'Be patient... or I'll kill you'

[Boone]

'Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet'
- Aristotle

'All commend patience, but none can endure to suffer'
- Thomas Fuller

'Whoever is out of patience is out of possession of their soul'
- Francis Bacon

'Beware the fury of a patient man'
- John Dryden

'Patience has it's limits. Take it too far and it's cowardice'
- George Jackson

'Patience you must have, my young padawan'
- Yoda

​

One of the revelations of the 2023 Washington Commander's season has been just how far off real sustained success lies for this organization. It's emphatically clear, the Front Office and coaching staff are in over their heads. The roster many of us imagined as young and increasingly talented, now looks to consist of a promising but unproven young QB, a handful of very good skill position players, and some starting caliber defensive linemen. Our punter is elite, so there's that.

2023 has been a real eye-opener. The kind of waking up the morning after a drinking binge unsure where you are eye-opener.

We all can, and should, revel in the start of a Daniel Snyder-free future.

But folks, it's time for a little dose of reality. Clean out the Front Office. Sweep out the entire coaching regime. And look hard at this roster.

It's not good.

When NFL fans talk about rebuilding, they tend to seize on a comforting bromide to assuage their fears. We point to teams that have 'blown it up' and had near immediate success. It does happen once in awhile. But it's akin to waiting until the 6th round to draft your quarterback because, you know... Tom Brady. The gulf between 'possible' and 'likely' can be vast in the NFL, a seeming abyss, especially when you're talking talking about the franchise in Washington.

The chances are, the waters ahead are going to get pretty choppy for awhile.

The question is, do we have the stomach for it?

And what is 'it' going to look like? 1-2 seasons? 4-5 seasons?

The latter seems like a big ask for a fanbase that's been through what we have the past 25 years.

And what about Josh Harris and Company? How patient will they be with a presumed new Front Office and coaching staff? Only time will tell, but the impression I get is that Harris, Rales, and the other owners are 'results' guys. They'll commit and watch and support - but they expect the wins to come sooner rather than later. And if that's the case, unless they get it right the first time out, we could be looking at several iterations of 'blowing it up' and starting over before they find the right leaders and players and we're rewarded with real success.

I have to admit, it's a scary proposition. Maybe not as scary as having Dan Snyder as your owner in perpetuity, but there are no guarantees on what's to about to come.

When I was in the Marine Corps, I remember getting a couple days off and heading to a seedy little beachside bar in Emerald Island, NC with some jarhead friends. I was standing looking at the jukebox nursing a beer when the most beautiful woman I have ever seen sauntered over to me and threw her arms around me. As she literally drug me around the corner into an empty room she put her lips to my ear and whispered...
'Be patient... or I'll kill you'. Then I realized the room she had drug me into was the men's restroom. Classy.

Being a Washington fan is kind of like that. On the one hand, you're smitten, full of desire and passion, and breathlessly waiting for what might be just around the corner. On the other hand, the whole thing seems more than a little crazy and you realize you may be making a terrible decision.

So - gut check time. Are you ready - to be patient?

 

[Chris]

You can’t reclaim a breath from the past.

You can’t borrow a breath from the future.

You can only take a breath from the present.

So I choose to take a deep, cleansing breath into my lungs now, cross my fingers, and roll with it.

 

[Chris]

To be honest, anticipation of the coming changes may, for me, be a pretty significant enthusiasm level high-point in my career as a fan since the golden era of Washington football.

 

[Boone]

Yeah, I appreciate that - and I'm not at all unenthusiastic. I guess what prompted the thread was the realization that we may be a lot more talent poor than maybe we thought we were even a year ago. The seemingly very poor 2023 draft did not help. I'm not expecting much the first couple seasons.

 

[Chris]

I think that with talented and inspired leadership (which is mostly missing currently) it is not far fetched that we begin to see significant buds of future promise showing in 2025.

Next season should, at a minimum, allow for the serious groundwork of nurturing that success to be planted.

 

[MikefromOH]

Call me Francis and I'll kill you

 

[Bulldog]

This team is talent poor on the OL, LB and DB.

There is some talent elsewhere on the roster and most of those players are just entering their primes.

Based on the track record of losing here and the fact Ron seems to have a roster of players that don't seem to care and haven't put in a real performance since the Seattle game, I think the turnover here is going to be significant.

More so than I would have thought at the beginning of the season. Then I assumed Ron was going to oversee another 7-10 type year where the team did just enough to come up short when it counted.

Why? Because Washington while mediocre has not been 1-10 Carolina type bad during Ron's term here and that was with Alex Smith on one leg, Dwayne Haskins starting several games, Ryan Fitzpatrick rupturing an Achilles in the first half of his first game, and the reality that a street free agent, Taylor Heinicke was a better player than the 'starter' Ron gave up multiple picks for in Carson Wentz.

The disgraceful fall of the defense from 7th to 32nd overall is amazing. The defense was poor almost from the start of the season.

Starting in that second game against the Broncos the defense giving up 33 points against an offense that was doing ZIPPO at that time of the season, it was a warning shot of things to come.

The fact the team ran Emmanuel Forbes out there on opening day when he was clearly not ready to be a starter was a real head scratcher.

I suppose Ron and Jack Del Rio felt they needed to show the owner that their shiny new #1 pick was going to make a difference and justify their draft.

That like so much else was an illusion.

The 2023 Washington draft to this point looks like one of the worst in team history. And with Vinny Cerrato around for years that's saying something.

Right now NONE of the team's top 4 draft picks has made ANY real impact on the team this season and that is with Washington making selections in the middle rather than at the end of the rounds.

The fact the secondary and offensive line were not great in 2022 to me set the bar pretty low for Forbes, Martin, Stromberg and Daniels to come in and be visible contributors.

Instead of that, Daniels looked as though he didn't belong on an NFL practice field and was quickly put on IR in August to sit for a year and perhaps be forgotten about?

Forbes and Martin got to play early but clearly looked overmatched at this level in 2023.

Stromberg? I don't know. Some folks like him, some think he is a natural guard and playing out of his future position in the NFL, and some think he is a strong bet to be another bust for the OL.

I don't know exactly what to think of him other than to note that with Nick Gates clearly not performing at a starting level through X number of games this season, the coaching staff never thought of bringing Stromberg in to replace him AT CENTER.

Instead when Gates was finally replaced it was 32 year old journeyman Tyler Larsen that got the call and became the starter.

Stromberg got some reps at guard along the way in 2023 but no starts as far as I can recall. Then he got hurt and went on IR.

On THIS line it's perhaps not too impatient to think a #3 pick should be able to go in as a rookie and do as well or better than a Nick Gates or Saahdiq Charles.

 

[burgold]

Patient? It's been over thirty years! The time is now!

Over the past few years, we've witnessed teams blastoff pretty quickly. Few teams execute the slow build into a protracted winner. It's usually a sprint. Even Joe Gibbs in the glory years modeled that. He ended his first year on a tear and then won a Super Bowl in year two. I think that's the key. Year two is when you know. Rivera's claim that it takes three four five or seventeen years to build a culture and a team is wrong. The NFL is a sport where the better coaches hit the ground running and you see signs of it pretty quick.

So, it's okay to demand excellence and expect it. It's okay to want your team to overreach and be better than it should, quicker than it should. We're crashing hard this year, but that's because everyone stopped believing, coaching, and playing... plus, some really bad team building in crucial areas like o line which is unforgivable because it was the area EVERYONE knew was problematic in 2022 and they swung and missed when they weren't watching strikes zip past them without even taking a swing. Next year, let's maximize the potential of our talent. Next year, let's start proving ourselves.

We need a great draft and better coaching. We already have many of the key elements needed to win. What we need is to be a winner.

I expect next year for us to rebound and by the end of the year to be excited about what's next. In year two, I want this team not only ready to run, but to sprint. I don't want a team that knows its place in the pecking order, but one who changes the pecking order.

 

[Bulldog]

To an extent I agree.

Year 1 is about changing the culture and starting to bring in impact players in the draft and FA.

Year 2 is about advancing to becoming a competitive team for a playoff spot and getting into that first playoff weekend.

Year 3 is about hitting the ground running and being in the hunt

If you bring in the right players as Bobby Beathard did in 1981 and Jimmy Johnson did in 1990 then you can do it.

In 1981 Beathard brought in May, Grimm, Manley, Brown, Grant and Clint Didier.

That's SIX starters in ONE draft.

Ron hasn't drafted six starters in the past 3 drafts. A number of the team's best players were taken before Ron got here in 2020.

 

[Boone]

This team is talent poor on the OL, LB and DB.

There is some talent elsewhere on the roster and most of those players are just entering their primes.

Based on the track record of losing here and the fact Ron seems to have a roster of players that don't seem to care and haven't put in a real performance since the Seattle game, I think the turnover here is going to be significant.

More so than I would have thought at the beginning of the season. Then I assumed Ron was going to oversee another 7-10 type year where the team did just enough to come up short when it counted.

Why? Because Washington while mediocre has not been 1-10 Carolina type bad during Ron's term here and that was with Alex Smith on one leg, Dwayne Haskins starting several games, Ryan Fitzpatrick rupturing an Achilles in the first half of his first game, and the reality that a street free agent, Taylor Heinicke was a better player than the 'starter' Ron gave up multiple picks for in Carson Wentz.

The disgraceful fall of the defense from 7th to 32nd overall is amazing. The defense was poor almost from the start of the season.

Starting in that second game against the Broncos the defense giving up 33 points against an offense that was doing ZIPPO at that time of the season, it was a warning shot of things to come.

The fact the team ran Emmanuel Forbes out there on opening day when he was clearly not ready to be a starter was a real head scratcher.

I suppose Ron and Jack Del Rio felt they needed to show the owner that their shiny new #1 pick was going to make a difference and justify their draft.

That like so much else was an illusion.

The 2023 Washington draft to this point looks like one of the worst in team history. And with Vinny Cerrato around for years that's saying something.

Right now NONE of the team's top 4 draft picks has made ANY real impact on the team this season and that is with Washington making selections in the middle rather than at the end of the rounds.

The fact the secondary and offensive line were not great in 2022 to me set the bar pretty low for Forbes, Martin, Stromberg and Daniels to come in and be visible contributors.

Instead of that, Daniels looked as though he didn't belong on an NFL practice field and was quickly put on IR in August to sit for a year and perhaps be forgotten about?

Forbes and Martin got to play early but clearly looked overmatched at this level in 2023.

Stromberg? I don't know. Some folks like him, some think he is a natural guard and playing out of his future position in the NFL, and some think he is a strong bet to be another bust for the OL.

I don't know exactly what to think of him other than to note that with Nick Gates clearly not performing at a starting level through X number of games this season, the coaching staff never thought of bringing Stromberg in to replace him AT CENTER.

Instead when Gates was finally replaced it was 32 year old journeyman Tyler Larsen that got the call and became the starter.

Stromberg got some reps at guard along the way in 2023 but no starts as far as I can recall. Then he got hurt and went on IR.

On THIS line it's perhaps not too impatient to think a #3 pick should be able to go in as a rookie and do as well or better than a Nick Gates or Saahdiq Charles.

Not a lot to argue with there Bulldog although when it comes to Stromberg not coming in for Gates, keep in mind, these are the same idiots who thought Wentz and Heinicke gave us a better chance to win than Sam Howell

 

[Boone]

Patient? It's been over thirty years! The time is now!

Over the past few years, we've witnessed teams blastoff pretty quickly. Few teams execute the slow build into a protracted winner. It's usually a sprint. Even Joe Gibbs in the glory years modeled that. He ended his first year on a tear and then won a Super Bowl in year two. I think that's the key. Year two is when you know. Rivera's claim that it takes three four five or seventeen years to build a culture and a team is wrong. The NFL is a sport where the better coaches hit the ground running and you see signs of it pretty quick.

So, it's okay to demand excellence and expect it. It's okay to want your team to overreach and be better than it should, quicker than it should. We're crashing hard this year, but that's because everyone stopped believing, coaching, and playing... plus, some really bad team building in crucial areas like o line which is unforgivable because it was the area EVERYONE knew was problematic in 2022 and they swung and missed when they weren't watching strikes zip past them without even taking a swing. Next year, let's maximize the potential of our talent. Next year, let's start proving ourselves.

We need a great draft and better coaching. We already have many of the key elements needed to win. What we need is to be a winner.

I expect next year for us to rebound and by the end of the year to be excited about what's next. In year two, I want this team not only ready to run, but to sprint. I don't want a team that knows its place in the pecking order, but one who changes the pecking order.

I'm going to challenge you and Bulldog on the 40 year old analogies... We all need to stop bringing up the first Gibbs era, because today's NFL bears very little resemblance to the 1980's version. Ask Joe Gibbs in his 2nd tenure - what worked then may not work so well in the modern NFL.

I don't disagree with your main point that the good GMs and HCs may not need 5 seasons to turn things around. But they might need 3 at a minimum. Assuming the coaching is going to be top notch and that we draft well (and btw, those are pretty big assumptions), you can only upgrade so much of the roster every season. 3 seasons seems like an absolute reasonable minimum to me.

Expecting more than that ignores the fact that not only are we looking at huge roster turnover, but we will be shifting to completely new offensive and defensive schemes (and all that comes with that). And it assumes we won't change course with coaches or front office people for a reasonable period. You say that 'we already have many of the key elements needed to win'. Explain what those are - because I don't think that's close to being true.? We have a handful of guys, probably 10 or less, who are true NFL starters. That's 20% of the roster.

I love ya burgold, and possible I'm way off base with the above, but your reply is exactly why I started this thread. I think you could be setting yourself up for major disappointment.

 

[burgold]

And I framed my response to be contrary and loud-mouthed lol

However, it's not really a 40 year old theory.
Mike Daniels was hired by the Dolphins in 2022. They're rocking it this year.
Lions hired Dan Campbell in 2021 and by the end of 22 that team was in clear ascendence. This year they are a contender.
Kyle Shanahan was hired in 2017 by 2019 he took the 49ers to a 13-3 record
Sean McVay was hired 2017 and by 2018 he had a 13-3 record

So, I think it still holds that by the end of year two if the coach is going to be a good one, there are unmistakable signs. Often, that's a playoff appearance. Sometimes, it's a streak that shows the team will be a contender. Three's an okay number as well, but really I think you start seeing something concrete and definable in that second year.

Also, after thirty years of being patient... preaching patience is a little bit like nails on the chalkboard :OLS:

 

[Boone]

We’re just debating brother, I hold you in the utmost regard 🤛🏻. The examples you’ve given are the success stories. So sure, it can happen. There are tons of examples where it doesn’t though.

I don’t disagree that we should be seeing some positive signs by the end of season two. I think my view that the cupboard is barer than many believe probably makes me more pessimistic.

 

[burgold]

Oh totally and I respect you a ton, too. I just think that you start seeing whether you struck gold fairly quickly and I don't want to mine for copper.

What I'm really saying is that if Harris or Harris' GM (as we all prefer) gets it right, we will see evidence of it sooner than later. I think next year will likely be a learning curve year and it'll be tough, but the year after if their guy is THE guy we should start seeing signs that he's special. Likewise, if we don't see signs in that second year it could be a warning signal that the coach is not special. For example, by year two, we all knew that Zorn and Spurrier was not going to be magic.

It's those average coaches who are harder to get a feel for. Sometimes, they start out strong because they have the high floor, but then they fail to elevate and fall off. What I want is for Harris to pick a guy who proves to be special. That, of course, increases the likelihood of a bust, too, but that's the dice throw I'm in favor of.

 

[Skinsfan1311]

Call me Francis and I'll kill you

Pipe down, Psycho!

 

[Bulldog]

The quickest path to success and improvement is to draft or already have the right quarterback in place

For teams like New England that since the departure of Tom Brady have gone with the likes of Cam Newton, Mac Jones and Bradley Zappe the rebuild looks like it will take forever.

Let's talk modern day.

The Eagles drafted Jalen Hurts in Round 2 in 2020 and overall they were a similar team to Washington, finishing slightly ahead but not by much.

Over the next year plus Roseman made some outstanding picks in the draft and some deft trades and Philadelphia passed the Giants and Dallas to become the big boy in the division.

That culminated last year in a 13-3 season and trip to the Super Bowl.

Cincinnati was a WORSE team than Washington in 2019.

Drafting Burrow and adding players at the skill positions the Bengals made it to the Super Bowl in Taylor's third season.

So, a rapid turnaround with a bona fide GM and head coach is not only possible in this era of parity and free agency but MUCH MORE LIKELY than it was back in the 1970's and 1980's where there were limited veteran players available in the offseason, usually in their 30's, and the ONLY way to improve was really to be patient and spend a number of years drafting and signing undrafted rookie free agents.

 

[Voice_of_Reason]

The whole thing needs to (and will be) nuked from the ground up. New GM, new coach and coaching staff, and we're going to look like an expansion team next year.

The other interesting thing is there are an extremely few number of players actually under contract for next year. Most of the team is FAs. Also, there are some veterans who need to be cut like Leno ($8m savings) and Thomas ($7m savings.) I don't hate either player by any means, but they both have $12+ million cap hits and they aren't worth that at this point.

All that said, we have VERY few players under contract, basically our draft picks the last 2-3 years + Allen, Payne and McLaurin who are under contract.

We're going to have 90+ million in cap room and 4 top 50 draft picks.

But we have an extremely untalented roster all the way around. There isn't one position group you can look at and say, "yep. We're set." Except maybe Defensive Tackle. For Wide Receivers, we need at least 1, Samuel is a FA. For RB, we need at least 1, Gibson is a FA.

They have 1 player on the OL who could conceivably start on another team: Cosmi. That's it. That's the list. Leno has a $14m cap number. He's going to be released or restructured.

Probably the first thing to do is completely re-build the DL. However, the secondary is also a complete mess, Curl and Fuller are both FAs, Forbes has had a disaster of a rookie year, Quan Martin and Percy Butler often look like they're running away from opponents instead of towards them.

And with all that said, with the assets we have available, I am optimistic a lot of that can be turned around very quickly. With a good GM and a little luck, you can rebuild those areas. At least to respectability and not have to watch Wylie turn the wrong way on a stunt of Paul fall on his butt, or Martin cover the 50 yard line instead of a receiver.

They key, of course, is Quarterback. I think they broke Sam. So I think they need to get another QB. At the very least, they should re-sign Brissett because he's going to be the best available Backup/Limited Starter QB available.

 

[Chris]

I’ve grown tired of hearing about all of the cap space the team has. Yes, it’s better than the alternative but that money is going to go much faster and not as far as people want to believe. The team has a ridiculous amount of needs.

 

[burgold]

Voice_of_Reason

Just to play contrarian, I think our view of this team's talent is warped. I think the coaching and morale is so bad and so counterproductive that pretty much every single player looks worse than they are. McClauren and Jonathon Allen didn't suddenly become C level players. Dotson looks like a total bust this year. Logan Thomas has become Mr. 50/50 (on his good days). So, I'd caution evaluating our players based on Rivera's last year.

I think Jack Del Rio called it quits and went through the motions until he was fired. He half timed it at best. We had a weak o-line so what does Rivera do? After we lose our o-line coach he never replaces him and eventually gives an assistant tight ends coach the title. Our DBs look totally lost and we keep hearing how their eye discipline is wrong. We keep hearing that they don't know where they are supposed to be.

In short, I think we have more talent than what we are seeing on the field. That isn't to excuse the players or say players who have given up or show no fight should be kept, but it is to say this season is in many respects a mirage.

 

[Chris]

I think it can be both- bad coaching (plus bad personnel selection) and a poor overall level of talented players.

I see very few players (maybe 5) that any of the top tier teams would truly covet.