It's official - Al Saunders is our new offensive coordinator!

I've never heard of Sid Gillman. Can someone give me a background on him?

The only thing I can gather from this at the outset is that Gibbs is ready to hand over the reins so he can ease up a bit on the hours at Redskin Park. An article by Joseph White from the AP ran in my local paper a couple of days ago saying that Gibbs complained more this season about the long hours than at any point in his career.

Maybe he's ready to take a step back and handle just the head coaching responsibilities apart from coordinating and playcalling duties. Notice he didn't bring a 'West Coast' guy in here. He still wants to stick with his offensive philosophy, so I think this is a good move.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sid_Gilman

70chip, i don't think mike martz and joe gibbs run the same offensive system.

this is huge news... KC's running game is second to none- even though they have an edge in OL talent, I believe Saunders can do something with our own personnel.

if breaux stays, then i think saunders will become assistant head coach-offense and bugel will become just o-line coach (bugels not gonna sign anywhere else so we dont have to worry about that)

I like the timing of this move. I don't care about "taking head coaches away" from other teams. I like the fact that they will have an ENTIRE offseason to plan and create an offense for this year. Those who don't see the benefit of this move may be a little football ignorant. More ideas are better than fewer ideas. Throw them all out and then fine tune the ones that work and coincide with the personell. Saunders+Gibbs+Breaux+Musgrave=BETTER OFFENSIVE PRODUCTION.
HTTR!!

I have to take issue with the Wikipedia link above. It claims that Gilman was the father of what is today known as the 'west coast' offense. Not so. What is now called the 'west coast' offense was developed by Paul Brown and Bill Walsh in Cincinatti in the early 1970s when the two coached together there. (call it the Ohio Valley offense) It was perfected and became famous when Joe Montana ran it for Walsh in San Francisco. This offense emphasises short controlled passes and was developed to allow a smaller team to control the clock without a power running game.

Gilman's offense, by contrast, emphasized deep passes and was the league standard for passing offenses prior to the emergence of the 'West Coast'.

Regarding Martz and Gibbs, I would suggest that in terms of the passing game the two have more, not less, in common. A qb coming from St. Louis to Washington would have much less to relearn than he would going to say Philadelphia or Green Bay where they run the west coast. Within an offense, one coach may emphasize run as Gibbs does now, or he may emphasize the pass as Martz does and Gibbs did in San Diego as the coordinator in 1979 and 1980. That's all.

In addition these offenses are constantly evolving so when one says 'west coast' offense or 'Joe Gibbs' offense, its a dynamic rather than static thing. Gibbs has said that offenses change about 30% a year. They steal things from other teams, think up new ideas, emphasize certain aspects to maximize talent, etc.

I Think That Saunders Is A Great Addition To The Redskin Family Hopefully He Does Open Up The Offense Immediately During Games Instead Of Waitng Until We Are Down By 14 Points Or Some Crap Like That.

More stuff--it's up at redskins.com (http://www.redskins.com) now--also, they report that the ENTIRE coaching staff is returning for next year! Talk about continuity!

:biggthump :biggthump :biggthump

Oh, and Welcome 3rd ID Soldier--are you home or overseas? Thanks for serving and welcome to the board!

This is almost as good a Clinton Portis, coming to Washington