Sometimes Its Who You Keep Not Who You Sign

[MTK]

Originally Posted by warriorzpath

I think if ryan clark was still with the redskins - he wouldn't be the player he is now. Just a feeling. What does this say (about the redskins)?... I don't exactly know.

All it says is people seem to think everyone on other teams are great and our players suck. It's all about perspective. And what kind of player is Clark right now anyway? He's a solid player, as he was here. It's not like he turned into Sean Taylor in Pittsburgh.

[warriorzpath]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

All it says is people seem to think everyone on other teams are great and our players suck. It's all about perspective. And what kind of player is Clark right now anyway? He's a solid player, as he was here. It's not like he turned into Sean Taylor in Pittsburgh.

Actually, judging by the jarring hits that he has made recently - especially the one on McGahee - I think he HAS turned into the Sean Taylor of Pittsburgh.

[MTK]

Originally Posted by warriorzpath

Actually, judging by the jarring hits that he has made recently - especially the one on McGahee - I think he HAS turned into the Sean Taylor of Pittsburgh.

He was never afraid of throwing his body around when he was a Redskin either. Regardless he is still no #21, not even close.

[warriorzpath]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

He was never afraid of throwing his body around when he was a Redskin either. Regardless he is still no #21, not even close.

I disagree - as a redskin, he may have been looking to make some tackles, but now he's looking to put people out on the stretcher with the way he hits. There's a big difference.

[BigHairedAristocrat]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

All it says is people seem to think everyone on other teams are great and our players suck. It's all about perspective. And what kind of player is Clark right now anyway? He's a solid player, as he was here. It's not like he turned into Sean Taylor in Pittsburgh.

He has improved alot and is one of the hardest hitters in the NFL right now. For the price, id take him over Landry in a heartbeat (assuming we had our #6overall pick back.)

This is somewhat unrelated, but I don't like Landry and Horton in their current roles. They both need to play SS. If we had the same corners we had now, i'd take Clark (FS) and Horton (SS) with our 2007 1st rounder back and used on a DE or DT over our current configuration and be deliriously happy. For what its worth, I'd also trade Horton for a 2nd rounder in a heartbeat if someone offered as much.

This team simly does not know how to select (and keep) the right defensive players and then use them effectively. The failure is two-fold. Its a failure in Vinny in giving Blache (and previously Williams) the right personnel for their system and its a failure in Blache (and previously Williams) in failing to adapt their system to fit the players Vinny gave them. Now that I think of it, the problems plagued our offense too. In the end, we've hired coaches to run a certain system, but we have never given them the right players to make their system work. Great coaches adapt their systems to their players, but it would be a whole lot easier for the FO to just pick the right players in the first place. its not that the FO NEVER picks the right players, it just does it about 50% of the time. thats simply not good enough.

[Ruhskins]

Originally Posted by BigHairedAristocrat

He has improved alot and is one of the hardest hitters in the NFL right now. For the price, id take him over Landry in a heartbeat (assuming we had our #6overall pick back.)

This is somewhat unrelated, but I don't like Landry and Horton in their current roles. They both need to play SS. If we had the same corners we had now, i'd take Clark (FS) and Horton (SS) with our 2007 1st rounder back and used on a DE or DT over our current configuration and be deliriously happy. For what its worth, I'd also trade Horton for a 2nd rounder in a heartbeat if someone offered as much.

This team simly does not know how to select (and keep) the right defensive players and then use them effectively. The failure is two-fold. Its a failure in Vinny in giving Blache (and previously Williams) the right personnel for their system and its a failure in Blache (and previously Williams) in failing to adapt their system to fit the players Vinny gave them. Now that I think of it, the problems plagued our offense too. In the end, we've hired coaches to run a certain system, but we have never given them the right players to make their system work. Great coaches adapt their systems to their players, but it would be a whole lot easier for the FO to just pick the right players in the first place.

Don't forget that things would be different in our defense if Sean Taylor was still alive. I would say that the team did know how to select a good player when they picked ST. I mean this conversation about Clark would not be happening if we had the ST/Landry combination at safety.

Also, people forget that Clark is playing alongside Polamalu, so I'm sure that adds to him (Clark) being a good player now.

[BigHairedAristocrat]

Originally Posted by Ruhskins

Don't forget that things would be different in our defense if Sean Taylor was still alive. I would say that the team did know how to select a good player when they picked ST. I mean this conversation about Clark would not be happening if we had the ST/Landry combination at safety.

Also, people forget that Clark is playing alongside Polamalu, so I'm sure that adds to him (Clark) being a good player now.

Good point on Taylor, but we would have been facing a different set of problems if he hadnt been murdered. We likely wouldnt have been able to keep Taylor here... or if we did, it would have cost us bigtime and other areas of our team would have suffered. (on the other hand, it could have forced the FO to make some tough choices, like cutting some of our older vets last year and not extending guys like Thomas and Portis... but that would be giving Cerrato too much credit.)

anyway, just remember that Clark was a good player when he was playing alongside sean Taylor too. Its not like he THAT much better of a player now... he was always good. He fit the system we ran. I imagine one of the reasons we let him go was that we wanted to move Taylor to FS, but in doing so, we created a huge hole that idiotboy Cerrato decided to fill by signing ArchDeluxe to a ridiculous contract - then when that was a colossal failure, we overcompensated by picking Landry.

[MTK]

Originally Posted by BigHairedAristocrat

He has improved alot and is one of the hardest hitters in the NFL right now. For the price, id take him over Landry in a heartbeat (assuming we had our #6overall pick back.)

This is somewhat unrelated, but I don't like Landry and Horton in their current roles. They both need to play SS. If we had the same corners we had now, i'd take Clark (FS) and Horton (SS) with our 2007 1st rounder back and used on a DE or DT over our current configuration and be deliriously happy. For what its worth, I'd also trade Horton for a 2nd rounder in a heartbeat if someone offered as much.

This team simly does not know how to select (and keep) the right defensive players and then use them effectively. The failure is two-fold. Its a failure in Vinny in giving Blache (and previously Williams) the right personnel for their system and its a failure in Blache (and previously Williams) in failing to adapt their system to fit the players Vinny gave them. Now that I think of it, the problems plagued our offense too. In the end, we've hired coaches to run a certain system, but we have never given them the right players to make their system work. Great coaches adapt their systems to their players, but it would be a whole lot easier for the FO to just pick the right players in the first place. its not that the FO NEVER picks the right players, it just does it about 50% of the time. thats simply not good enough.

Clark is a solid player but nothing special. This is just another example of people overrating other team's players while underrating our own.

Correct me if I'm wrong but over the past few years the D has pretty much carried this team, so they must be doing something right on that side of the ball. It's amazing they can continue to overcome these horrible personnel decisions and bad coaching.

[Ruhskins]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

Clark is a solid player but nothing special. This is just another example of people overrating other team's players while underrating our own.

Correct me if I'm wrong but over the past few years the D has pretty much carried this team, so they must be doing something right on that side of the ball. It's amazing they can continue to overcome these horrible personnel decisions and bad coaching.

Agreed Matty. It's not like Clark left, the defense fell apart, and they've been at the bottom of NFL defenses. Once again, some posts here are just beating that dead horse of bashing the front office on things that happened in the past.

[Larry Michael is Satan]

Ryan Clark was a great compliment to ST, and was one of my favorite Redskins. I remember seeing big hits on the field and assuming it was #21, but then see #25 get up from the pile. I remember one of the Skins saying "Ryan Clark will separate your body from your soul." He was apparently a very positive force in the locker room too, which yes, actually does matter.

It was a big mistake not re-signing him, and I believe it speaks volumes about GW's ego. The Skins would get beat down the middle, and obviously in GW's mind it couldn't be the fault of his genius Cover-2 scheme, it must be the inferior safety's fault. Goodbye Clark, hello Arch. Also speaks volumes about the Skins FO, as there wasn't a qualified GM to overrule Gregg.

I'm happy for Ryan, he and his well-run team deserve to win a few Superbowls.

[redskinjim]

we blew that one antonio peirce was another mistake

[44ever]

I think the one point that can't be desputed is the fact that while our defense didn't fall apart, it didn't become dominate either. We have had to double or in some cases triple our efforts to fill holes we had already plugged solidly.

The FO was in such a hurry to win now that it influenced terrible draft and trade stratedgies. And now the mistake(s) have finally been realized. So what will FO do now? Well basically the same mistakes but not for the sake of the instant win, but for trying to play mistake catch up.

Because desicions on JT and others have cost us to give up draft pics, VC will now try to compensate by trading down. Again not being in position to comfortably pick from our current slots. Probably signing guys we would have normally pass on if we still had the resorces too.

So yeah Clark leaving didn't kill our D. But just imagine how much better we would be with him. Not to mention the domino effect choices like this cause.

Vinny still has some fall out to deal with

The FO needs to develop patience and forsight

[over the mountain]

the clark issue reminds me of the brad johnson-jeff george deal (is this going back to far?). we had a capable guy who wanted to stay with us, we didnt sign him to a reasonable contract, then turn around and pay another less capable guy a boat load of money.

lame post by me, i know . . .

go skins!!

[SmootSmack]

Well we also have completely changed the culture within the organization from when Spurrier was here (trust me, it was a disaster). Hopefully, we've got a QB for the next decade.

But I don't want to start getting into another Gibbs debate again. So I'll just leave this topic alone

[JoeRedskin]

Originally Posted by SmootSmack

Well we also have completely changed the culture within the organization from when Spurrier was here (trust me, it was a disaster). Hopefully, we've got a QB for the next decade.

But I don't want to start getting into another Gibbs debate again. So I'll just leave this topic alone

I'm just curious. Under Spurrier, how was personnel aquisition organized? Was it all Dan? Did Vinny run the show? Or was Spurrier basically given a green light for whoever he wanted on offense and defense was just whatever looked good in the papers?

I believe it was a disaster. I am just interested in a) What was the culture that made it so disasterous? b) How did Gibbs change it? c) Even though some of the players remain unchanged (anyone still here from the Spurrier era other than VC?), have the changes Gibbs created taken hold?

I realize it my be too early to tell on (c), but I am curious as to your opionion on it.