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Akh’s Thoughts: Week 9
Ten thoughts on the skins’ loss to the Falcons.
1-The biggest story of this game was the bipolar nature of the skins’ play. They were an unmitigated embarrassment in the first half, when the Falcons were mowing them down like grass. Then, they came out and took advantage of the Falcons switching to a more conservative/safe scheme especially on defense. The real Skins’ team is probably more of the one in the first half who struggled to get anything right. The Falcons’ withdrawal into a safe scheme would account for the skins ability to move the ball more effective—especially running a lot of stretches and draws against them.
1a-Why they look this bad in the first half is a fairly simple answer: coaching. Yes, the skins have massive problems talent-wise and the constant stream of injuries have depleted an already flawed roster, but the sleep walking the skins always seem to do in the first half of any games comes from the total lack of effective preparation during the week by the coaching leaders: Zorn, Blache and Sherman Lewis. There is no more evidence of the house cleaning that has to take place in the coaching staffs then this continuing problem that the team has.
2-Another constant theme that we’re seeing from this team is mental mistakes. They had 10 penalties for 88 yards, including 3 15 yards personal fouls and 3 offsides. These are hallmarks of a team that plays with zero discipline. Which means that they have no fear of the coaches or of being benched for mental errors. This is on top of the usual missed blocks, lazy routes, blown coverages and lack of effort early in games. Independent of the talent issues this team has, there needs to be a massive change in how accountable players are held for their mistakes.
2a-And I guess when Haynesworth said that he had changed from the player who stomped on Gurode’s face, he was lying. His coming in late in the scuffle and pushing a Falcons player should have merited an ejection.
3-I don’t think that anyone can say anymore than the defense’s struggles come from the offense keeping them on the field too long. Not only did they struggle to stop the Falcons’ attack, after the offense kept the ball for essentially the entire 3rd quarter and pulled the skins within a touchdown; the defense goes out fired up with plenty of rest and gives up a 73 yard drive(66 yard rushing touchdown). The defense was also fairly ineffective giving up 5 drives of 60 yards or longer—3 of them with 10 or more plays. Those aren’t hallmarks of a quality defense. And it wasn’t turnovers or short drives either, the skins defense gave up 24 points and the Falcons didn’t start a single drive in Redskins territory.
3a-Anytime a Rb, no matter how good he is, goes for a 9.2 yards per carry average against your defense in more than a few carries, your defense is struggling.
3b-The pass coverage was just awful. Hall and Rogers looked like they were doped up before the game, and the Falcons’ WR didn’t seem to be covered in any traditional sense. Roddy White is a dangerous player who can burn just about any CB in the NFL, and the skins were giving him 10 yard cushions all game long. On one of the Falcons’ scoring drives, he had two catches where there wasn’t a defender anywhere near him.
3c-Nothing shows the failures of the defensive front 7 more than the stat that out of the redskins’ 46 solo tackles against the Falcons, 16 of them(the top 3 tacklers actually) were from Horton, Landry and Doughty.
4-Santana Moss has another game where he really didn’t make an impact. He was targeted 8 times and made 5 catches—one of them going for negative yards. He’s still a major drag on this passing game, especially since he has 40% of his receiving yards this season in one performance against the Lions. On the other hand, Marko Mitchell finally saw some real playing time at WR for the skins, and he showed some real promise. They ran him on some slant routes, and he made 2 catches in heavy traffic that requires real concentration and ability. I don’t understand why he isn’t seeing more action at WR especially over Thomas and Kelly(both of whom were no-shows against the Falcons).
5-While Mike Sellers did have a very nice long pass catch, he turned in another godawful game at fullback. His pass blocking was horrendous, and his run blocking was not memorable. This sudden decline in his play has coincided with him signing his new contract(which is the biggest of his career). At this point, he has to be one of the first cuts of whomever is leading the new regime in Ashburn. His play is beyond unforgivable and the skins would be better off finding a young hungry player to replace him with.
6-I’ve watched a lot of football in my life, but the current incarnation of the redskins offensive line has to be arguably the worst one I’ve ever seen. They struggle, in a straight up situation, to pass block(Campbell took 10 hits in 22 attempts, along with 5 sacks), to run block(Betts was able to move the ball in the 2nd half, but that had more to do with the Falcons playing the deep pass as much as possible after getting up 3 Tds) and they can’t even block well in space against smaller players. The only way the skins can keep the rush off of their Qbs is to run bootlegs, quick routes and misdirection. To give you an idea of how pathetic this unit is, Derrick Dockery is currently the best pass blocker this team has, and he’s never been known as a pass blocking specialist in his career.
6a-I’ve said it before, but Bugel is one of the major problems with this o-line. He has enough respect from the front office that he could have objected to the Stephon Heyer/Mike Williams experiments and demanded the team get him some real talent or depth.
7-The playcalling was as schizophrenic as the rest of the team was. Lewis called a fairly bad game in the first half, which led to an ineffective rushing game and a passing game designed to get the Qb killed. In the 2nd half, Lewis used more bootlegs and runs designed to take advantage of the Falcons using more deep zones..and the skins were able to move the ball much better. When they switched back to more deep drops and less traps/draws, the falcons were able to shut down their offense much easier. Also, it was special that Zorn snuck his nose into the 4th down call late in the game, leading to a very questionable play-action throw to the fullback 3 yards behind the line of scrimmage.
7a-Another terrible coaching idea, probably from the bingo-addled mind of Sherman Lewis was the concept of using Rock Cartwright in at the goal line. 5’7” RBs not nearly as quick/shifty as Darren Sproles are essentially useless as goal line backs, and Rock showed that by being easily stopped each time he carried the ball in that situation.
8-LaRon Landry’s play was another major issue coming out of this loss to the Falcons. He had arguably his worst game as a member of the Redskins, generally looking ineffective in coverage and run support, and compounding the problem by taking himself out of plays looking for the big hit rather than stopping the bleeding of a big run/pass. I used to think that Landry’s problem was merely being played out of position at Free Safety and playing 20-40 yards off the line, I don’t know how effective he would be in that role anymore if he these problems with making basic tackles.
9-The special teams plays was, as is standard with the skins, inconsistent. The kickoff coverage was much improved, but the punt returns were just as crappy, even with DeAngelo Hall being the only returner who made a real return. Also, they never really saw much return from the kick return game. Add Danny Smith to the list of coaches who should go also.
10-The bottom line of this game was that it was much closer than it should have been. The Redskins only showed competency after the Falcons dialed back their team holding a 3 touchdown lead. And even then, they really had to scuff and struggle even to get within a touchdown. And predictably, the well rested defense gave up a long touchdown, putting the game out of reach. Although the franchise would never admit it, this is the part of the season to start benching/cutting dead weight and even playing young hungry guys like Marko Mitchell regardless of who gets offended. Unfortunately, this is merely the first wave in the Skins’ November from Hell. So, it’s just going to get much darker before dawn.
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 5.2. Dropped a couple big plays and generally wasn’t a threat.
TE: Fred Davis 5 flat. Had a couple nice catches, but was generally ineffective.
LT: Stephon Heyer 2.25. Sadly, our best OT against the Falcons.
LG: Derrick Dockery 5.33. Solid in run blocking.
OC: Casey Rabach 1.5. Just terrible all game long.
RG: Will Montgomery 1.15. Jonathan Babineaux destroyed him and Rabach.
RT: Mike Williams 2.1. Awful.
Y WR: Devin Thomas 3.2. invisible.
QB Jason Campbell 5.4. Statistically, not bad, realistically subpar.
FB: Mike Sellers 4.7. Good long catch, subpar blocking
RB: Ladell Betts 5.22. A couple nice runs in relief of Portis, a nice screen catch, but generally only effective when the Falcons were in dimes and deep zones.
PK: Shaun Suisham. 7.7 Nice long FG.
DE: Andre Carter 5.25. A nice tackle early, generally invisible otherwise.
DT: Albert Haynesworth 6.2. The Falcons kept him bottled up a lot of the game.
DT: Cornie Griffin 4.4. Golston played a better game.
DE: Philip Daniels 1.4. A major liability in the run game now.
SLB Brian Orapko 5.6. A couple sacks(although I think one will be reversed in the official scoring since Ryan was over the los) as a DE, but was lost..again…as OLB.
MLB London Fletcher 6.01. A couple nice plays, but Turner ran all over him.
WLB Rocky McIntosh 6.4. A nice INT early in the game, but was as culpable as Landry on Turnover 66 yard TD run.
CB DeAngelo Hall 5 flat. Invisible.
FS LaRon Landry 2.2. Unforgivable errors today.
SS Reed Doughty 4.7. Solid tackling…usually after deep into the skins’ defensive backfield.
CB Carlos Rogers 4 flat. Looked bored all game long.
P Sam Paulescu 7.75. 3 punts, 150 yards. Can’t ask for much more.
Coaching grades:
Offense: C-
Defense: D
Special teams: D
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