[Paintrain]

Originally Posted by The Goat

I heard that at the time but cannot remember the source. I also remember hearing that Williams respected Saunders and thought he should have control of the offense while Danny/Vinny wanted nothing to do w/ Saunders. Ultimately, Danny chose to go into rebuild mode instead of building on what we had (rebuilding both in terms of leadership and offensive system, for instance I think it was apparent by end of '08 Williams was a leader as much as Gibbs and I specifically remember several players speaking to that during and after the search for a new HC.) Danny didn't exactly blow up the team because Blache stepped in and retained a very effective defense; however in terms of team leadership and the entire offense it seems obvious we're in rebuild mode once again.

While speculation is cheap my best intuition is that w/ Williams as HC and Saunders most likely in control of the offense we'd be better than 8-8 and maybe much better as Saunders offense always yields bigger dividends over time. Oh well, I wholeheartedly want Zorn to have tremendous success now that he's here. In fact I think his success is critical because, just guessing again here, I highly highly doubt another high quality, high character HC will work for Dan Snyder for a very long time. It's Vinny, it's the way Danny handled the Spags circumstance, and not least how Danny handled the situation w/ Williams who regardless of what some rather bitter Skins fans might say is extremely well respected in the NFL, altogether I just don't see anyone great working for Snyder.

You know, I was never really a Grilliams guy and never thought much of him as a HC 'replacement' but that being said I think you could be right or at least if there was a 'two year' ultimatum in place as rumored, he and Saunders should have had that two years to build off of their existing work and then blow it up if it didn't sustain or improve.