Six turnovers guarantee failure as Redskins lose to the Bucs 19-13

by Skin Patrol on Nov 25, 2007 6:00 PM EST in Recaps Comment 5 comments

The sirens sound and your commanding officer orders bayonets fixed. You shift through your gear as your fellow soldiers find their own bayonets or, at worst, a good spade worth using against the enemy. To your horror, you find only a spork! and realize that this isn't a fight you can win.

I dare you to come into my foxhole.

That's kind of what it's like when you turnover the ball 6 times; even if you play otherwise great football except for those six downs, you're still going to lose. It doesn't matter if you are playing Bruce Gradkowski. It doesn't matter that your defense heroicly holds the opposing team to under 200 yards of offense, and forces them to settle for 4 field goals. Your 400+ yards of offense, your 23:9 first down hegemony, and your 52% conversion on 3rd down (and two of those failures ended up being converted right after that) matter not if you cannot protect the football. That we were in the game late in the 4th quarter despite those six turnovers really says a lot about the Redskins. Or the Bucs.

Were the Bucs lucky to win this one? I'll give them all the credit in the world for being on top of footballs we dropped before any of the good guys could get there. And certainly they were no luckier than, karma watch, Your Washington Redskins were on 120 yards of total offense in victory against Tampa Bay in the playoffs a few seasons back.

It is simply too depressing to think about. This was a defining defeat. When victory was near necessary, when it was our time to prove that we were a legitimate playoff contender against a very mediocre looking Tampa Bay team, we folded like lawn chairs. TexSkins said it:

After 5 turnovers and a terrible 1st half... and with your team in position to score a winning TD, you can't make that pass. You absolutely cannot turn the ball over in that position.

You can, actually, if you don't care about winning. And perhaps teams that have lost more football games than they've won, have scored 27 fewer points than they've yielded, and are morally opposed to protecting the football, really don't care that much about winning.

I'm overstating things because I'm so pissed about the loss; sometimes even when you snap the ball 82 times, there are only 6 truly consequential plays. This is now the 2nd game we've had to learn that the hard way. The other was against Green Bay, and to no one's surprise both them and the Bucs are ahead of us in the postseason hunt. Why should we have any reason to believe that we won't lose in the future, immediate or distant, in similar frustrating fashion? We dropped the ball.

Elsewhere it's the same story, just better written. Turnovers: Redskin Report, Curly R open thread, Hog Heaven, Running Redskins, Riggo's Rag 3rd Q post, Tandler's, More Tandler's, Harry Hog

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As stated before

Campbell will have to learn how to win these types of games in the 2nd half of the season(instead of the 1st). Essentially this will be his learning curve and it should come as no suprise as it took whining and complaining from many fans around the country to let Campbell out of his handcuffs.

Campbell looks very good and has all the tools, but these games really are his first games where hes learning how to win instead of how not to lose and this should be expected of him. There's no doubt this was a coaching mistake and as a result the season is all but lost. Why did we give up 3 draft picks for him? Only to let him basically hand the ball off?

This collapse was evident 4 weeks ago, but gibbs still to this day refuses to acknowledge his telegraphic run plays are killing us at times. i.e. 4th down today in field goal range. But i've come to expect it as we all should have by now. By the way had we taken that FG we could have at least sent the game into OT.

Yeah i know i know, there's still hope, but i'm still hoping we get a high draft pick. With the inability to win, we are headed for an odd situation with all these high draft picks on this team and our ever shrinking cap space.

Here's to JC, the one player who could change this franchise into what it once was or close to it. I love what you are doing and keep it up, you're getting there!

by Sincethebeginning on Nov 25, 2007 9:09 PM EST reply actions 0 recs

This is so infuriating

If you think about it, we really could be 10-1. Instead, we're 5-6.

I don't know whether that's encouraging or discouraging.

Bullets Forever, your Washington Wizards blog.

by Mike Prada on Nov 25, 2007 11:59 PM EST reply actions 0 recs

Another Inexcusable Loss

Fire Gibbs, or at least give him the dignity of choosing to resign before he has to be fired.

As of now, the season is over, and the best thing to do would be to tank the rest of the games and get the highest possible set of draft picks and hope they don't all get traded for crap like Adam Archuleta or Brandon Lloyd.

Of course, it does appear as though they are tanking games right now, the way they continually find a way to lose in the fourth quarter.

The reason why the Redskins can't win with injuries is because all of the depth that normally comes from having a complete set of draft picks does not exist in Washington.

Every draft, they trade 2 or 3 draft picks to move up and get a decent player like Campbell, Cooley, or McIntosh, but they are paying too high a price, and losing depth. When a key player goes down, we have to pick up some scrub who has no experience at all, or some veteran who is way past his prime, and then that player is in the game in the fourth quarter, when the Redskins are choking away a lead, or blowing a comeback, like today.

It is bad luck to lose Thomas, Taylor, and Jansen, however, every team has injuries. Good teams overcome injuries. Especially against inferior opponents.

This team has been mismanaged on and off the field for the last decade.

Gibbs looks like he has no clue on the sidelines, constantly makes poor decisions, burns timeouts at the worst possible times, and can't make a decision. The game has passed him by. Sorry fans, I love the three Super Bowl trophies too, but that was a different coach. The one we have now resembles Tom Landry in his last seasons. That's why Jerry Jones fired him and brought in Jimmy Johnson. Gibbs has that same look in his eye, like he has no idea what is going on, and he has to turn to an assistant and ask 'what just happened?'

Fire him immediately or force him to resign. Williams can take over until the end of the season.

Bill Cowher is out there, people. Someone who coaches with a 10 times the passion that Gibbs has.

Get Cowher and lock him up before someone else does.

I am sick and tired of watching a talented team lose games in the fourth quarter.

This team is too good to be 5-6.

by ccrombar on Nov 26, 2007 1:03 AM EST reply actions 0 recs

whoaa

Actually, Keenon McCardell and Reche Caldwell (two veterans who are 'way past their prime', almost saved your ass today with their clutch 2nd half receptions. Your make-shift offensive line only yielded two sacks after only giving up 1 sack last week, despite the fact that Campbell has thrown the ball over 100 times in the past two contests.

Gibbs looks like he has no clue on the sidelines, constantly makes poor decisions, burns timeouts at the worst possible times, and can't make a decision. The game has passed him by.

I disagree again. I would have been more willing to agree with this assesment a week ago, but Gibbs really impressed me today. It sure would have been nice to have that extra timeout during the final drive, but if you were watching the game closely, you would have realized that Gibbs called a very intelligent timeout early in the second half after Campbell got dinged up on a 2nd down play. After the timeout, the 'Skins proceeded to march down the field for their first TD of the afternoon. Hardly a wasted timeout. A subtly brilliant timeout in fact, because without a score there, the 'Skins aren't in the game like they are for the rest of the contest. If you rush in that situation following a monster hit on Campbell, you likely surrender the ball back to TB and fail to establish any sort of positive momentum for the rest of the game (which the Skins did in fact grab with that TD drive).
Furthermore, Gibbs rolled the dice at exactly the right times today. He went for it on fourth down three times, all of which were appropriate decisions, but perhaps not decisions he would have made earlier in the year. You can't put the onus on him for calling that chicken shit running play on 4th down and inches. That's on Saunders.

Bottom line is your two stars - Portis and Moss - cost you this game with their fumbles. It wasn't because Gibbs is a dinosaur or lacks passion. It wasn't because your team has been mismanaged (of course it has, but you're actually putting a pretty darn good product on the field this year).

Teams have to learn how to finish. This year's 'Skins team has had a tremendously tough time finishing games, but it's not something that comes easy in this league, especially when you're dealing with a young QB, WRs who are better suited making the big play rather than being possesion receivers, and an offensive coordinator who still thinks he's running behind Will Shields and Willie Roaf.

I do agree that it's been disappointing, and that it's probably wise to get in conversations with Cowher sooner rather than later (because even if Gibbs wins a SB this year, it'll probably be his last), I just disagree that the Skins disappointments are squarely on GIbbs or the inexperienced players or 'washed up' veterans. Like I said, you've gotten incredible production from your line and at least today, from McCardell (a very astute pickup imo). Your defense is legit and should be for the forseeable future if Snyder makes a few wise decisions on draft day the next two years. Campbell is progressing nicely and should be able to eliminate some of the costly mistakes that he's made on late drives the past two weeks.

This year's Skins team reminds me a lot of last year's Steelers team (the team I blog for). The Steelers outplayed their opponents in most of their games, but found themselves at 2-6 half way through the season due to turnovers and an inability to finish games. Big Ben was demonized and Cowher, much like Gibbs, was said to be 'past his prime' and 'no longer in it'. A year later, Big Ben is praised as one of the best QBs in the league, and the Steelers are suddenly back in contention. All I'm saying is you guys are close. Real close.

by Blitzburgh on Nov 26, 2007 1:46 AM EST up reply actions 0 recs

Much of the same

I think ccrombar said it best so read his post b/c i'm to tired/lazy and he really makes some good points. I'm at a point right now where I have to force myself to tkae the good out of the bad. All the wildcard or most of them lost to..yay. When you lose like this all the time it really eats at you..someone needs to held accountable for this.

by CptChaosSidekick on Nov 26, 2007 7:44 AM EST reply actions 0 recs