Lanky Livingston
Guest
In a town drawn up by a Frenchman, a place brimming with people who hail from somewhere else and who don't agree about much of anything, the Washington Redskins managed to attain something any professional sports franchise would kill for: a giant fan base that loved them unconditionally.
The primary architect of this loyalty was longtime Redskins owner Jack Kent Cooke, the ruggedly handsome silver-haired showman who'd come to town after working similar miracles in Los Angeles with the Lakers. In the 1970s and '80s, his blue-collar teams made this preposterous swamp feel like a city.
But this season, something seems to have changed. It's not that the Redskins are 3-7 and headed for oblivion—the team has had only three winning seasons since 1999. It's that the complaints many fans and former players are hurling at the team seem to suggest something more serious is happening: that its essence—whatever it is that made the Redskins "the Redskins"—has gone away.
A Harris Interactive poll taken in 2003 put the Redskins at No. 6 in the NFL in nationwide popularity. In the most recent poll taken earlier this year, they had fallen to No. 17.
"It's very possible that the ownership of this team has ruptured themselves in a way with the fans where a lot of them are through," says John Riggins, a former star Redskins running back who has been openly critical of the team's current owner, Daniel Snyder. Michael Richman, a Redskins historian, says that between the losing and the acrimony surrounding the team, "this could go down as the worst season in Redskins' history."
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The primary architect of this loyalty was longtime Redskins owner Jack Kent Cooke, the ruggedly handsome silver-haired showman who'd come to town after working similar miracles in Los Angeles with the Lakers. In the 1970s and '80s, his blue-collar teams made this preposterous swamp feel like a city.
But this season, something seems to have changed. It's not that the Redskins are 3-7 and headed for oblivion—the team has had only three winning seasons since 1999. It's that the complaints many fans and former players are hurling at the team seem to suggest something more serious is happening: that its essence—whatever it is that made the Redskins "the Redskins"—has gone away.
A Harris Interactive poll taken in 2003 put the Redskins at No. 6 in the NFL in nationwide popularity. In the most recent poll taken earlier this year, they had fallen to No. 17.
"It's very possible that the ownership of this team has ruptured themselves in a way with the fans where a lot of them are through," says John Riggins, a former star Redskins running back who has been openly critical of the team's current owner, Daniel Snyder. Michael Richman, a Redskins historian, says that between the losing and the acrimony surrounding the team, "this could go down as the worst season in Redskins' history."
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Click link for rest of the article.