Four Years Later: Are We Better Off?

[Paintrain]

We're a better football team than we were in 2004 but I'm in agreement with what others have said, we're still not consistently good. We've made the playoffs twice (sandwiched by 6-10 and 5-11 seasons) with miraculous end of the season runs that coincided with improbable circumstances of other teams losing (NO at home to Philly, GB losing to make the Dallas game meaningless for them) and us hitting a mini stride at the right time. A legitimate argument can be made that we were more lucky than good and were the beneficiary of being the right team at the right time.

Good teams don't have to do that, they take care of business from September-December. If we win games we should have won/closed out (NYG, GB, PHI, BUF) we are sitting at home on Saturday rather than trudging across country on 5 days rest. Those are the differences between good teams that make it deep into the playoffs consistently and teams that occassionaly flash. We are a mirror of Tampa Bay, 6-10 to 10-6 to 5-11 to 10-6 (except we were 9-7 this year) and nobody considers Tampa a strong consistent team. Most prognosicators picked them last in their division this year and if injuries/stupidity didn't decimate their competition (Atlanta-Vick, Carolina-Delhomme & Smith missed most of the year, NO-McAllister, Payton's playcalling) do we really think they are a 10 win team?

Roster wise we are in much better shape with a franchise QB in Campbell, Portis still going strong, Moss, Cooley and Randle-El serviceable at WR (but we need a stud WR, Moss is a #2 at this point and ARE is a #3), the OL is solid, the DL has some good young talent, LB should be a strength in '08 (Fletcher, Washington and I'm calling Briggs a Redskin) and the secondary has 2 solid players in Landry & Smoot with some young depth and hopefully Rogers coming back by midseason..

While I have backed off of my 'Gibbs must go' mantra of pre-Taylor murder, I still think a philisophical change needs to occur offensively to become much more aggressive. We need to model the aggressiveness after the Patriots, Packers and Cowboys (ugh) who attack for 60 minutes and try to hang as many points on the board as they can.

[JoeRedskin]

Originally Posted by Paintrain

While I have backed off of my 'Gibbs must go' mantra of pre-Taylor murder, I still think a philisophical change needs to occur offensively to become much more aggressive. We need to model the aggressiveness after the Patriots, Packers and Cowboys (ugh) who attack for 60 minutes and try to hang as many points on the board as they can.

When we get an O-Line that can consistently keep our QB clean and open holes in the 4th quarter - the points will come.

[MTK]

Originally Posted by Paintrain

We're a better football team than we were in 2004 but I'm in agreement with what others have said, we're still not consistently good. We've made the playoffs twice (sandwiched by 6-10 and 5-11 seasons) with miraculous end of the season runs that coincided with improbable circumstances of other teams losing (NO at home to Philly, GB losing to make the Dallas game meaningless for them) and us hitting a mini stride at the right time. A legitimate argument can be made that we were more lucky than good and were the beneficiary of being the right team at the right time.

Good teams don't have to do that, they take care of business from September-December. If we win games we should have won/closed out (NYG, GB, PHI, BUF) we are sitting at home on Saturday rather than trudging across country on 5 days rest. Those are the differences between good teams that make it deep into the playoffs consistently and teams that occassionaly flash. We are a mirror of Tampa Bay, 6-10 to 10-6 to 5-11 to 10-6 (except we were 9-7 this year) and nobody considers Tampa a strong consistent team. Most prognosicators picked them last in their division this year and if injuries/stupidity didn't decimate their competition (Atlanta-Vick, Carolina-Delhomme & Smith missed most of the year, NO-McAllister, Payton's playcalling) do we really think they are a 10 win team?

Roster wise we are in much better shape with a franchise QB in Campbell, Portis still going strong, Moss, Cooley and Randle-El serviceable at WR (but we need a stud WR, Moss is a #2 at this point and ARE is a #3), the OL is solid, the DL has some good young talent, LB should be a strength in '08 (Fletcher, Washington and I'm calling Briggs a Redskin) and the secondary has 2 solid players in Landry & Smoot with some young depth and hopefully Rogers coming back by midseason..

While I have backed off of my 'Gibbs must go' mantra of pre-Taylor murder, I still think a philisophical change needs to occur offensively to become much more aggressive. We need to model the aggressiveness after the Patriots, Packers and Cowboys (ugh) who attack for 60 minutes and try to hang as many points on the board as they can.

I think down the stretch with Collins we saw a much more aggressive approach. It's amazing how different things are with an experienced QB. We still have some work to do to get JC to that point where the coaches aren't afraid to hand the game over to him, and most importantly, he needs to start throwing TDs in big spots and not INTs.

[Sheriff Gonna Getcha]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

I think down the stretch with Collins we saw a much more aggressive approach. It's amazing how different things are with an experienced QB. We still have some work to do to get JC to that point where the coaches aren't afraid to hand the game over to him, and most importantly, he needs to start throwing TDs in big spots and not INTs.

Exactly. This is a QB driven league; give Gibbs a Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, or Carson Palmer and everyone will be praising Gibbs the way they praise Dungy and BB. Hopefully, JC makes strides between now and August.

[Paintrain]

Originally Posted by Mattyk72

I think down the stretch with Collins we saw a much more aggressive approach.
It's amazing how different things are with an experienced QB. We still have some work to do to get JC to that point where the coaches aren't afraid to hand the game over to him, and most importantly, he needs to start throwing TDs in big spots and not INTs.

I agree, with Collins having 10+ years in the system we saw a different gameplan.. You were among the corp group saying the playcalling wasn't conservative or a problem in the late game losses, will you now agree that the playcalling WAS more conservative since we've seen a difference?

I think (as his teammates also indicated) Campbell can handle more than was given him, as shown by his production the times they opened the gameplan up & went with more no huddle and downfield passing game. Yes, he threw more INT during that stretch than we'd want, but that's going to happen with a young QB still feeling his way. I think his growth was stunted by not allowing him to have the whole playbook from game 1. I'd rather have seen those bad plays in September when he had a chance to learn and improve later in the season than taking the handcuffs off in November when it was almost a desperate move.

I hope '08 sees us picking up offensively where Collins left off (with JC at the controls of course), not where they had Campbell tip toeing thru the gameplan.

To my comments about 'luck' I probably should have said we benefitted from fortunate circumstances each time, not neccesarily random luck.