Washington Redskins' Owner Dan Snyder: Love Him or Hate Him?

The list of people who hate Dan Snyder is still longer than that of people who are starting to come around to him, but not by much.

Some people cling to their hatred for all things Snyder as if it were a religion. Some just cannot bring themselves to forgive him for things he’s done in the past. They will readily admit they are still Redskins fans, but will simply say they just don't like Dan Snyder.

Everyone has their own reasons for hating Dan Snyder. For some it's because of the $8 beers at the games or the high-priced jerseys sold at "fan appreciation days." Others have just never forgiven him for steering this team away from all things "Jack Kent Cooke." (The sainted former owner of the Washington Redskins).

Has Snyder made some mistakes? Certainly, even I (the optimist of optimists) must concede that.

But has he learned from his mistakes? Maybe it’s time for some fans and the media to do some conceding.

Many fans began to forgive Snyder when he lured Hall of Famer and beloved head coach Joe Gibbs out of retirement. Snyder allowed Gibbs all the latitude in the world to select his own coaching staff and players.

Many still grumbled that Snyder was still his old self, and that the players were still his influence. Even with Gibbs touting the recruitment of players like Mark Brunell as his own choice, fans and the media weren't buying it.

Snyder had simply turned Gibbs into yet another “yes man,” a puppet to do his bidding and force the fans into accepting his secret behind-the-scenes player selections.

Yet these past two offseasons have seen a marked difference from the days of old. Vinny Cerrato (a man nearly equally as vilified as Snyder himself, who has also been caled a puppet) was finally allowed to do what made him so successful in San Francisco: draft players.

Until two years ago, I didn’t even know who Vinny Cerrato was. He was simply painted as a business partner of Snyder’s by the media, and a minion of Snyder by the fan message boards.

I never knew Cerrato had been with the 49ers, much less that he had been there long enough to have seen them win a Super Bowl. I never knew that he was the guy who first selected a little known wide receiver named Terrell Owens in the third round of the ’96 NFL draft, much less players like Ricky Watters and Dana Stubblefield.

With everyone talking about how Snyder needed more people around him to make "football" decisions, I had simply assumed Cerrato was just a golfing buddy given a position of prominence based on their friendship.

The past two offseasons have shown a preference for the draft over the acquisition of high priced free agents. They have shown that building team chemistry is more important than acquiring a guy from another team based on statistics.

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