[Ruhskins]

Originally Posted by Slingin Sammy 33

VC is taking the bullets for Greg Williams. This was a Greg Williams decision all the way. I really get sick of hearing everyone dump on the FO for Lloyd, ARE & Arch. These were bad signings, pushed by Al Saunders, and Greg Williams. Gibbs as a manager was giving his assistants the tools they supposedly needed. These signings went south and Saunders and Williams are gone. WTF else does anyone want.

Saunders and Williams had Gibbs' support and neither DS or VC was going to go counter to Gibbs' wishes. Had they done that, they hysteria here would've been more over the top than it already is sometimes.

When Gibbs left the big questions was, why didn't GW get the job? The Arch thing and personality conflicts with the FO were probably the major reason. Hindsight on that looks pretty good now IMO, how about some props to the FO for getting that one right.

Bottom line is we have the correct structure in place. Zorn has input as every coach should, but the bottom line in player selection falls squarely on VCs. We can't fully evaluate Thomas, Kelly, Davis, their progression in 2009 will be key though. Tyron, Brooks, probably bad, but they were 4/5 rounders and many get cut across all NFL teams. We needed a punter and the #1 punter coming out of college wasn't a bad pick, he just didn't make the transition. Colt Brennan is the next Joe Montana / Tom Brady in waiting (SARCASM ALERT) and I'd say Horton was a pretty good pick. We didn't break the bank in FA, and the Taylor signing was a 1 year rental that didn't pan out. It was a risk taken under duress anyway. No way we could've addressed all our needs in one draft, and when we picked Thomas the players targeted on the DL were already taken. The Davis pick is still a bit of a head-scratcher, IMO there were still solid players on the DL, CB and OL available, but I'm willing to leave the jury out on that one until 2009/2010.

Let's not under-estimate the severity of the blow losing ST was either. He was signed to a reasonable contract and was arguably a top 5 defensive player in the league. He's taken away with zero compensation....that's a huge void to fill in so many ways. Can we have just a small bit of patience and see what happens this off-season. If we can fill a few holes there's no reason we can't be a contender in 2009, and in 2008 were still in the chase for the playoffs going into Week 16.

I think people like to overlook the fact that Gibbs was in some way, shape, or form involved in some of these bad acquisitions. Don't get me wrong, Gibbs did great things for this franchise during his second stint, and I will not overlook that nor am I trying to undermine them. However, a lot things that people like to blame solely on Vinny and Snyder, were done either because of Gibbs or with support. Let's not forget that Snyder gave Gibbs a blank check on decision making, and as it has been stated before, DS or VC would never have gone against Gibbs wishes.