Redskins-Cowboys II Game Tape Reviews and General Grossmania

Last reviews of the year, thanks to holliday travel and such.

Offense

After the game on Sunday, many fans suggested that Rex Grossman passed his test as Redskins starting quarterback. I completely agree with their sentiments. I also think that Grossman is incredibly fortunate to be playing under circumstances where winning the game was not a primary objective of how well the quarterback performs. Grossman made way too many plays that hurt his team's chances of winning the game. He was more responsible than any other player for a 20-point third quarter deficit.

From the perspective of offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan, that's not really relevant. What Grossman was able to prove was that any old player who knows and understands his offense can have a banner day. By that measure, any player who has quarterbacked a team against the Cowboys since Week 5 must have known and understood their offenses: they've all had banner days. Grossman's performance against Dallas wasn't notable in any way except that he threw 100% of the team's touchdowns and two-point conversions (6 in total), and he committed three turnovers, two of the "horrible" variety.

Would the game have been won with Donovan McNabb at quarterback? Honestly, it wouldn't have. The reason is because Grossman made some aggressive, but accurate red zone throws that led to points -- throws that McNabb would have passed up. The Redskins red zone performance has been suspect all year, and the playcalling on this end of the field was just as questionable as it had ever been before. But some luck -- such as a roughing the passer call that extended the drive -- contributed to Grossman's red zone skill. Dallas also blew plenty of coverages to help him. This is a defense that plays dreadful assignment football, a defensive issue far more fundamental than the one the Redskins have (a lack of supporting talent, plus some key injuries).

Grossman still played a pretty poor game. None of the three turnovers needed to happen, or weren't Grossman's fault. On the flip side, none of the turnovers were 100% the fault of the quarterback (not even the horrible first quarter INT), but three turnovers is a lot more than the Dallas offenses' zero turnovers. The biggest difference between the Tampa Bay game (which I argued the Redskins deserved to win) and the Dallas game (which they did not) was that the opposing offense took care of the football. McNabb would have made up all the points he would have lost with questionable red-zone efficiency by committing one or fewer turnovers. This game may have been a statement game for the Redskins offensive coaches, but all we learned about Grossman was that he's not as polished a player as McNabb.

This was not a great pass protection game for the Redskins. They were able to get the comeback started because they were able to keep Grossman clean in the pocket for much of the middle two quarters, but the only solution the Redskins had when the Cowboys dialed up the pressure on Grossman in the fourth quarter was for Grossman to hit open receivers under duress. This was Grossman's best quality in this game. Following the lost fumble, Grossman under-threw but completed a deep ball to Anthony Armstrong, then on his next two passes, took advantage of Dallas' three man rushes to identify coverage mismatches and, on this drive alone, Grossman looked like a quarterback who was drafted in the first round. The touchdown pass on the slant to Moss against FS Alan Ball was a TD before the ball was even snapped.

By the start of the fourth quarter, the Redskins were still down 16 points, and Grossman would play the rest of the game with an immense level of pressure on him (Ryan Torain is not yet adept at executing protection assignments), and made a number of good throws, as well as a number of poor reads. Make no mistake: the Cowboys gave away the lead with fundamentally stupid errors more than the Redskins took it away. A good defense probably gives up the first two TDs to Grossman, and maybe another FG, but certainly would have held the Redskins under 20 points. The roughing-the-passer call came on a dead in the water play: Grossman had nowhere to go with the football. He then missed an open Fred Davis on a bootleg, and missed Moss again for a TD before finally executing the 3rd down throw to a wide open Santana Moss.

On the second to last drive, it was Ryan Torain who took the Redskins down the field, through some interesting screen concepts and other passing plays designed to get him on the edge in space. Torain is a good runner in open field, but struggles with a lot of the more basic concepts of being a runner at this level. He's physically a good blocker (giving me hope for his development as one), but has remarkably poor vision, which prevents him from running to both open holes and reading assignments vs. the blitz. Torain is not a dangerous runner when stretched towards the sideline, and you can't always expect blockers to be able to seal the edge for him. I'm convinced his biggest asset is his ability to 1) catch screens and not waste motion upfield like Williams does, and 2) have the trust of his offensive coordinator to convert precious run calls into yards. Keiland Williams would easily be an 1,200 yard runner if he got the benefit of the gameplan the way Torain does. Instead of "throwing the kitchen sink" at the defense in terms of a running game, we go into our 80-20 non-balanced playcalling game, running only simple stretches with Williams. That's not how you get a 150 yard game from your backup running back (although Williams executes stretches pretty well).

Keep this in mind if you believe Ryan Torain can be a no. 1 back in the NFL: I don't think he has the ability (vision) to do it. That doesn't mean I don't want packages that are designed to get an excellent north-south runner into space where he can chew up the yards and get downfield, but there's a reason that Torain is so ineffective in the red zone compared to Williams. Well, aside from Casey Rabach. Torain is neither a liability nor an asset, per my evaluation, but he's a bit overmatched as a featured runner. He's been the third most valuable running back on the team this year, and remember, he didn't make the team out of camp. I'd take him any day of the week over Larry Johnson though.

Grossman's final two drives are probably the ones that say the most about Rex Grossman. He comes off his own four yard line with a dangerous but deadly accurate flat pass to Cooley in the flat. An excellent example of how decisiveness can beat a defense even when the read is wrong. The next play was wasted to Roydell Williams: a good read by Grossman, but the pass was thrown well away from where Williams wanted it and Roydell hasn't shown me that he'll go get a ball all year. Then a perfect pass to Cooley beat a cover two look for 17 yards. Coming off that throw, Kyle Shanahan went for it all down the sideline to Moss, expecting the same coverage. He got the coverage, Grossman beat the pressure with a good throw and Moss...dropped it. The very next play, Grossman took a bad sack from the strong safety on a play where the blitz wasn't even well timed. That was an awful sack to take, as the play had already developed. The drive ended on another sack, but this was a blown communication where Keiland Williams and Kory Lichtenstieger failed to block a LB in a zone blitz. They're both first year guys, so it's not evident who screwed up, but based on the call, Williams probably had the assignment, then assumed he was free to release because the Cowboys only brought four. My biggest criticism of Williams this year is that he gets into the patterns too fast, thinking that just because there's four guys on the rush, he doesn't have to chip because there are blockers behind him.

Losing 17 yards in two plays is the biggest reason the Redskins lost the game anyway, at least after being down by 20 points. I'd take two more deflating Santana Moss drops over what actually happened. Sam Palescu is not a solution at punter.

My Soapbox

One criticism I have of some Redskins fans, in general, is that roughly half of the fanbase decided based on poor performance this week that Graham Gano, a 23 year old second year player who has given the Redskins one of the best kickoff units in memory, should be released for performance reasons against the Bucs (and the season, where his FG% is amongst the worst in the league). After all, changing the losing culture of the Redskins requires one to make some sacrifices in talent to ensure the best performance for a team. Well, that and Gano probably cost the Redskins a game. Of course, one week later, Santana Moss drops a ball that hit him in the hands as the Redskins are closing in on a monumental victory and season sweep of the hated Dallas Cowboys.

Santana Moss is a 30-year old receiver with an expiring contract who is only on the payroll for two more games. It would be wrong to look at the Moss play and ignore the 400+ yards the defense gave up, and the poor performance of the kick coverage units, as reasons for losing this game. It was also wrong to blame Gano for the Bucs loss without looking at DeAngelo Hall's or Kyle Shanahan's struggles in the same game. But had Moss made that catch -- and godforbid acutally beaten the overmatched safety and scored -- the Redskins are going to win the game.

None of those familiar culture-changing rants have been used against Moss or DeAngelo Hall this week. Which is to be expected. It's important to be accountable for inexcusable mistakes, unless of course, the mistakes are made by a player who has his replica manufactured and sold by the team. Graham Gano is as much a part of the teams success (and failures) this year as Moss or Hall, but because it's easy to find a new kicker, his underperformance isn't tolerated by some (not all) fans. I'm not saying that Moss or Hall should be immediately released before evaluation can take place, that would be ridiculously short-sighted. I'm saying that if your action plan for improving the clubhouse atmosphere is to cut young, cheap talent who the team doesn't have a great investment in when they screw up, but conversely talk about "being snakebit" when your stars make mistakes...well, that attitude might have something to do with why the Redskins won no division titles this decade.

Luckily, I think the Shanahan's were smart to not make the same mistake that Vinny Cerrato did last year, when he cut Shaun Suisham (who had a great FG%) after an inexcusable miss that cost the Redskins the Saints game. I don't see too many other reasons to think the culture is any different around Redskins Park than it was last year, but there you go: that's one piece of evidence that suggests it is.

End rant.

This will be the final offensive tape review of the season, due to holliday-related travel of your author. It is my sincerest hope that all 15 offensive reviews have been enlightening for you, because I always learn a lot in order to put these together, and that makes it worth it for me. If these are even moderately readable for the public, well, then so much the better.

Defense

Nothing has changed in terms of first down defense: the Redskins are still a dreadful first down defensive team, when they are primarily a 3-4 team. All we found out this week is that fixing the nose tackle position doesn't change the fact that the Redskins can't stop teams in normal downs and distances.

The Redskins' first successful defensive play on a 1st and 10 came from a four man front on the Cowboys first drive. Andre Carter hurried Jon Kitna's pass, who bounced one at the feet of a well covered Miles Austin. The next successful stop of a first down play came three drives later, when Anthony Bryant got some push up the middle, allowing Reed Doughty to make a stop behind the line. One drive later, another incompletion on first down, some more pressure up the middle by Bryant, and well, Jason Witten flat dropped a pass.

Things got a little bit better on first down later in the game. This is a good third down defense that Jim Haslett has drawn up. Very typically, when the Redskins get to 3rd down, they get off the field. The first third down conversion by the Cowboys on a play that wasn't in some way given by the officials messing up (a missed hold on Leonard Davis on the first, a ridiculously generous spot on the second, a roughing-the-something call on the third) occurred on the sixth drive of the game. That's when DeAngelo Hall was beaten by Jason Witten on the out-pattern, then by Sam Hurd on a smoke screen the next drive. The Cowboys would convert just one third down in the second half.

This is one of the best third down defenses the Redskins have had. It's just SO bad on first and second down that the opponent is hardly ever in third down. This is why the Redskins have given up more yards than any other team in football this year: when you can just alternate first and second downs all the way down the field, the fact that the Redskins aren't giving up big plays is completely relative. All the drives are long, even the ones truncated by turnover.

Pass pressure came from all angles in this game, and the Redskins easily won the game at the line of scrimmage. Jon Kitna remained poised for the most part, and though his reads were pretty simple, he was able to execute some accurate throws against various coverages. Kitna has earned my respect this year: he has played exceptionally well in relief of Tony Romo. It's been a long time -- 7 years, perhaps -- since Kitna played this well in a season. His favorite receiver in this game, Jason Witten, played the role of leading receiver out of injury necessity, but was no worse at it then he was back in the days where he was the Cowboys' most targeted receiver. The Redskins clearly did not plan for him to be the focal point of the offense, otherwise, London Fletcher would have been covering him more. It might not have mattered: Witten gets on the edge as a receiver quicker than any player I have seen.

I charted the Redskins with 21 hits and hurries in this game, plus two holdings. By my system of sack shares, that amount of pressure suggests a four-plus sack day. Unfortunately, despite all the pressure, the Redskins sacked Kitna just twice, which really has been the story of the year. The last two weeks, the pressure has kicked back up again (it had been non-existent for the five games prior) with more overload blitz concepts used, but without Orakpo for the second half of this game -- and likely the rest of the season -- it's hard to turn the QB hits into sacks.

Anthony Bryant might be the best run defender the Redskins have played on the defensive line this year, and while I haven't seen enough of him to discern whether or not he's a pass rushing upgrade to Ma'ake Kemoeatu, I think he's an overall upgrade. In a best-case scenario, he's our Antonio Garay, a nose tackle who the Chargers found near the end of last season who played for a member of the coaching staff or front office at another destination. The 2009 Chargers were just dreadful on the defensive side of the football last year, not at all dissimilar to the current Redskins. Then they found Garay, and he's been the most important contributor on their top-five defense this year. Nose tackle performance has gone up considerably since he's gotten into the lineup.

I can't yet make the same conclusion about Jeremy Jarmon at right defensive end yet. Jarmon is exactly the kind of player we need in that role, highly drafted, very good at interior pass rushing, and prototypical size, but all players in the 3-4 front need to be stout against the run, and Jarmon hasn't played in enough rushing situations for me to make an evaluation on his viability as the starting RDE in next year's 3-4. It's either him, or an offseason acquisition starting in that position, but I'm completely comfortable playing Bryant and Carriker as the other two defensive linemen. It's now safe to say that injuries to Bryant and Jarmon really hurt this defense, preventing the problem from being solved.

Rocky McIntosh showed up on film in a good way for the first time in weeks. It's performances like this from Rocky that will tantalize you thinking you have a playmaking LB, when you really do not. I have a theory, and this is pure conjecture, that Rocky, who is from South Carolina and went to college at The U, is simply uncomfortable playing in any sort of weather conditions (cold, wind, rain, snow, etc). The amount of mental lapses he will make in a game is usually numerous: in this game, it was none, or at least none that I caught. His reads appeared far more decisive, and he usually hit runners and lead blockers with forward momentum instead of reaching out with his arms at the last second while out of position. This guess would also explain why he starts strong every season only to fade and become a liability later on. For other examples of this phenomenon, see: Orton, Kyle.

DeAngelo Hall had a game to forget, including more ridiculous third down gambles when making a tackle forces a field goal. What stood out most is that Hall never really came close to forcing a turnover, but that's what his game has devolved into: desperate attempts at forcing a turnover since the Giants loss. Carlos Rogers was really good in this game, allowing just one completion on a slant to Miles Austin. Reed Doughty played very well again, then got injured and was replaced at safety by Kevin Barnes, who did as well as could be reasonably expected. Kareem Moore was dreadful again. Moore, like every other safety on our roster, is far more comfortable in the box than anywhere else. He might have the most deep range among any of our safeties, but he's so bad at reading plays that he's never in position to make plays. For all the grief I give Hall, and rightfully so, his instincts tend to lead him to the ball more often than the average player. This is not the case for Kareem Moore, no matter how far the opponent stretches the field, Moore never seems to get closer to making a play. I don't see any developmental value in him either. He does the same things well that Reed Doughty and Chris Horton do, only, not nearly as well as they do them. This team completely lacks a coverage safety, although Barnes did that job intriguingly well for a half.

The defense gave up a lot of empty yards in this one: 32 on a gadget play, 22 because Doughty fell down, a lot of meaningless gains on third and longs. Their problems in this game was that they couldn't cover Jason Witten (even with their best players), and couldn't force the Cowboys to keep him in for blocking. Most of the critical plays came against DeAngelo Hall; no one else on the defense really had a bad day (except maybe Moore...but he may just be a bad player). Lorenzo Alexander has struggled on defense in the second half of this season, and there were a lot of gashing runs allowed when, and only when, Ma'ake Kemoeatu was playing the nose in his rotation with Bryant.

The Cowboys also had great success dictating the match-ups in coverage, using formation diversity while rotating in only new running backs. They were in 2 WR, 2 TE most of the game. Kareem Moore was a marked man, and they did their film study, not running any players into London Fletcher's zone unless it was deeper down the field. Even there, their success was mixed.

I end this year's defensive reviews with just one important tidbit of knowledge that you absolutely did not need me to have. I don't know if I've said it enough for it to be appreciated, but here it goes: London Fletcher is good at football.

Really good.

Did you get anything on Perry Riley? He looked really fast out there from what I saw, and one of the few besides Fletcher who was actually wrapping high and bringing down the ball carrier

Did you get anything on Perry Riley? He looked really fast out there from what I saw, and one of the few besides Fletcher who was actually wrapping high and bringing down the ball carrierRiley was in (as in around the ball) on three plays. I wrote about McIntosh because he's had so many problems this year, but if the coaching staff is sold on Riley, we're almost certain to get an upgrade at the position from what I've seen.

Good read, like always! I absolutely love Fletcher, he's a superman for the team.. It's amazing that he's still playing at high level..

As for Grossman, if he continues to play same or better next two games then I definitely hope we will resign him.

I noticed early on in the season that NcNabb had an aversion to throwing the flat route passes.

Do you put the blame solely on McNabb or do you put some of the blame on Kyle?

Imo a coach must be able to get McNabb/their QB to make the correct read.
I think that issue is a microcosim of their relationship: a sad failure to communicate.

Also, did it seem like their were a heck of a lot more screen concepts as part of the passing game?
That would have been a good way to force McNabb to be more efficient throughpalycalling.

Early on, it was probably the offense. If you're just reading half the field, deep, as the play develops, the timing to throw a flat route is going to be non-existent.

More recently, I didn't feel McNabb had a problem with hitting the fullback or running back in the flats. Thought it was isolated to earlier in the season.

Didn't think there were more screens (perhaps more diverse screens) but there were definitely more "burn this play" end around type attempts.

Awesome, I've had to miss a lot of games due to work and no DVR so this helps a lot. Downloading the game now.

I noticed Hall jumped out at me a lot as well this week, in an incredibly bad way. Almost unbelievably poor from this him, that is, if you didn't know who he is.

I've always like DeAngelo Hall, I like that he's able to force turnovers and I used to think he had really good ball skills. As it turns out, he's just got a lot of raw athleticism, that occasionally fools one into thinking his ball skills are better than they are. While I still really like to see him force turnovers, I'd really like to see him stop "jumping" routes where he never gets close to the ball, misses the tackle and gives up a big game or a touchdown.

As to your rant, I've advocated ditching both Moss and Hall just last week. I said then, that while I like DeAngelo, he's everything that's wrong with this football team, same with Moss. They're overpaid and overrated. Neither of them deserve to have a team built around them, as if they're part of some core.

Santana has been dropping passes for years and I'm really getting sick of it. He's inconsistent and when he's bad, he's horrid. Santana Moss has no business being a number one receiver (even though I think that's Anthony Armstrong now) and he really has only played like one for, maybe, three seasons in his career. I'm really hoping the Skins don't re-sign him at the end of season, or at least not long term, because I don't want them convincing themselves that they've got WR1 solved, when they really don't.

I noticed Hall jumped out at me a lot as well this week, in an incredibly bad way. Almost unbelievably poor from this him, that is, if you didn't know who he is.

I've always like DeAngelo Hall, I like that he's able to force turnovers and I used to think he had really good ball skills. As it turns out, he's just got a lot of raw athleticism, that occasionally fools one into thinking his ball skills are better than they are. While I still really like to see him force turnovers, I'd really like to see him stop "jumping" routes where he never gets close to the ball, misses the tackle and gives up a big game or a touchdown.

As to your rant, I've advocated ditching both Moss and Hall just last week. I said then, that while I like DeAngelo, he's everything that's wrong with this football team, same with Moss. They're overpaid and overrated. Neither of them deserve to have a team built around them, as if they're part of some core.

Santana has been dropping passes for years and I'm really getting sick of it. He's inconsistent and when he's bad, he's horrid. Santana Moss has no business being a number one receiver (even though I think that's Anthony Armstrong now) and he really has only played like one for, maybe, three seasons in his career. I'm really hoping the Skins don't re-sign him at the end of season, or at least not long term, because I don't want them convincing themselves that they've got WR1 solved, when they really don't.

Moss has his share of bad games, but has been big for us over the years. After watching the replay of the drop it was tougher than it looked I think, his feet got a little tangled w/jenkins. should he make that catch? yes, but I don't think that 1 drop nullifies his performance.

I don't think, or I'm guessing, that re-signing moss means that the WR1 is "solved". I think he needs to be re-signed in addition to bringing in a #1. Armstrong has shown improvement but is a 3 or 4 on most teams if at all.