who missed most of September with a knee injury, and wideout Plaxico Burress, who has battled an injured ankle. But several others have been lost for the season to broken bones, including linebacker Mathias Kiwanuka, tight end Jeremy Shockey, and running back Derrick Ward.

Look at the Chargers...they were a MASH unit by the time they rolled into Foxboro for the AFC title.

I could go on and on...so the injury excuse isn't going to fly. It's part of the NFL and to be quite truthful...the offensive line was not much of an issue down the stretch this year. Heyer and the rest of the subs played effectively.

The relative small number of pro bowl performers is not a true indication of the talent level, but rather, a reflection of the kind of seasons the Redskins have had. Invariably, teams with better records have more players picked to the pro bowl. That's the way it goes.

The point I was trying to make concerning the underachieving is this: the Redskins are a cornerstone franchise in the NFL. The last four years are not indicitive of where this franchise needs and should be.

If you think 6-10, 10-6, 5-11 and 9-7 is par far this franchise then you certainly have the right to feel that way. However, I truly and honestly believe that that is simply not good enough. Given the financial resources, fan support and overall tradition of this franchise...more should be expected.


Remember the Glory...don't settle for less

There is not a true, die-hard fan on this board that can't honestly admit the last four seasons have been, on the whole, extremely dissapointing.

OK. I think I'm a true and die-hard Redskin fan, and I think the last four seasons have been, on the whole, the best since Joe Gibbs retired in 1993.

(Sure, to be exact about it, I thought Marty S. had begun to make the Redskins into a team again, but I blinked and he was gone.)

For the first time in years, the Redskins began to behave like the Redskins. They hit, they played defense, the organization began to shed the perpetual search for 35 year old ex-stars. The team started playing like a team, rather than a collection of guys in the same uniform.

Of course the process was not complete. The team needs a big WR, like Art Monk, the future Hall of Famer who retired holding the record for receptions, and who was drafted to be a lot like Charley Taylor, also a Hall of Famer who also retired holding the all-time record for receptions.

So they had not found the next Art Monk? Big deal. I don't see any QB in the NFL today who can pass as well as Sonny Jurgensen did.

The team lacked depth at OL, but did pretty well considering the injuries. Something that a smart draft could fix.

The DL needs another Charles Mann or a modern Diron Talbert, but, again, that's something a draft can fix.

Dissapointed? Only in Redskin fans who failed to appreciate what they had when Gibbs returned.

Dissapointed? Only in Redskin fans who failed to appreciate what they had when Gibbs returned.

Welch,

It's not that I don't appreciate Gibbs' return and what he did for the franchise in terms of stabilizing certain aspects. And yes, there were some very positive trends developing.

But there were also many disturbing trends surrounding performance and results. Particularly, the incapability of winning close games and repeatedly giving up second half leads. In the 1980's Gibbs was a master of the half-time adjustments...that was his calling card. Something was missing in his second tour of duty.

Gibbs took the team to a title in just his second season the first time around. Things just didn't click in his encore... I've said it before and I'll say it again...4 years is forever in the NFL.

As a life-long Redskins fan I appreciate Joe's passion and contributions this time around and yes the team is better today than when he got here. And yes, he added much needed stability and laid a nice foundation. But again...reflecting back, as a whole, I expected a little bit more.

Honestly...I think everybody did.


Remember the Glory

Honestly...I think everybody did.

I expected it would take longer than the first time.

Gibbs took over a team that had begun rebuilding in Allen's last seasons and continued with Pardee. They got Riggins, Theismann, and Butz...important guys. The Allen/Pardee teams won for ten years, and had developed a an intensity...or a mutual expectation about winning.

Gibbs started with a respectable defense, great defensive coaching, a good QB (not Dan Fouts, but a quick-witted, slick QB), a great RB, Monk, who was starting his second year. Beathard found an all-star OL.

The Turner/Snyder teams were as lame as any, even during those occasional years when Turner had a winning record.

It hurt that Gibbs started with no QB...imagine if he had had Turner's playoff team, with Johnson and Davis? No big WR. A thin OL. Most of all, a team tradition of under-performing, added to three years of Spurrier's coaching and drafting. Rod Gardner? Ramsey, Wuerffel, and Mathews? Running the ball? All that.

One thing about Gibbs and second half adjustments: I think (that is, guess...not much evidence) that the classic Gibbs teams were smarter, more skilled and disciplined, than the one he inherited and reconstructed. I think he could make changes because his players understood more.

What evidence? Not much, but I remember that Gibbs taught them the Bills no-huddle offense at the end of the '91 season, and used it in the Super Bowl. He said, later, that he could do it because that offense was so practiced that it could do anything. Might have compared it to a great racing car that responds to a driver. And it shocked the Bills defense.

Meanwhile, Petibon trained the defense to make their substitutions in the time it took the Bills to line up. Petibon got his defensive packages into the game, which flustered the Bills. No team had done that, which meant that the simple Bills offense could not force the Redskins defense simply to react.

This Gibbs team had yet reached that level. Maybe a sluggish team restricted the changes Gibbs could make. There is no reason to believe that he forgot how to adjust. He certainly remembered how to fire-up a team.

I expected more and was a little disappointed in how we were going this season but towards the end, especially after all that we went through - I thought the team was finally looking pretty close to playing well together.

While I am not against change per se and with Gibbs gone was kind of expecting some more changes but the problem I have is that we had a standard here and something that could be built on at the end of the year - Snyder has taken that foundation and is hoping to have a great team but everything now has to get back to a level that we had already gone far beyond - very disappointing to have to get that standard of achievement back and it will take time.

You know what...good riddance to the status quo.

Continuity of what? The cover 3 defense that allows teams to march down the field into the red-zone? An offense that is so confusing to defenses that it even confuses our own offense?

Boo-Hoo all you want for the players that wanted Greg Williams to stay, most of that was sentimental loyalty talking anyway. I'm sure Greg was a good guy, but seriously, the defense in '06 was a liability. It was THE liability. If the defense had not been the 31st ranked defense in the league that year, we are talking about three playoff berths in four years...not two. Do I even need to mention Archuletta?

The players know Blache, so it's not like a total stranger coming in here on defense.

If Zorn can do for Campbell what he appears to have done with Hasselbeck, is that such a bad thing either? I think Zorn is more likely to be a bit more humble and shape an offense to the strengths of the players versus trying to force them to conform to his "proven genius".

I am certain the the team (maybe not the players, but at least the ownership/management) knows who the coach is going to be. They said they won't announce it until "after the Superbowl" so that it doesn't over-shadow it, but that is EXACTLY why we AREN'T naming him. The media circus of speculation has been enormous thus far, now picture an entire week of speculation built around the named coordinators. The buzz around this team is gonna be huge while everyone waits for the announcement.

There will be three teams talked about this week. New York, New England, and Washington.

Will it be Fassel? Will it be Schottenhimer <sp> (my personal favorite, but I'm not holding my breath), or hey, has anyone considered that it might just be Bugel? Who could it be? The media is going to eat itself alive with it's theories.

The two general keys to a winning team are selecting the right players, and having the right coaches. I think this year we showed that we can select the right players. We were dragging in players from no-where to fill injury needs and they played great (Daughty, Goldsten, Caldwell, Heyer, and more).

Here's hoping we picked the right coaches.

Gregg Williams was a good Redskin and did a fine job as DC. I wish him nothing but the best. Did he deserve to be HC? Maybe. But one thing we need to keep in mind is that on the outside we cannot understand the inner-workings of the personalities involved. For any relationship to function, the principals must be on the same page and get a long. I'm not the biggest Snyder fan in the world (and I'm trying real hard to give him the benefit of the doubt) but he deserves to hire someone that a) he thinks can do the job and b) he's comfortable with.