Washington Redskins Football Team Commanders History Discussion Thread

[Voice_of_Reason]

Well, I simply disagree about Kliff. I think ignoring his failures and fully crediting Kliff after Jayden performed miracles is also revisionist history.

He had a large amount of flaws in his scheme and him pretending the scheme was infallible was whacko. His play calling became worse and worse. He backed his decisions with antiquated theories that have been proven wrong over time.

I don't think anybody is ignoring Kliff's failures.

I don't think he ever said his scheme, or him, were infallible. In fact, I remember him saying after games he wished he had done something different in certain situations.

However, I think those who are so intent on criticizing him ignore the parts of the offense and the production which worked. And they sortof treat him as just this supreme moron who Daniels saved.

Neither is true. The truth is in the middle.

You also have to give Kliff an enormous amount of credit for developing Daniels. He was a rookie. He improved week to week during the season. That also takes coaching and scheme. Kliff found things Jayden's rookie year which worked for him. The communication between the two of them was apparently off the charts. Kliff wasn't a slave to his scheme, he actually adapted it to what Daniels did well.

That’s maybe a hyperbolic way of saying that he seemed unwilling at times to adjust. And his point about the scheme being antiquated is spot on imo. There’s a reason successful teams like the ravens and Eagles are going to a similar scheme to the one we are. It’s what’s working around the league, currently. And I’m glad we’re doing it going forward, even if it means we have to break in a rookie OC. Note the Ravens and Eagles are also breaking in rookie OCs, albeit guys with more coaching experience overall than our guy. Of course, a little more experience would be ideal, I’ll grant you that, but I don’t agree that Quinn should be fired if he doesn’t hit the ground running at full speed. Give it a minute.

As for Jayden campaigning to keep him, that actually came from his mommy. I know you don’t like hearing about that subject, but do we really know whether it’s coming from him or her?? I know who wasn’t interested in him as an OC… The rest of the league.

I actually don't know how unwilling Kliff was to adjust. In 2025, I'm not sure there was anything to adjust to. He knew they needed to run the ball more, and they did. However, after 3 of the teams 5 day 1 receivers were on IR or our (McLaurin, Noah Brown and McCaffery) along with Ertz and Ekler being out, there just wasn't a lot you could do. The best running backs were rookie 6th round Bill who hadn't played in a year, and Chris Rodriguez, who was fine but not great.

The starting QB was also out for much of the year.

At some point, you just can't blame any OC. Could the ghost of Bill Walsh done better? Probably. How much better? Probably not a lot better.

There were people who were down on Kliff from the moment he was hired here. I'm not sure I ever understood that. And they just couldn't wait for him to fail. They had to mostly keep their mouths shut in 2024, but during the 3 game losing streak, they got emboldened to come out with the Kliff cliff stuff. Then when we won another 8 games and made it to the NFC Championship game, they had to shut up again.

And finally, in 2025, they were given the ammo to come out and blast him.

I've never said he was flawless. But I do think he should get a tremendous amount of credit for the offense in 2024 and the development of Daniels.

And I don't think there's a chance in the world that Daniels' mom puts out something about her son's coach without his consent. The LSU stuff, maybe, that's money related. There's no way Daniels would allow his mother to campaign for a coach he didn't want to play for. My guess is Daniels really liked Kliff. The communication was off the charts. He and his mother probably discussed that. Did he ask her to put out a tweet? Probably not. But if he was saying, "eh, that Kliff, man, I don't know." She never would have done it.

And it's fine that the rest of the league wasn't interested in Kliff as an OC. As I said, it might have been time to move on. But I don't think that diminishes in any way his accomplishments while he was here either. Both things can be true at the same time.

 

[burgold]

It's funny how critical we are in hindsight. I do remember a lot of us being surprised when Kliff "left" the team. Grading on the curve because of injuries, the offense was not the problem. The offense probably did hold up its end. That said, all of the criticisms of Kliff: unimaginative, underutilized run game, a defense that seemed ahead of the offense at times, a "hurry up/no huddle" style that forced us into simplified calls that made it easy for the d to diagnose and somehow led to us needing to call the time outs and scrambling to get plays snapped in time... all those criticisms are fair.

 

[Voice_of_Reason]

It's funny how critical we are in hindsight. I do remember a lot of us being surprised when Kliff "left" the team. Grading on the curve because of injuries, the offense was not the problem. The offense probably did hold up its end. That said, all of the criticisms of Kliff: unimaginative, underutilized run game, a defense that seemed ahead of the offense at times, a "hurry up/no huddle" style that forced us into simplified calls that made it easy for the d to diagnose and somehow led to us needing to call the time outs and scrambling to get plays snapped in time... all those criticisms are fair.

No disagreement. Those are fair criticisms.

I have less of a problem with lining a WR on one side and letting him jus sit there than others. But I watched Harrison and Wayne do it basically their entire careers in Indy, and they were just fine. But then again, they were Harrison and Wayne with Peyton, so maybe that's why. But those guys were always in the same spot. Wayne on the left, Harrison on the right. Everybody knew where they were going to be and it didn't matter.

I actually think Kliff going to work with McVay might be just what the doctor ordered. McVay is extremely creative, and ever evolving. He's off the WCO tree.

What's interesting about McVay's lineage from a coaching tree perspective is that he has legacy in both of the main branches of the WCO.

What's interesting is the WCO was invented by Bill Walsh. The most prominent OC for Walsh with his own tree is Holmgren. Andy Reid is off the Holmgren tree, and then Jon Gruden branches off of that tree. And then there is dumbass Jay, who was HC here, so McVay inherited the Holmgren/Reid/Jon version of the WCO offense from Jay.

However, McVay was hired under the Mike Shanahan coaching staff. Mike never worked for Walsh directly, but he took over the Walsh offense when he was OC in SF and worked with Montana and Young. (As an aside, the fact that Mike worked with Montana, Young and Elway is somewhat wild.) So the Mike Shanahan WCO variant passed from Mike to Kyle to McVay also.

I think McVay is the only coach where those two variants intersect that directly, since Mike was HC here, he was learning, at least in some way, directly from the top of the branch.

And McVay has evolved the offense himself. He has really re-invented the offense at least twice, maybe 3 times since he's been an OC/HC. It keeps evolving.

So Kliff going to work with him, I don't know if there is anybody better to work and learn from.

 

[SkinsNumberOne]

No disagreement. Those are fair criticisms.

I have less of a problem with lining a WR on one side and letting him jus sit there than others. But I watched Harrison and Wayne do it basically their entire careers in Indy, and they were just fine. But then again, they were Harrison and Wayne with Peyton, so maybe that's why. But those guys were always in the same spot. Wayne on the left, Harrison on the right. Everybody knew where they were going to be and it didn't matter.

I actually think Kliff going to work with McVay might be just what the doctor ordered. McVay is extremely creative, and ever evolving. He's off the WCO tree.

What's interesting about McVay's lineage from a coaching tree perspective is that he has legacy in both of the main branches of the WCO.

What's interesting is the WCO was invented by Bill Walsh. The most prominent OC for Walsh with his own tree is Holmgren. Andy Reid is off the Holmgren tree, and then Jon Gruden branches off of that tree. And then there is dumbass Jay, who was HC here, so McVay inherited the Holmgren/Reid/Jon version of the WCO offense from Jay.

However, McVay was hired under the Mike Shanahan coaching staff. Mike never worked for Walsh directly, but he took over the Walsh offense when he was OC in SF and worked with Montana and Young. (As an aside, the fact that Mike worked with Montana, Young and Elway is somewhat wild.) So the Mike Shanahan WCO variant passed from Mike to Kyle to McVay also.

I think McVay is the only coach where those two variants intersect that directly, since Mike was HC here, he was learning, at least in some way, directly from the top of the branch.

And McVay has evolved the offense himself. He has really re-invented the offense at least twice, maybe 3 times since he's been an OC/HC. It keeps evolving.

So Kliff going to work with him, I don't know if there is anybody better to work and learn from.

It is wilder that someone who worked with Montana, Young, and Elway apparently also thought Beck was really good as well as Tannehill.

I wonder if Kliff will learn from Sean. I guess we will see. Some dudes, they don’t learn well that way. Kliff strikes me that way but obviously it is a guess.

I think Sean is a decent teacher but the proof on the ground is less compelling. I don’t think his coordinators have a great track record as of yet in spite of NFL excitement to latch there. So there is a growing amount of data. It is not the worst record but overall I don’t think it is compelling.

 

[NickyJ]

It is wilder that someone who worked with Montana, Young, and Elway apparently also thought Beck was really good as well as Tannehill.

That was never a thought for Shanahan. Beck was acquired in 2010, started in 2011. Tannehill was drafted the same year as RG3 in 2012.

I don't think we'll ever really know what they truly thought, but Shanahan's praise for Beck might have been him putting smiley stickers on a tank. Such a stupid and unnecessary thing to say about staking his reputation on him if it was to tank, though.

 

[Conn]

I always thought the over-the-top Beck belief projected by the Shanahans was to basically cover the fact that they were going to successfully tank in the Luck year. Like, they were arrogant enough to think they could make Beck work probably, but I also think Mike knew how bad it could be while also knowing they would be rewarded with a QB, and had the job security to set himself up (and the thought at the time was he was setting up Kyle’s future, as well). I’m not saying they secretly wanted to lose each week, I’m just saying that they were very aware of the potential silver lining if that happened, and didn’t have a lot of great options other than selling their shitty vet QB

 

[Conn]

That was never a thought for Shanahan. Beck was acquired in 2010, started in 2011. Tannehill was drafted the same year as RG3 in 2012.

I don't think we'll ever really know what they truly thought, but Shanahan's praise for Beck might have been him putting smiley stickers on a tank. Such a stupid and unnecessary thing to say about staking his reputation on him if it was to tank, though.

Beat me to it. Yes, I have thought for a long time that it was a “willingness” to tank, if not an active obvious effort. It was really well known what a good year it was to need a QB, and even then we still had to (decided to) trade up. Not unlike us making some trades to set ourselves up for the 2024 draft

 

[Voice_of_Reason]

It is wilder that someone who worked with Montana, Young, and Elway apparently also thought Beck was really good as well as Tannehill.

I don't think he ever thought Beck was any good. I thought he might be as good as Grossman.

I wonder if Kliff will learn from Sean. I guess we will see. Some dudes, they don’t learn well that way. Kliff strikes me that way but obviously it is a guess.

He took the job, and that's step one. If he wasn't willing to learn, then he didn't have to take the job. Kliff could always go back to college. Or just sit out and kindof do nothing since Arizona is still paying him $7m/year for 2 more seasons.

I think Sean is a decent teacher but the proof on the ground is less compelling. I don’t think his coordinators have a great track record as of yet in spite of NFL excitement to latch there. So there is a growing amount of data. It is not the worst record but overall I don’t think it is compelling.

I think you have to consider that just about all HCs fail. I posted that in another thread, but the vast, vast majority of coaches don't make it. Even the guys off the Shanahan tree, there have been some hits, and some misses.

I think it's less that McVay teaches, and it's more what the students learn from just being around and part of the program.

 

[NoCalSkins]

Wasn't the main criticism of Kliff when they hired him that his scheme tends to start out of the gate hot but was poor at making adjustments as the season goes on and opponents get film and make adjustments? I think the ultimate separation had more to do with Quinn (and maybe front office as well) wanting to go in a philosophically different direction with the offense and less to do with Kliff underperforming.