It came 7 weeks later than we thought it would happen, but we finally have confirmation of what we all thought to be true going into the preseason. The Redskins are not good. They are just flat out lousy. Shame on me for even thinking that they were and shame on every other idiot expert that thought we were good after going 3-1 to start the year. If we were good, there was absolutely no chance that Carolina would have won the game today. In fact, going 3-1 was probably the worst thing to happen to this team. First and foremost, it gave the fans a false sense of hope. Secondly, with as bad as the Rams and Dolphins have been, there's no chance now that we get the #1 pick to draft Andrew Luck.
Everybody coming into the season thought that the Redskins could very well be the worst team in the league. Those same people looked silly after we started 3-1, but if you think about it, we only really had one good win in there (28-14 over the Giants). The other two were squeakers and nailbiters. Today we got hammered by a team that went 1-15 last year. The Redskins have played bad football for the last two weeks. Bad football never wins. We can claim injuries have been a problem, and they have been, but good teams overcome injuries, no matter how many or how deep. Here are some example of bad football in this game alone:
-Steve Smith caught everything thrown his way. Our secondary is below average, but when one receiver exploits everybody the way that Steve Smith did today, that is bad. Everybody was wowed over his catch on 3rd and 17 following a holding penalty that took the Panthers down to the 1 yard line early in the 4th quarter, but Josh Wilson and Reed Doughty allowed Smith to get behind them. Yes, it was a great catch, but good coverage on that play makes it not even close to a catch.
-On the 2nd play from scrimmage, Cam Newton was flushed from the pocket after excellent coverage downfield and a good upfield rush. However, one by one you saw would-be tacklers flailing aimlessly at the rookie. I know he's big and he's quick, but surely an NFL linebacker ought to be able to take him down for at the worst a minimal gain.
-Tied 6-6, with 30 seconds left and 1 timeout, the Redskins had a chance to take the lead with the ball on their own 30, needing 40 yards for a field goal. Instead of throwing the ball upfield like they should have, Beck throws a check down to Gaffney, who instead of turning up the field and getting as many yards as he can (he was nowhere near the sideline), he tries some sort of do-se-do shimmy and gets the ball stripped. Carolina kicked the go-ahead field goal instead.
Good football teams do not do those things that I outlined above. There were more, but those things stand out in my mind the most. I know it seems like I'm just throwing another typical post-mortem pity party for myself, but there was a reason everybody picked the Skins to come in last place again. We saw those things today. If this team is going to compete going forward, we need to seriously evaluate both the offensive and defensive game plans. It was inexcusable to allow Cam Newton to shred us the way that he did. The running game was good, but once again we got away from it way too soon.
Notice that throughout this entire rant, I have not once mentioned the names Beck and Grossman. For his part, Beck played pretty well. He threw for one touchdown and rushed for another. He did lose a fumble, but overall Beck played a pretty good game. The point of this is that our problems go well beyond the quarterback position. Our secondary is average, as is our offensive line, especially with Trent Williams out and Kory Lichtensteiger on IR. Now that Hightower is hurt, the running game is in trouble now. This team has serious problems that cannot be addressed with the quarterback alone. Next week in Buffalo..er...Toronto, we play a Bills team that has been revitalized. As AK says, they are the best team in the AFC East. Unless we figure something out this week in practice, which I highly doubt, we'll get exposed yet again, this time North of the border.
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