Zornies 17 - Elis 23, Very Frustrating

The Giants have already been crowned NFC champs this morning if you read a New York area tabloid, listened to WFAN sports radio, or read any other media based in New York such as SportsIllustrated.com. The Giants offense was outstanding. Eli is worth every penny. The Giants defense dominated. They are perfect.

Conversely, the Redskins “should have tried harder to land Sanchez or Cutler” (I’m not kidding. That is what some clown on SI.com wrote. He must have written it before yesterday’s games. Campbell’s QB rating is in the 90s, Sanchez, who looked good, is in the 80s and Cutler, OMG, is in the 40s). The Redskins did not improve one iota from last year. The Redskins did nothing on defense.

To the victor goes the spoils...

Cold Water
Okay, time for a little cold water on the face. Every statement I make in this regard will be backed by a fact or statistic.

The Redskins offense actually outplayed the Giants offense yesterday. When the Skins offense was on the field, they scored 17 points. When the Giants offense was on the field they scored 16 points.

Once again, Jason Campbell actually outplayed Eli Manning, albeit by a statistically insignificant amount—Campbell’s QB rating for the game was 93.6 and Eli’s was 93.5. (See the QB comparison below to understand the "once again" reference). No real difference in QB rating, but notice Sports Illustrated is not calling for the Giants to sign Jeff Garcia this morning or for a Manning refund on the $90+ million. But, based on yesterday’s performances they want to replace Campbell with a guy who threw four picks and lost.

Clinton Portis ran the ball better than Jacobs. Look at the numbers. But, also look at some key points in the game. The Giants had third-and-two (or less) and fourth-and-two (or less) three times in the game, tried to ram Jacobs down the Redskins throats and failed every time including one when Redskins safety Horton tackle Jacobs for a five-yard loss on fourth-and-one.

The Only Difference
The only difference in the game was this: The Giants defense scored on a turnover and the Redskins defense did not. One play. Osi scored and Hall did not. That’s it. One play out of 111 was the difference between a Redskins victory and a loss. It’s hard to imagine waking up this morning and reading in the tabloids that the Giants were done this year, if they had lost yesterday, but the media has buried the Skins already.

More Observations
A. I cannot stress this one enough: Maybe Jim Zorn needs an offensive coordinator; one who knows how to call a game; one who has done it before.

There is an old adage in football: offenses are supposed to take what the defense gives them. By the middle of the second quarter in yesterday’s game it was apparent what the Giants were willing to give up. They stacked eight guys in the box on most plays and double-covered Moss. The Giants weren’t going to let Portis or Moss beat them. They made the Redskins try to beat them by throwing to someone other than Moss.

Now, here is the kicker: The Redskins were throwing to guys other than Moss and it worked! The Giants left the intermediate routes in the middle of the field wide open. By the end of the second quarter Campbell was 5-for-5 for 83 yards on crossing routes and tight end seam routes that were in the middle of the field, ten- to twenty-yards from the line of scrimmage. Still, Zorn inexplicably insisted on calling a balanced run/pass attack.

But, that only works in theory before the fact. Once the game is underway and your opponent shows you all of his cards, it is time to make an adjustment. Zorn needed to keep throwing to that part of the field until the Giants proved they could stop it. The only way the Giants were going to stop it was by making an adjustment themselves such as by dropping a few linebackers and safeties in coverage. But, that would have opened up some running lanes for Portis.

B. The Giants receivers made some surprising and amazing acrobatic catches that kept drives alive on key third downs. I bet they surprised Giants fans. I’ll bet they surprised themselves. Let’s see them do it for a whole season before we hand them that crown. The odds are not with them. Either Eli is going to have to get a lot more accurate or they will see some important drives stall.

C. Several comments in the media implied that the Redskins yards and scores in the last eighteen minutes of the game were of the “garbage time,” stat-padding variety. That is pure nonsense.

It is garbage time when a team has no chance of winning, not when they are kicking an onside kick with two minutes left and a touch wins (not ties) the game. Believe me, the Giants did not want to have to defend against that onside kick.

It is garbage time when a defense allows an offense to go down field in ten-yard chunks to eat up the last four minutes of a game, let the team score and still win by two TDs. The Redskins, on the other hand, drove 72 yards in 1:42 to get that TD to Cooley and make the onside kick meaningful.

D. There is a very good chance that we are all going to wake up on Monday, October 19, to find the Redskins right in the middle of the NFC East race. They may even be all alone in first place on that date. Their next five games are more than very winnable. These next five weeks will give Zorn a chance to fix his errors. It will give Snyder a chance to hire an offensive coordinator. It will give the veteran players a chance to wrest control of the team from Zorn. They will be able to work out the kinks and still win. Perhaps they will be firing on all cylinders by that date, who knows.

Some of Offensive Coordinator Zorn’s wonderful calls:
1. On the second play from scrimmage, after Portis picked up over thirty yards on the first play, he calls a reverse pass. A trick play early in the game after you just showed you can play smash mouth with the Giants? It was like Mike Tyson apologizing after delivering a hard punch.

2. Deep in Giants territory he called a fake rocket screen to the right sideline and had Campbell spin 180 degrees and deliver a real rocket screen to Moss on the left sideline. Minus two yards later, I wondered about that play. Now, I’m no genius offensive coordinator like Zorn, but it seems to me that after you bring up to the line of scrimmage the linebackers and safeties who bit on the fake screen, perhaps the only thing worse than an actual screen would be a draw play. Is it me?

3. Deep in their own territory Zorn failed to call even one pass play. The Giants were ten in the box at that point, so there was no way running was going to be successful. Three and out and the Skins had to punt from their end zone.

4. But, the real killer was that he kept going to the running game until it was too late; loooong after it was clear the Giants would overstack to prevent it and loooong after it was clear that the Giants could not stop the Redskins intermediate passing attack.

Campbell's Performance
Here are Campbell’s numbers when he threw intermediate passes in the middle of the field:

Attempts: 17
Completions: 14
Yards: 163
Y/A: 9.6
TDs: 1
Ints: 0

Rating: 126.23

All but one of those passes went to ARE and Cooley, and that one was incomplete to Moss. Cooley and ARE had seven catches each.

Maybe Zorn needs an offensive coordinator who is not so offensive to Skins fans. Seriously, he is in over his head and has a lot on his plate. Zorn cost the Redskins yet another win yesterday.

Redskins Preview Part I

This will be a brief note to be followed by a more extensive analysis. I just want to address some of the mainstream media predictions for NFC East this year. Absolutely no one thinks that the Redskins can avoid the cellar this year. For example, in response to a question about whether the Cowboys have a shot at the playoffs, Troy Aikman said, “There is only one NFC East team with no shot and that is the Redskins.”

All of this is remarkable considering that they had the talent to be a playoff team last year. They beat the NFC champs, for example, and swept the only other team that could have been NFC champs—the Eagles. That is SWEPT. And, it is remarkable because they are a much better team this year.

They had the fourth best defense in the NFL last year and have improved it immensely with the additions of Haynesworth and Orakpo. In the NFL opener Steelers-Titans game on Thursday, Chris Collingsworth remarked at one point that Ben Roethlisberger had a perfect pocket formed around him in which to throw. He said if this was last year there was no way that pocket would be there because Haynesworth always collapses pockets up in the middle. Several have said that Haynesworth is the best defense lineman in the NFL and Chris Carter said on today’s pregame show that he thinks Haynesworth will be the defensive player of the year.

Orakpo is going to have no pressure because he will not be asked to do a whole lot. He is not joining this defense as a savior, just a role player, albeit a first-round role player. But, he has been a monster defender in college and going against first-team NFL lineman this year. He could get 12- to 15-sacks this year without breaking a sweat.

Considering several of the injuries to the defensive line last year (e.g. Daniels, a leader was sorely missed) led to a non-existent pass rush; considering that they STILL managed to finish fourth on defense in the NFL and second-toughest to score on in the NFC; then you must know that Redskins back seven was outstanding. And, this year they get Deangelo Hall for an entire season.

The one thing this defense lacked was pressure on the quarterback from the front four. They have that in spades now. The Redskins will get many more turnovers this year, they will shorten the field for Campbell and the offense, and they will take pressure off Campbell because he will be managing games with a lead and not running for his life trying to make a comeback.

Speaking of running for his life: The Redskins weakness is a lack of depth on the offensive line. Three of the five starters missed significant playing time last year. All three are back this year. If they stay healthy this year, Campbell will develop into one of the best quarterbacks in the league.

As for the other NFC East teams. It is almost a foregone conclusion that the Giants will win the NFC Championship if the Eagles or Cowboys do not. Let me just ask a few questions here:

Didn’t the Giants just lose their best coach? So, are we to believe that they will not miss Spags? The guy replacing him has already caused controversy because he doesn’t want to be on the sideline with the team. Didn’t the Giants just experience 100% turnover at wide receiver and virtually 100% in the defensive secondary? I heard that all of their wide receivers combined have fewer than 150 catches in their career.

Are we to believe that this team is that much better than last year because they got one defensive lineman back? Remember, this team couldn’t get past the Eagles last year. I’m not even sure that the Giants have the best defensive line in the NFC East anymore, not when you consider depth. Why is Manning a much better quarterback now compared with last year? Is it because he just got a raise? See the post below comparing two quarterbacks. The answer to the riddle is this: Eli Manning is quarterback A and Jason Campbell is quarterback B.

The Eagles are the class of the NFC East? What does that make the Redskins who beat them twice last year? Didn’t the Eagles lose a bunch of players to injury? Didn’t they lose the architect of their defense on the sideline, the great D-Coordinator Johnson? Didn’t they lose their heart and soul on the field in Dawkins?

The Cowboys? Didn’t they lose their best receiver? What have they added to improve their team?

Honestly, I do not get why “last-place Redskins” is an open-and shut case. Often in probabilistic fields like sports and markets, when all of the action lines up one way, when all of the sentiment leans one way without questioning the rationale, as I questioned it above, then usually the opposite happens. How many thought the Arizona Cardinals would be in the Super Bowl last year? Stay tuned.

Quarterback A versus Quarterback B

Can you guess who we are?

First year as a starter:

Quarterback A:
Starts: 7
Completions: 95
Attempts: 197
Completion Percentage: 48.2%
Yards: 1,043
TDs: 6
INTs: 9
QB Rating 55.4

Quarterback B:
Starts: 7
Completions: 110
Attempts: 207
Completion Percentage: 53.1%
Yards: 1,297
TDs: 10
INTs: 6
QB Rating: 76.5

Winner: Quarterback B


Second year as a starter:

Quarterback A:
Starts: 16
Completions: 294
Attempts: 557
Completion Percentage: 52.8%
Yards: 3,762
TDs: 24
INTs: 17
QB Rating: 75.9

Quarterback B:
Starts: 13
Completions: 250
Attempts: 417
Completion Percentage: 60.0%
Yards: 2,700
TDs: 12
INTs: 11
QB Rating: 77.6

Winner: Toss up

Third year as a starter:

Quarterback A:
Starts: 16
Completions: 301
Attempts: 522
Completion Percentage: 57.7%
Yards: 3,244
TDs: 24
INTs: 18
QB Rating: 77

Quarterback B:
Starts: 16
Completions: 315
Attempts: 506
Completion Percentage: 62.3%
Yards: 3,245
TDs: 13
INTs: 6
QB Rating: 84.3

Winner: Quarterback B

Career through three years as a starter:

Quarterback A:
Starts: 39
Completions: 690
Attempts: 1,276
Completion Percentage: 54.1%
Yards: 8,049
TDs: 54
INTs: 44
QB Rating: 73.2

Quarterback B
Starts: 36
Completions: 675
Attempts: 1,130
Completion Percentage: 59.7%
Yards: 7,242
TDs: 35
INTs: 23
QB Rating: 80.4

Winner: Quarterback B

Hint: Both had good offensive lines, great defenses, and excellent running games in their first three years.

Hint: Quarterback A gets paid a LOT more than Quarterback B and Quarterback B is in his contract year.

The 2008 Season Post Mortem

First let me begin by taking the heat for making a statement that was wrong. On September 22, 2008 when the Redskins had a record of 2 – 1, I posted the following prediction:

“…the Redskins season is probably going to be determined by what they do over their next two games. Both are division games on the road—at Dallas this week, and at Philly next…If they come out of these next two games with a split, they will be 3 - 2 and sitting pretty for a playoff spot…If they sweep the next two they will win the NFC East—the toughest division in the NFL (8 - 0 against non-NFC East opponents so far).”

You know the outcome. The Redskins did sweep Dallas and Philadelphia on the road, but not only did they fail to win the division, they could not even grab a wildcard spot. Why not? It starts at the top. It always does.

The Redskins organization has serious problems. Dan Snyder is a Redskins fan, which I like, but like many people who are successful in one sphere, he thinks he can be successful in any sphere. To be fair, some people can pull that off. And if all you care about are the Redskins’ cash flow statements, Snyder is pulling it off. I should know because Snyder perennially sucks several thousand dollars out of my accounts despite putting an inferior product on the field in most years. It’s just that Snyder is not one of the people who can pull it off in the one place that matters to Redskins fans: championships. He thinks he needs little help in building a winning football franchise. And he is wrong.

Snyder was smart to bring Joe Gibbs back and give him free reign over the organization. Snyder was such a fan you could almost hear him calling Joe “Mr. Gibbs” in private. Vinny Cerrato, the man putatively in charge of personnel decisions, was wide eyed around Gibbs. Gibbs brought respectability back to the franchise in part because he pushed Snyder and his cronies to the sideline.

Team Snyder swore they learned from Gibbs and wouldn’t repeat their past mistakes such as dismantling the team at the end of each season and disrupting the stability necessary for success. Four years of continuity resulted in two playoff appearances in the past three years and nearly another trip to the Super Bowl in 2005. But, when Gibbs left unexpectedly, team Snyder came back with all of their bad habits and dismantled almost all of Gibbs’s coaching team. The head coaching job should have gone to Gregg Williams, and Al Saunders should have stayed on as offensive coordinator this year. Jason Campbell would have known Saunders’ offense by now.

In the one area where there was some continuity, the Redskins once again excelled. Williams’ defenses were always outstanding and Defensive Coordinator Greg Blache, who was Williams’ assistant for the prior four years, maintained that system and personnel. The Redskins were the second toughest team to score on in the NFC next to the Giants and the Giants were only better by two points. Until the last game, the Skins were the only team in the NFL that did not give up twenty-five points in any game. Teams with defenses this good are almost always in the playoffs and almost always go far in the playoffs. Unfortunately, the Skins offense did not score at least twenty-five points in any of its last eight games; not since it beat Detroit 25 - 17. Speaking of the winless Detroit Lions, the Lions scored more points than the Redskins in 2008.

If the Skins could have managed 25 points in each of their last eight games, they would have finished 13 – 3. Ironically, their only loss in that stretch would have been in the last game of the year against the 49ers, but they would have had home field advantage all locked up by then anyway.

Had they managed to score the same 21-points per game that Gibbs was repeatedly criticized for in 2007 on Extremskins.com—the Redskins official message board—they would have finished 10 – 6 and in the playoffs. More than likely they would have won the 49er game too, because the game would have mattered, and they would have finished 11-5. They also would have split the season series with the Giants and finished with the same overall record as the Giants, but with a better division record they would have won the Division title. So, why was there a lack of continuity, especially on offense?

Well, what front office in its right mind would hire its assistant coaches before it hired a head coach? It’s a rhetorical question. No head coach worth a dime is going to want to coach a team when he cannot pick his assistants. The HC is responsible for everything that happens on the field and in the locker room, and responsibility without authority is just stress. What front office does something like that? One that thinks it can do it all, or one that does not care. I do not think team Snyder is one of the latter. I think it wants to win, but it is just incompetent, and incompetent front offices tend to hire incompetent coaches.

Zorn’s clock management, decisions under pressure, and official challenges of bad calls were pathetic. He only threw the red challenge flag about six times this year and lost all but one. The one win: Against the Ravens after he had already lost a challenge, he threw the flag with about six minutes left in the game to argue for two yards at mid field. When a coach wins both challenges, he will get to keep one of them. If he loses at least one challenge, he only gets two for the entire game. That Zorn would give up his last challenge with six-minutes left in a close game for two yards of field position near the 50-yard line—after a first down mind you—is just terrible.

In the opener against the Giants, deep in Giants territory, in field goal range with a few minutes left in the game, he made the decision to go for a first down on fourth and long. They were down by nine points at the time and needed both a field goal and a touchdown to win the game. My kids’ high school coaches would have known that he had to kick the field goal there to preserve any chance for a victory. I would be writing the same thing today even if they scored a touchdown there. You have to play the odds, but I do not believe that Zorn even understood the odds.

How good were the Skins last year? They beat the Cowboys on the road and could have swept them. They swept the Eagles. They held the emotional Giants to sixteen points on opening night in the Meadowlands—the night they celebrated their Super Bowl victory. They beat the NFC champions and representative in last year’s Super Bowl—the Cards. That, my friends, is a playoff-caliber team. Joe Gibbs handed Snyder a perennial playoff contender.

But, they lost to the then-winless Rams (two wins for the year), the 1-11-1 Bengals, and the then-six win and nine loss 49ers. That is coaching. A good coach with as much talent as the Redskins had last year would have found a way to win those three games.

It was particularly frustrating in the Bengals loss to watch Zorn bench a healthy Clinton Portis when the Skins were attempting to score the tying touchdown in the third quarter with a first-and-goal from the one-yard line. The Skins were very much in the playoff hunt at the time. A win would have probably secured a spot in the playoffs. On Mike Sellers’ second attempt to punch it in from the one, he fumbled, and the Skins did not score again after that. I love Mike Sellers...as Clinton Portis's blocker, which is his normal role. He had no business getting the ball there. Zorn benched Portis because Portis was critical of him in the week before that game. Way to punish the team and the fans, Jim.



Again, that is coaching, not lack of talent. But in many ways I am being unfair to Zorn. Snyder thrust Zorn into a role for which he was clearly not ready. I am not sure that he is ready now after he has sixteen games under his belt. If Zorn can be faulted, it is in not being self-aware enough to reject Snyder's offer.

But, cheer up Skins fans. This post mortem was written at the darkest hour last year and never posted on Counter Trey until now. The 2009 season is looking brighter. I liked what I saw in the preseason game against the Patriots, and the Skins defense is going to be beastly this year. That alone may be worth the price of admission. Now, if only coach Zorn can get out of his own way…Stay tuned.