What's the Washington Redskins' Problem on the Field?

After starting out 6–2, the Washington Redskins looked poised to possibly win the division and challenge the New York Giants for NFC dominance. Wow, a lot of things have changed in the last two weeks! 

Where do I begin? 

Let’s start with the offensive line, which, for some reason, has forgotten how to pass protect. They have given up 10 sacks in the last two games. Jon Jansen looks like a statue on passing downs. 

Where’s Stephon Heyer, who was starting in the beginning of the season, until he was injured?  He has been active the last two games, and hasn’t seen the field. 

I thought the “West Coast Offense” was a “pass first to set up the run” scheme, which means you need to be able to pass protect.  The Redskins haven’t been doing a good job in that area, and it’s a big reason why they sit at 6–4 now and on the verge of missing the playoffs.

The mental mistakes need to stop. They are 11 weeks into the season and guys have been practicing where they’re supposed to be, and what they’re supposed to be doing, for four months now. 

If Devin Thomas doesn’t know when he’s supposed to be on the field (he has looked like a “deer in headlights” for most of the year), put him on the bench and keep him there. Offensive pass interference here, illegal formation there—these bad penalties always seem to happen when they are driving the ball—a.k.a. momentum killers!

Can the defensive line get any pressure on the quarterback?? What happened to that great pass rush they would have with Jason Taylor and Andre Carter on the ends? I understand Taylor has been injured most of the season, but he looked healthy Sunday night, and I don’t think he touched Tony Romo.

As a matter of fact, I don’t think any defensive players touched Romo. They haven’t put much pressure on any quarterback this year. Fifteen sacks in 10 games isn’t going to do it. 

Do we ever blitz anymore? Where’s the coaches’ confidence in our cornerbacks to cover man-to-man? We constantly give the quarterbacks in this league plenty of time to throw the ball, and eventually, it’s going to hurt us.

Now it looks like we can’t stop the run either. Were we so worried about Romo throwing the ball on us that we forgot they had a pretty good running back, too? There’s no excuse for them running the ball 10 out of the last 11 plays in that game, and us not be able to get a stop with six minutes left. 

This is a sure recipe for disaster against teams on our upcoming schedule like the New York Giants, Baltimore Ravens, Philadelphia Eagles, and San Francisco 49ers, who have all combined, as a team, for more than 950 yards rushing each. 

Maybe the quarterback can try to be a leader sometimes. If someone on the offense does something wrong, well damn it, tell them they did. All the great quarterback’s in the past like Dan Marino, Troy Aikman, and Joe Montana did and all the great ones now like Peyton Manning and Brett Favre

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