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Solution Thread

SilentThreat

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Put on your GM hat and lay out the plan you would take next? This is what YOU would do, not what WILL happen. Agree, disagree, whatever, that's fine, but follow it up with a plan, not just a rebuttal.

If I'm GM it would go like this.


1. I sit down with Doug and ask him about the direction of this franchise. Where does he want us to go. In all likelihood Kirk is gone... Not only do I think paying him $28 million a year would be a poor choice, I don't think he signs here regardless of the offer. He's very good at PC, and making sure he says the right thing, but I don't think he wears a Redskins helmet next year, and I think he is the one that makes that choice. In this conversation with Doug, we have the very hard talk about whether Jay is where we want to go from here.

2. I personally do not want to continue this handoff game we play with QBs to HCs. IF Doug and co thinks Gruden is the guy, we sign him to a deal. I don't think he is the guy, so it's more likely that we come to the conclusion that we move on. We then start the coaching search. Get the HC in here at the end of the season and put in place the plan for the scheme we will run for the long term. At that point, we sit down and start looking at QBs in the draft and free agency that fit that scheme.


What would YOU like to see the team do?
 
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1. Stop negotiating with Cousins. Now. Tell him the season has started and there will be no further negotiations until the offseason. From there he either blows up and earns that pay, or more along the lines of what I think is going to happen, he blows up and he's not worth anywhere near that pay. Either way, our decision is made for us. His may not be, and ultimately he will dictate where he signs a contract, but our portion is done. Worth it or not. Period. In the mean time, I'm continuing keeping tabs on possible trade scenarios, FAs and quarterbacks in the draft that I like for the Skins.

2. Move forward with Jay Gruden. Enough with the coaching carousel in DC. It's been a revolving door and we wonder why we can't develop anything. Look at the teams that are among the top of the league right now:

Seattle, Dallas, Pittsburgh, New England to name just a few. What do they all have in common? A head coach that has been around for awhile. There are exceptions to every rule, and Denver could be one of those, among other teams. But changing coaches time and time again isn't a solution to a problem. It's a multiplicative problem. You'd have to catch lightning in a bottle to sign the best coach possible for your situation and have your situation actually align to that point. Keep Jay. Commit to Jay. Commit to his system.

The rest kind of has to fall into place a little. So it's pure evaluation mode for the time being. The only other thing I'd do is make sure Colt McCoy is locked up for a few more years. We may need him in the short term to lead the team without causing an all out rebuild as soon as Kirk walks.
 
As I've said and concluded in some other random posts, I think Gruden is an excellent evaluator of talent. I could give several examples, but won't at the moment, just to make this brief. With that in mind, I would make him GM-Head Coach, similar to Shanahan, and let him pick his own players.

Gruden, the play-caller ? Not so much. Hand over the majority of play-calling duties, to a capable OC.

So, give Gruden some more responsibility in one area, and take it away in another.

Neither of the above will happen, so I'm just dreamin.
 
Need to hire a competent GM to start with.

IMO, Doug Williams was given a title to make him look important for an attempt at some positive PR.

I wouldn't trust him to put a bicycle together,much less a football team.

Until we get a GM with a proven pedigree in here, we're just spitting into a fan. And if you do that,all you'll get is wet.
 
I'd start with a top to bottom coaching evaluation. Is coach A-Z doing an excellent or poor job getting younger players to take over the vets position, in time. The pipeline is CRUCIAL to the success of the franchise.

Every vet coach will have a younger/eager assistant & no coach will bare too much workload. This would ensure once the vet coach gets called up the younger coach steps in. "Next man up" with the staff & players alike.

The GM will have a draft plan in place that spreads picks around the team, though primary focusing on O & D lines. Something like every draft will have at least one of the first 3 rds going to a line, no exceptions.

Along with a huge scouting department, a staff of Dixieflatlines will scour the league for cutting edge scheme & play variables to implement. High % success plays along with brainstorming the next "new" thing would be the focus.

Unless they're chronic bedshitters like Haslett all coaching staff as well as the GM will be on contracts no longer than a 3 yr max. Earn the next contract.

That's for the offseason and beyond but this season would be to clean up turnovers, play stout D & run the ball 25+ times per game.
 
As I've said and concluded in some other random posts, I think Gruden is an excellent evaluator of talent. I could give several examples, but won't at the moment, just to make this brief. With that in mind, I would make him GM-Head Coach, similar to Shanahan, and let him pick his own players.

Gruden, the play-caller ? Not so much. Hand over the majority of play-calling duties, to a capable OC.

So, give Gruden some more responsibility in one area, and take it away in another.

Neither of the above will happen, so I'm just dreamin.

I like the Gruden as GM/HC but not play caller idea. I've somewhat wondered if he has been functioning as a pseudo GM as of late.
 
I'd really encourage Warren B. to buy the team.

Short of that, I continue to believe that Bruce has to go.

The only problem with that scenario is that the second Bruce leaves, Doug Williams would become the next Vinny/Bruce.

Have to get Snyder out of the equation.
 
Warren buffet isn't gonna live much longer so pass on him
 
So much for the in-depth conversations.... sorry for having expectations.
 
So much for the in-depth conversations.... sorry for having expectations.
@SilentThreat - you have some great conversation going. Here's what I've learned in over a decade of helping to run fan forums - you can't really control posting or steer conversations - it's just hard to do. People are going to post however lengthily, broad, or short as they desire, or even respond with driveby's or jokes. It's human nature. It's a good thread, don't sweat it.

It's also a really tough question. I want to answer with what I think may already be going on but I know that's not what you're asking. I think fans turn coaches, players, and even owners into comic book caricatures but really these are complex humans who have all kinds of motives, priorities, personalities, and complexities. I'm sure that there are all kinds of dynamics going on and that there has been a lot of energy expended on having 'a plan' - we just don't know all of the data involved and what that plan is. As fans, when signs of obvious success aren't evident, we tend to veer towards the outlook that they are all idiots when things aren't going well, or that there 'is no plan'. The plan may not work (the past 20 years is compelling evidence of this), but I am certain there are a number of plans and contingencies. If you work for any large business or corporation, you know all of the dynamics that go on - and how those dynamics are managed can have a huge impact on whether a company kicks ass or fails.

To your specific question though - I think the first challenge is getting the right GM. You can give Bruce whatever title you want, but he is operating as the GM. I will continue to believe that he is not a savvy football guy. He's not going to put together a championship caliber team that has a 5-10 year run of sustained success. He's a great business guy and politician. But I don't think he's a football or even an organizational genius. He's a politically savvy guy who knows how to navigate shark-filled waters because he is the 2nd biggest shark IN the water.

So unfortunately, I think we may continue to struggle until Snyder finds a true football GM.

If I am the GM, I recognize that the biggest detriment to the success of the Washington Redskins since Joe Gibbs has been the coaching carousel. Look at every consistently successful franchise over the past 20 years and they all have one thing in common. They found a great head coach and they stuck with him for a sustained period. I won't run the numbers - we may not be #1 , but we have had more head coaches over the past 20 years than nearly any other team.

Of course you could argue that we had to change head coaches because they failed. I would argue that the opposite is true - we failed because we kept changing head coaches. The caveat is - you have to hire a head coach that is NFL ready and knows what he's doing. You can't take a ringer on a Jim Zorn when there's no evidence he can get it done. If you do take a ringer on an unproven, you better give him a long contract and bear down for a lot of pain before he figures it out. The constant head coaching shuffle has doomed us. It has to stop. That means that if you can hang on to a Jay Gruden, who may not be perfect, but he certainly is competent, you do it. I'd give him an extension that says unequivocally 'you are our guy - get out there and build a winner'.

The other big barrier to long-term success is consistent mediocrity. I know that sounds silly, but what I mean is, what keeps some teams mired in mediocrity is never being 'bad enough' to be able to get a dominating player, particularly at the QB position. This has been the Redskins situation for quite some time. If you don't suffer through a 1-3 win season, how do you get a chance at a true franchise-changing QB? You don't, unless you are willing to give away the farm as the Redskins did for RG3, a move that set our cause back 5 or more years. When you've found a competent head coach (we have), he's probably going to find a way to win 6-8 games every year. So your QB options now rely on finding a hidden gem (more on that in a minute). We found our hidden gem in Kirk Cousins. It's not too late to retain him. He may not be the Hope diamond. But he's certainly a real nice sapphire or ruby. We can make our girl pretty happy with that. My biggest priority as a GM, regardless of this seasons performance, is showing him the love and commitment and signing that LTD. Plan B is letting Cousins go and being prepared to be that 1-3 win team for enough seasons to start over. That's really the only other option guys - so if it happens, you're going to have to suck it up as a fan and realize that's the rebuilding system in the National Football League. To get good, mediocre teams nearly always have to get worse.

We've also been hurt by our reputation as a franchise (whether deserved or not). The best coaches don't seem to want to come here. We've seen it when we are looking for our next head coach (every 3 years - see above) and other coaches. We hear names of great coaches mentioned and then they disappear like the morning mist. Even big $$ don't seem to matter. Great coaches believe it's best to stay away from DC. As the GM, I make it my mission to change that perspective. I tell Dan Snyder, eff the invisible owner act, if the perception of you as a meddling, SOB of an owner is out there, it's not going to change because the DC and national media decides to play nice - YOU need to change it. That perception is killing us, both in terms of attracting talent, and retaining it. I would have a major plan to change the perception of our owner by putting him out in front and dispelling some of the urban legend around him, and do whatever it took to make playing for Washington a much more attractive option. Getting off the pot and building the greatest fan stadium experience anywhere would also help.

Finally, the team needs an identity on the field. We're well into the Gruden era and I still don't know what we want to be when we grow up? As the GM, I know that without a clear understanding of what KIND of talent we need, it's going to be very difficult to put together a great team. BPA is fine, but we all know sometimes it's not about how talented a kid is, personality and character matter (see 'Su'a Cravens'), and more importantly, FIT with what we are trying to accomplish on offense and defense matters a lot. We've drafted and signed a lot of 'square peg/round hole' types over the years. We need an identity that everyone understands. Are we the greatest show on turf, Air America, or are we going to run over you with the most physical team in football? We don't appear to know...

Those are a few of my barely awake thoughts this morning...
 
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1. Before I ink a deal as GM the one thing I want to know is what authority do I have? What is chain of command above me. I just want to know what I can and can't do.

2. Next I would seriously want Allen gone or only in charge of uniforms and all the fluff. He can still work on contracts, but personnel would be my game.

3. I would work with Doug Williams to develop a vision and plan for where we want to be and how to get there. I would lean to keeping Gruden to give him the talent and time to develop the team. We've switched coaches way too much and I don't want it to get to the point where no one wants to work here. I know there are only 32 HC jobs, but to attract top talent you have to have stability.

4. Next would be to work with Williams and Gruden (plus other coaches) to grade our roster. See who we really want to keep and who really wants to be here.
 
Mostly #3 , riggins. Develop a vision & plan. 7 HC's this century & none have lasted more than 4 years (Gibbs 2 & Shanny). This is Jay's 4th year so he can't break that record till next year. The FO doesn't seem to have much of a direction of what they want to do and/or how to.
 
I have come to the conclusion that Dan Snyder, even though I think he has genuinely made efforts to minimize his role in daily operations of the product on the field, is the common denominator. I truly believe we as middle aged fans will not see another Super Bowl as long as we live, because Snyder will never relinquish power. Dude just doesn't know how to run a successful football team.

ST, I know you want more...unfortunately, I think that is the root cause, and until it's uprooted, we will see the same thing, repeatedly...like we have for 20 years.
 
ST - you have some great conversation going. Here's what I've learned in over a decade of helping to run fan forums - you can't really control posting or steer conversations - it's just hard to do. People are going to post however lengthily, broad, or short as they desire, or even respond with driveby's or jokes. It's human nature. It's a good thread, don't sweat it.

**LOTS OF VERY VALID STUFF DELETED OUT FOR BREVITY**

Those are a few of my barely awake thoughts this morning...

I concur with alot of this, plus alot of other stuff I've seen commented here.

I'm kind of with El on the fact that while Snyder is the owner we're very unlikely to see a change of our form to world beaters again, and I think (much like Boone) that the issue really boils down to Bruce and the fact that he's a better politician than he is a football guru. He seems to have used that political savvy to put himself in a position where he is untouchable in the Front Office, and while he holds that position we're going to be in trouble GM-wise. It strikes me that he thinks like a politician and everything is a power struggle to him, anybody with too much say or power is a direct threat to the security of his position.

At this point I'm not sure there's much a GM can do to turn the team around, mostly because the team is in that mediocrity zone just like Boone said. See it alot in Basketball, where you've got those teams that win about 30 games a season, just miss the playoffs and then languish around the 8 to 16 position int he draft, high enough to get a decent player, but not high enough to get a genuine game changer. The Skins have done well in recent years (depending how you look at it) by getting decent players high in the draft (or at least potentially decent players. Scherff is on a down start to the year, Doctson has potential but we've not seen it yet and Jonathan Allen is a rookie yet to prove the promise he represents), but it's the QB that's the real game changing position, and unless we tank we won't get that number one draft pick that gives us that man. And as we found out with RGIII even that's not a guarantee.

I believe stability is the key. As much as we sometimes dig on Gruden and Cousins, I'd much prefer we let them stay and develop for the foreseeable future. I strongly feel that at somepoint you have to break the wheel. Both are decent at their position, Gruden is competent enough to coach us to wins and Cousins is good enough to guide the team on the field. There may be a ceiling for these guys, but I think that the issue with the Redskins is one of culture and stability. We've lost that winning culture in the locker room, lost it years ago. A winning season for the Patriots is business as usual, for the Redskins it's a special anomaly, and that needs to change. Players shouldn't be excited about a winning season, they should be focussed on stringing winning seasons together.

This team seems to be focussed on the wrong things from a top level management level.

I've never been to Fedex, but I've heard it's not the best stadium experience in the world. And the focus for this new stadium seems to be on the new stadium being bigger and swankier with more VIP suites etc. I'd love to go the other way. They were talking on a podcast the other day I was listening to about using that cash to renovate and modernise RFK. Keep it small and intimate, maybe a 45,000 people stadium, and bring back the rocking stands (with some proper modern engineering!). Give the Redskins a home that the fans can get up close and personal with the team, give us a home worth defending. (Maybe those of you who have ACTUALLY been to the stadiums in question could offer an opinion on this).

And, as much as it pains me to say this, (and as controversial as I think it may be to people here!) maybe it is time for a name change. I suspect it'll happen at sometime in my lifetime so why not just embrace the concept. Keep the colours and the theme but make it something that isn't going to draw attention away from the field. It wouldn't be the first time. The team has been the Braves previously, the logo has changed over the years from the Spear logo, to the stylised R, to the current logo. I'm not averse to a change as long as the heritage is protected. I've always been partial to Washington Warriors, keeping the Burgundy and Gold and going with a subtle logo change. I saw a concept the other day just using the feathers of the logo on the side of the helmet. There's dozens of concepts out there and while I am VERY attached to the logo we have I'm sure someone could come up with something awesome and cool.

I'm also in agreement with Boone on identity. I hear too much from this team about identity and it's all wrong. The O-Line should not be referring to themselves as Hogs 2.0. When they EARN a nickname it'll come to them. You can't force history and identity by picking your own nickname and hoping it sticks. Play well and the fans will give you that nickname.

I feel like the team has pieces to be really good. We have a decent QB who has put up good stats for a few years now. We have the makings of a good O-line if it can just get back to last years form. We have a good set of Tight ends, and receivers who have potential. We have a couple of solid if unspectacular running backs and one in the wings who could be really good. We have a kicker who we know can be super accurate. We have a defense that might not be the best, but has potential to become solid. We have decent coaching staff across the board.

I'm not saying any of it is the best at it's spot, but there are teams out there doing better with worse.

Hence why I feel that this is a problem that comes from further up the food chain. While Snyder and Allen are at the top of that chain I think we're doomed to this mediocrity with maybe occasional flashes of something better.
 
P.S. I didn't get alot of sleep last night so the above post is very much the ramblings of a man who needs his bed. LOL
 
@SilentThreat - you have some great conversation going. Here's what I've learned in over a decade of helping to run fan forums - you can't really control posting or steer conversations - it's just hard to do. People are going to post however lengthily, broad, or short as they desire, or even respond with driveby's or jokes. It's human nature. It's a good thread, don't sweat it.



I know, it's just exhausting when you hand the mic to someone and ask 'here is your chance to detail what you would do' and their response is to make a fart sound and run off the stage galloping like the guy from Monty Python's clip clop scene.
 
Well, I know for me personally, this topic seems to be more of an offseason question, or a bye-week WTF are we doing question.

After just one game seems premature.

But, that's just me.
 
I would like it if Dan Snyder hires two people sometime soon - Assistant GM of the Falcons Scott Pioli and former Chiefs GM John Dorsey. Make Pioli the GM and have Dorsey as team president.

I think that could bring some good, additional stability in the front office.
 
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I know, it's just exhausting when you hand the mic to someone and ask 'here is your chance to detail what you would do' and their response is to make a fart sound and run off the stage galloping like the guy from Monty Python's clip clop scene.

I got what you were saying - my point was that other than one McD5 driveby, the thread was pretty much filled with serious responses? It's all good regardless...
 

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