Four Years Later: Are We Better Off?

[irish]

I gotta vote with Tripp because this is a vote on the team and not Gibbs (as the heading implies). I think this team is spinning its wheels and doesnt get better and doesnt really get worse. I dont see the Skins being any better next year than this year. It will be an 8-8 or 9-7 team again.

Sure this team has made the playoffs but in reality this team has won nothing since Gibbs returned and I'm sure had we taken a poll 4 years ago today predicting the next 4 years and I predicted 2 playoff appearances but no playoff wins I would have been skewered. Unfortunately that has been what happened. It always looks like this team is getting better but they never really do.

[MTK]

Originally Posted by irish

I gotta vote with Tripp because this is a vote on the team and not Gibbs (as the heading implies). I think this team is spinning its wheels and doesnt get better and doesnt really get worse. I dont see the Skins being any better next year than this year. It will be an 8-8 or 9-7 team again.

Sure this team has made the playoffs but in reality this team has won nothing since Gibbs returned and I'm sure had we taken a poll 4 years ago today predicting the next 4 years and I predicted 2 playoff appearances but no playoff wins I would have been skewered. Unfortunately that has been what happened. It always looks like this team is getting better but they never really do.

except we do have a playoff win

[irish]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

except we do have a playoff win

Yes I forgot about that win. Thanks for catching that. 1 for 3 in the playoffs is not what most on this board would have expected. It Still does not change the fact that this team always seems to look like its getting better but it never does.

[#56fanatic]

To me, roster means nothing. look at the superbowl teams NE fielded. No really big names, but just players. We have lived off the hype of the roster for 10 years, and really nothing to show for it. I do think having Campbell is one of the bright spots. Cooley, Landry, and Rocky - other than that who knows. I can't put Moss in that catagory because you just dont know. He had one stellar year, and average for the rest. I dont think we are any better than we were 4 years ago. records speak of that.

[SmootSmack]

Originally Posted by #56fanatic

To me, roster means nothing. look at the superbowl teams NE fielded. No really big names, but just players. We have lived off the hype of the roster for 10 years, and really nothing to show for it. I do think having Campbell is one of the bright spots. Cooley, Landry, and Rocky - other than that who knows. I can't put Moss in that catagory because you just dont know. He had one stellar year, and average for the rest. I dont think we are any better than we were 4 years ago. records speak of that.

what records are you looking at?

[Sheriff Gonna Getcha]

Originally Posted by #56fanatic

To me, roster means nothing. look at the superbowl teams NE fielded. No really big names, but just players. We have lived off the hype of the roster for 10 years, and really nothing to show for it. I do think having Campbell is one of the bright spots. Cooley, Landry, and Rocky - other than that who knows. I can't put Moss in that catagory because you just dont know. He had one stellar year, and average for the rest. I dont think we are any better than we were 4 years ago. records speak of that.

You mean big-names like Brady, Randy Moss, Richard Seymour, Teddy Bruschi, Mike Vrabel, Roosevelt Colvin, Adalius Thomas, Vince Wilfork, Ty Warren, and Asante Samuel? Many of those guys were free agents BTW.

As for our record, it was 5-11 in 2003 and 9-7 this year. Almost doubling your wins is pretty decent IMO, but maybe that is just me.

[SmootSmack]

Originally Posted by Sheriff Gonna Getcha

You mean big-names like Brady, Randy Moss, Richard Seymour, Teddy Bruschi, Mike Vrabel, Roosevelt Colvin, Adalius Thomas, Vince Wilfork, Ty Warren, and Asante Samuel? Many of those guys were free agents BTW.

As for our record, it was 5-11 in 2003 and 9-7 this year. Almost doubling your wins is pretty decent IMO, but maybe that is just me.

To play devil's advocate though I can see where people might say but we went from 6-10 to 5-11 to 10-6 to 9-7.

However, I think the first year was a wash. And the ensuing years started to forming the future of this team by selecting guys like Rogers, Golston, Montgomery, Cooley, Landry, Campbell, etc.; keeping core guys like Cooley; establishing a new (but proven in the league) offense; and more than anything establishing a culture of unity and confidence.

I don't deal with them much anymore on a personal level so I only know from secondhand knowledge what's it like inside Redskins Park. But I dealt with them almost every day from Summer 1998 to December 1992 and it was a horrible environment. It was a defeatist, every man for himself culture. The Turner era was one of disrespect, Schottenheimer one of egos (but not Matty), though it may have been the most similar to this one in terms of confidencek and the Spurrier era one of apathy.

[MTK]

Originally Posted by Sheriff Gonna Getcha

You mean big-names like Brady, Randy Moss, Richard Seymour, Teddy Bruschi, Mike Vrabel, Roosevelt Colvin, Adalius Thomas, Vince Wilfork, Ty Warren, and Asante Samuel? Many of those guys were free agents BTW.

As for our record, it was 5-11 in 2003 and 9-7 this year. Almost doubling your wins is pretty decent IMO, but maybe that is just me.

Who?

[GTripp0012]

Originally Posted by Sheriff Gonna Getcha

You mean big-names like Brady, Randy Moss, Richard Seymour, Teddy Bruschi, Mike Vrabel, Roosevelt Colvin, Adalius Thomas, Vince Wilfork, Ty Warren, and Asante Samuel? Many of those guys were free agents BTW.

As for our record, it was 5-11 in 2003 and 9-7 this year. Almost doubling your wins is pretty decent IMO, but maybe that is just me.

Only Moss, Colvin, and Thomas I think.

I think we got a lot of significant pieces between January 2004 and September 2004, something I did not consider when I first voted. Though this team was 6-10 in 2004, it just simply lacked the balance of a great offense. Since day one, Gibbs and Williams made the defense a priority and have enjoyed a level of sustained success that we never could before.

Due to this misunderstanding of dates, I'd like to strip my own republic, and recast my vote for being better. We may not be much better on the whole than in 2004, but the quality of loss in 2004 was just so much higher than in 2003, especially late in the year.

Had Brunell been healthy that year, thats likely a playoff team.

[backrow]

For those undecided out there, our poll says it all. At this moment, 10:45 p.m. on Monday night, our poll says 73% for Joe Redskins better off.

And that's the way I voted.

Two (2) PO teams in four (4) years says it all, since we had little to brag about during the two previous coaches tenures.

[Sheriff Gonna Getcha]

Originally Posted by GTripp0012

Only Moss, Colvin, and Thomas I think.

Mike Vrabel was as well. Additionally, the Pats acquired Donte Stallworth(Philly's former #1 wideout) and Rodney Harrison in free agency and Wes Welker via trade. They've got a nice "base" of draftees, but with big-name FA like Randy Moss, Donte Stallworth, Wes Welker, Roosevelt Colvin, Adalius Thomas, Mike Vrabel, and Rodney Harrison it is kind of hard to argue with a straight face that the Pats is built solely through the draft. In fact, about half that team's starting lineup consists of free agent acquisitions.

[Sheriff Gonna Getcha]

Originally Posted by irish

I gotta vote with Tripp because this is a vote on the team and not Gibbs (as the heading implies). I think this team is spinning its wheels and doesnt get better and doesnt really get worse. I dont see the Skins being any better next year than this year. It will be an 8-8 or 9-7 team again.

Sure this team has made the playoffs but in reality this team has won nothing since Gibbs returned and I'm sure had we taken a poll 4 years ago today predicting the next 4 years and I predicted 2 playoff appearances but no playoff wins I would have been skewered. Unfortunately that has been what happened. It always looks like this team is getting better but they never really do.

Are you serious? You honestly can say with a straight face that this team is no better than it was in 2003? If so, someone is going to have to send you tapes of some of those games.

[JoeRedskin]

Originally Posted by irish

Sure this team has made the playoffs but in reality this team has won nothing since Gibbs returned and I'm sure had we taken a poll 4 years ago today predicting the next 4 years and I predicted 2 playoff appearances but no playoff wins I would have been skewered. Unfortunately that has been what happened. It always looks like this team is getting better but they never really do.

I disagree. After the final game of the Spurrier regime, and Spurrier's resignation (remember, he quit on the Redskins, not vice versa. In fact, as I recall, Snyder tried to convince him to stay), this team did not look like it was getting better and, in fact, I would say it was looking into the future with despair.

Who could we get to coach? How would restore respectability? How could we avoid being consistent cellar-dwellers given the state of our cap and the apparent age of our roster?

I don't know how you felt at the time, but I felt pretty hopeless.

Gibbs brought immediate credibility and immediate hope. Unfortunately, the hope was overblown but, again IMO, the credibility was not. Four years of continuity in management and message has made a difference. Read the players post season comments. This is a team that expects to win AND has shown the capability to do so. Compare these to the 2003/2004 pre-Gibbs offseason.

Before you can be consistent, you may have to be sporadic. Right now, over four years we have had two losers and two winners. If we can put another winning season together next year (which I anticipate - not a perfect season, but a winning one), three of four seasons will be winners and the culture of consistent winning can be re-established.

I think the 2003/2004 offseason was the pits and the years of mismanagement and infighting had come home to roost. Again, Gibbs has changed the way the team and, importantly, its non-player employees look at the time.

Does it have flaws, of course. Are we on a downward spiral? No. Can we legitimately hope to win even if our talent level is not top-notch, or the injury bug strikes? Yup.

More importantly, do the players believe they can win even if our talent level is not top-notch, or the injury bug strikes? Again, I think that this season gives that a resounding yes.

Further, unlike the euphoria of post-2005, when the team thought all it had to do was show up to win, this team seems to realize that it takes a team working hard ALL the time to win.

The culture of winning, so thoroughly destroyed by Spurrier/Cerrato/Snyder troika, is returning and coming to fruition under Gibbs.

This team will play hard for Gibbs and, in doing so, will win for him.