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Akh’s Thoughts: Week 7
Ten Thoughts on the Skins’ loss to the Eagles:
1-The bottom line about the game was best expressed by Wilbon this morning: the eagles were an incomplete team who made a lot of mistakes, and yet the Skins didn’t put up much resistance to them. What we’re seeing is total failure by all sides of the ball to do their job and a team who’s stopped really caring about the season. If this wasn’t bad enough, the roster, especially on offense, has turned into a sick version of The Gong Show, where its only a matter of time before another starter is carted off the field(and the season). The really frustrating thing about this team is that the offense, defense and special teams might have good plays or drives; they never can put it all together or sustain the quality play for very long.
2-Sherm Lewis should probably go back to the bingo hall. While the red zone play calling was better, it looked rather clear to me that after the first offensive play(a play action naked screen to Cooley), the Eagles’ defense knew the play calls better than the Skins’ offense did. In the first half, time after time, the Eagles knew exactly where to line up, where to blitz to and who was faking what. On the INT TD, Quentin Mikell knew exactly which crease to blitz in and knew Campbell’s throwing lane perfectly. This isn’t luck, this is a well coached defense that studies their film.
3-Jason Campbell was just awful against the Eagles. Most of his stats came when the Eagles packed it in and were in a vague prevent defense, so I discount his 284 yards(120ish of them came in the 4th quarter), but even in the rare plays when he had the time to throw, he wasn’t able to do so with any consistency. The problem isn’t a lack of talent, Campbell shows enough flashes that its clear he has some talent, the problem-imo-is that Campbell is just ruined; he doesn’t trust the team/coaches around him, and that’s as much on Campbell as its on the offensive talent/coaches around him. He’s too gunshy and too afraid of making a mistake that he refuses to really take any chances in the passing game. He needs to go elsewhere, and if we had a young Qb with some mobility(and memo to the Brennan cultists, Brennan has never been able to deal with pressure, so even if he was healthy, playing him would be an unmitigated disaster), this would be the time to transition to him. Since we don’t, the Redskins are living LBJ’s analogy about being on a Texas highway during a hailstorm Qb-wise for the rest of the season: you can’t hide from it, you can’t run from it, all you can do it get through it.
4-I’ve seen some really poor performances from Redskins’ Oline in my life, but the performance of Heyer-Dockery-Rabach-Montgomery-Williams had to be up there among the worst I’ve ever seen. Not only can’t they run block, but also Campbell had to have taken 20-25 hits last night. And worst of all: there are plays where they aren’t even blocking anyone. There were far too many plays where the Eagles’ blitzers had a free release at Campbell(or Portis). And while I know how depleted they are as a unit, a lot of the blame has to fall squarely at the feet of Joe Bugel. I honestly think he’s lost it as a Oline coach. Yes, guys like Heyer don’t have a lot of talent or are playing out of position, but when you have players getting out of their stances late, having bad footwork or just completely blowing their assignments, one has to wonder how poorly they’re getting coached.
4a-I hate to keep whipping a dead horse, but Stephon Heyer has no business playing in this league. None. I counted 4 pressures, 3 sacks given up along with 2 holding penalties called on him last night.
4b-Casey Rabach also had a really poor night blocking, snapping and calling the blocks. The first fumbled snap was on Campbell, but the final 2 appear to be on Rabach lazily snapping the ball. He also struggled to block DBs who blitzed up the middle and generally looked ineffective.
5-There is a temptation to look at the defense’s performance and be happy, they held the Eagles down in the 2nd half(too bad that was after the game was effectively over) and outside of the 2 big plays, statistically they held the Eagles in relative check, but this is precisely the problem with the defense. No matter who they’re facing, and no matter who’s on the field for them, the defense always finds a way to let the team down, whether that’s through giving up a couple big plays, or giving up a late drive or giving up a flurry of first downs late in a game to keep the opposing offense on the field, this defense just isn’t good enough. And more to the point, it’s schematically wrong for what the skins have on offense. A bend but don’t break defense, which is what Blache is going for week in and week out, is a good idea if you have an offense that can score quickly or put up 3+ TDs a week(see what the Colts have done for years). With the skins’ offensive ineptitude, they need a defense who can get a consistent pass rush(yes, Carter/ Fat Albert are providing a better pass rush, but there’s no consistency) and cause more turnovers.
5a-I did chuckle a bit when the announcers talked about how Blache said that his defense wouldn’t give up any big plays. This is part and parcel of the problem I describe in #5: Blache coaches his defense scared. He coaches them to give the opposing offense 7 yards if they won’t give up 40(which is why he drops so many guys into coverage, or has the zones at 7 yards on 3rd and 4 or tells the Cbs to give such big cushions and has Landry lining up in Annapolis). That really didn’t work out against the Eagles and cost them the game.
5b-Another reason to not get too chipper about the defense was the fact that Donovan McNabb bailed them out with a poor performance. Especially on 3rd downs, McNabb looks like he was still feeling the effects of his broken ribs: his passes were sailing, falling way short(and harmlessly hitting the ground) and even when he could get it in a good position, his WRs had a bad case of the drops.
5c-I mentioned them before, but Haynesworth and Carter are player who clearly are not part of the problem with the Skins. Haynesworth’s contract is obscene, and the skins could have bought a couple offensive lines with the money, but Haynesworth is delivering on that contract. He’s turning in a truly dominating performance. Its a shame that defensive coaches refuse to blitz much up the middle to take greater advantage of what he brings. Andre Carter is clearly playing for a final big contract(the skins aren’t going to give him his option bonus), but he’s one of the few players who appears to play hard most of the time.
5ca-Also, I was impressed by the performance of Jeremy Jarmon(who always seems to be around the ball) and Chris Wilson.
5d-A player who’s really regressed to the point of questioning his future on the team is LaRon Landry. I don’t know how much of his problem is his playing totally out of position or how much is regression, but he’s just not getting the job at Free Safety. I don’t know how much the defense has to lose by playing Smoot, Moore or Barnes at FS and bringing Landry into the box as the Strong Safety.
6-Cooley’s injury devastated an already depleted offensive corps, and while Fred Davis showed some promise in replacing him, the Skins lost Campbell’s only reliable weapon when he went down. And I don’t know if anyone else noticed this, but Cooley didn’t exactly look defeated or angry about getting hurt. He had a smile on his face from most of the shots I saw of him being carted off or in the locker room. I really can’t blame him.
7-Danny Smith’s special teams turned in another stink bomb against the Eagles, the most glaring problem being the poor performance of Hall, Moss and ARE at returner(to be fair, ARE is spectacularly worse than either Hall or Moss). The skins really just need to hold an open try out amongst the Cbs and WRs to see who can contribute anything in this area. This might be a good place to get Marko Mitchell involved with the team and the get ball in his hands since Zorn refuses to use him on offense.
8-Two young players who stepped up their games against the Eagles were the oft-maligned Fred Davis and Devin Thomas(Malcolm Kelly appeared to be stuck in line at Johnny Rockets for a majority of the game). Davis showed a lot of promise as a pass catcher, he’s clearly got the physical tools to frustrate Lbs in coverage like Cooley does, but Davis is a major liability as a pass blocker. Almost to the point where Davis should be split out in the slot and Yoder brought in as a dedicated blocker(another potentially good idea is to use Williams, Heyer or Jones as a 6th Olineman). Thomas showed flashes of what he struggled most with: route running. His red zone TD wasn’t just a solid call by Lewis, it was a perfectly run route by Thomas. He also contributed some other solid catches later on.
9-Another disturbing thing I noticed, and have mentioned before, was the total lack of energy by the skins outside of guys like Carter, Davis, Portis(you could see the frustration boil over when he threw his helmet into the bench) and Haynesworth. Independent of the coaching issues this team has everywhere on the field, the players just don’t look like they give a crap, even when they’re still technically in games.
10-College players to start watching if you’re a skins fan, assuming the season holds true to form, the skins should be picking in the top 5-6 and again in the top few picks in the 2nd round. Here are the top five players that currently would fit the skins’ major needs for each draft slot:
1st Round:
1-Russell Okung OT Oklahoma
2-Bruce Campbell OT UMD
3-Bryan Bulaga OT Iowa
4-Sam Bradford Qb Oklahoma
5-Charles Brown OT USC
2nd Round:
1-Jason Fox OT Miami
2-Jake Locker Qb Washington
3-Ciron Black OT LSU
4-Anthony Davis OT Rutgers
5-Mike Johnson OL Alabama
Player grades:
To make it clearer what the grades mean, I submit to you a legend on how to read the grading:
10: Legendary performance.
9: AP All Pro team caliber performance
8: Pro bowl caliber performance
7: Good, maybe a brain fart here or there.
6: More good than bad.
5: More bad than good
4: I’m looking at NFL.com’s depth chart for who’s behind him
3: Liability
2: Should be starting for the Raiders
1: Opposing fans not only know his name, but openly mock him(and we have creatively snarky nicknames for him)
0: The player must have incriminating photos of his coordinator or position coach(or both)
Pass: the player didn’t play enough to merit a grade.
X WR: Santana Moss 6.89. A very quiet 74 yards.
TE: Fred Davis 7 flat. Terrible blocking, good pass catching.
LT: Stephon Heyer 0. Godawful.
LG: Derrick Dockery 5.1. Solid, but can’t cover up for Heyer
OC: Casey Rabach 1.75. Inexcusable.
RG: Will Montgomery 2 flat. Almost as bad as Williams
RT: Mike Williams 1.5. Terrible.
Y WR: Devin Thomas 5.75. Solid contribution.
QB Jason Campbell 2.25. Arguably his worse half of football in years.
FB: Mike Sellers 3.3. Lazy and ineffective is no way to stay in the NFL.
RB: Clinton Portis 4.5. invisible except for marking where the Eagles defense were.
PK: Shaun Suisham 6.25. Nice long FG.
DE: Andre Carter 8 flat. Another good game for the Vet.
DT: Albert Haynesworth 8.2. Really dominated the entire Eagles line.
DT: Cornie Griffin 4.5. Up and down.
DE: Philip Daniels 2 flat. MIA
SLB Brian Orapko 2.5. The only time I noticed him on the field was when he got hurt.
MLB London Fletcher 6.7. Killer personal foul on 3rd down, otherwise solid
WLB Rocky McIntosh 5.25. There’s times you forget he’s on the field.
CB DeAngelo Hall 5.1. Invisible.
FS LaRon Landry 4.2. Blech
SS Reed Doughty 5.25. Good sack in the 2nd, otherwise ineffective.
CB Carlos Rogers 4.8. Looked clueless at times
P Hunter Smith 6.75. Solid
Coaching grades:
Offense: D
Defense: D+
Special teams: D-
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