Via Doug Farrar and the excellent folks at Football Outsiders. Every week that goes by where Jason Campbell successfully throws zero picks will only draw more oooohs and aaaaahs from the football watching and obsessed world. Fourth highest rated passer in the league currently? Campbell. 6th DYAR 5th DVOA? Campbell. Huge.

Here Doug takes a look at Jason Campbell against Dallas on three particular plays, emphasizing what he is doing right both through the Xs and Os and the words of his teammate Santana Moss and Coach Jim Zorn. The three plays are quick slant to Antwaan Randle El to beat a blitz, long pass to Santana Moss 1, long pass to Santana Moss 2. Teaser on the 2nd play:

After DeMarcus Ware got busted for defensive offside on third-and-4 from the Dallas 45 (good to know they still call that in the NFL these days), Campbell made what may have been his most impressive play of the day. First-and-10 from the Dallas 36. Ware got past left tackle Chris Samuels and was on Campbell quickly. As Ware prepared to complete his pursuit with a chop to cause a fumble, Campbell coolly moved up in the pocket, kept his form, and threw the ball just over the outstretched arm of end Greg Ellis, who was coming in from the right side. Santana Moss was a good 10 yards past any Cowboys defender after beating Newman on a deep crossing route, and took the ball in easily before going out of bounds at the Dallas 8-yard line.

Third play comes with a great diagram and the like, which I will steal but no more, as you should go check out Football Outsiders for the rest:

Fig, 1: Moss' Double Move

Figures.

Hat tip Curly R, there are a lot of great gametape breakdowns of the Redskins win over Dallas. Offense and Defense over at Hog Heaven complements Greg Trippiedi. More on Campbell at Post Game Heroes.

The good news, hat tip Big Blue View, is that Mathias Kiwanuka will live:

I was already in the tunnel under the stadium when I heard he was injured on the last play of the Giants 16-7 win tonight, and I saw him walking gingerly toward the X-Ray room after the game with the trainers at his side. But he walked without a limp, both to that room and to the locker room.

And when he returned, he said he was “OK.”

In case you don't know, in the waining seconds of Thursday's fight, Chris Samuels was called for offensive holding on Mathias Kiwanuka. Kiwanuka appeared to hurt his ankle or leg on the play though, fortunately, he appears to be ok.

X-rays must've been negative. You never like to see a player get injured, especially at the very end of an already-over game. I don't like the Giants, but I don't will injury on even my rival teams or players. This is a game. When people get injured, it affects their livelihood. And while I applaud the violence of this game most of the time, I don't really want people to experience devastating and extended physical pain of the kind that comes from broken bones. Wind knocked out of you, walk it off? Cool. Shattered ribs? Not cool.

So no harm no foul, right? Wrong, so sayeth Kiwanuka (hat tip: AOL Fanhouse):

"Honestly, I thought it was a dirty play," Kiwanuka said. "There's no question about it, he was definitely beat. Instead of recovering or giving up or whatever options you have ... I don't think there's any place for that in the NFL."

More from Kiwanuka:

"As an NFL player, there's going to be times when you're going to get beat," Kiwanuka said. "For a guy to turn around and ... basically he tackled me, after I beat him around the edge. It's uncalled for."

Samuels former teammate Antonio Pierce had a slightly different take:

"It shouldn't have happened, but it happened," LB Antonio Pierce said of the play. "Our guy is okay, he's healthy. That's all that matters right now. ... It's smart on (Samuels') behalf. No doubt. If David Diehl or Kareem (McKenzie) was in that position, I'd expect them to do the same thing. They could go about it a different way, maybe. I wouldn't want them to try to almost injure a guy and have him out for a couple of weeks. From that standpoint, that's disappointing, but I would expect our guys to protect Eli."

That's how Justin Tuck feels as well, emphasis added:

"I understand his reasons for doing it, I don't necessarily agree with it," Tuck added. "You're putting a player's health in the balance there, that's always going to be questionable. But I know Chris. He's not a guy like that (who would) try to take out another guy. It was just a bad judgment play."

I don't think we're going to get Redskins fans or players and Giants fans or players to agree one what it is that happened, exactly, as partisans for either team will see it however they want to see it. As I was drunk by the time this happened (what else do you do in a 9 point loss?) I don't remember seeing much of the actual play, but I do distinctly remember seeing Samuels standing near Kiwanuka immediately after, motioning towards the Giants sideline, and looking generally contrite over the incident. It kind of reminded me of Lawrence Taylor over Joe Theisman. At the time I wrote that it was unfortunate but that the manner Samuels acted afterwards certainly didn't appear to be that of a guy intentionally trying to injure another player.

I'm reluctant to bring up a similar incident in fear of establishing a damning pattern, but I think it speaks to Samuels as a player and provides an opportunity to quote others defending his character. You might recall that in December of last year, Samuels broke the leg of Antonio Garay:

Last Thursday, Redskins offensive tackle Chris Samuels hit Bears defensive tackle Antonio Garay with an illegal chop block, breaking Garay's leg and ending his season...

The officials missed it and Samuels wasn't flagged on the play, but he was later fined $12,500.

How is this supposed to speak highly for Samuels? It was what he did afterwards that mattered, emphasis added:

Redskins offensive tackle Chris Samuels recently called Bears coach Lovie Smith to apologize for delivering an illegal chop block that ended defensive tackle Antonio Garay’s season...

“It’s not like he had to [call to apologize],” Smith said. “I know what type of football player he is. He’s not a dirty player or anything like that. But it says a lot about a guy who’s sorry for something that was unfortunate.”..

“It’s not something he tried to do on purpose,” Smith said. “Things like that happen in the game of football sometime.”

Similarly, Samuels apparently spoke with Tom Coughlin after the game, emphasis added again:

Added coach Tom Coughlin, "I spoke to (Samuels) after and he said, 'That wasn't intentional.'"

Chris Samuels has started 125 games to date in the National Football League
which is plenty of time for peers to compellingly level charges of persistent dirty play if indeed he is that kind of player. As far as I can tell, Samuels does not have a reputation as a dirty player. He's very well liked by teammates and when print is written about him, it's almost always in a positive light. I don't know Chris Samuels, but I've never had any reason to suspect he's a dirty player. And I am perfectly happy, unlike Kiwanuka, drawing the line between dirty plays and merely unfortunate ones at: Intent. A dirty play, in my mind, is one where a player either intends to injure or intends an act so reckless that injurious results are more likely than not to follow. I wish I had video of the incident in question, though am comfortable claiming from my (admittedly inebriated) recollection from the game, the play was far from so reckless that injury was a necessary result. And taking Samuels at his word, and the history, I very seriously doubt that Samuels intended to harm anyone on that play.

I trust that Samuels is not a dirty player. I am pleased Mathias Kiwanuka is uninjured. I don't fault Kiwanuka for being upset over the incident -- he's the one who damn near suffered a livelihood affecting injury, afterall -- but I respectfully disagree with his assertion that my offensive lineman is a dirty player.

These are my brief, uncollected thoughts having been drinking for most of the game and existing in a bitterly disappointed state, currently. I think these things are best analyzed with the benefit of a night's rest but, whatev.

• Whoever was the Giants defender who was injured on the last play of the game, I hope he's ok. The result was obviously decided by the time whomever that was started favoring their injured parts and the last thing I want to see, even against a division foe I hate to lose to, is someone get injured on a meaningless play. Chris Samuels looked sufficiently contrite.
• Jason Campbell didn't play so hot. I felt he held on to the ball too long or else made the wrong decisions. The only time he, and the team, were able to move the ball was consistently was in desperation time when the opposing defense was giving up space.
• I don't think the offensive line was horrible but they were definitely below average. JC was rushed a few times and the penalties are a problem.
• Defense exhibited what felt like a bend but only enough to break after wasting a bunch of clock time. The few times I remember us pressuring Eli Manning he did something horrible, which raised the obvious question; why weren't we pressuring more? I recall Doughty getting a hand on Manning during a safety blitz and him completing a long pass but, beyond that, I can't recall Manning doing anything right when we pressured him. Our interception came on a pressure play. This is not rocket science, if you scare the opposing quarterback, he'll screw something up.
• Speaking of turnovers... we won that battle and lost by 9 points. Sad fact is we're not going to escape a dramatic majority of games with the turnover lead and we certainly won't have 0 turnovers for even a simple majority of our fights. If you can't keep it close when you win that crucial +/- turnover scuffle, you aren't playoff bound.
• Defining moment of the game was Jacobs plowing over LaRon Landry. That's one of our best against one of their best and they won.
• Good news! I forgot how many weeks (months?) it took us to score a touchdown with a wide receiver last year and we did it in week one this time around. Drinking to not having to listen to ESPN repeat that gruesome statistic every day.
• We lost 16-9 against the Super Bowl Champions in their house filled with nearly 90 thousand motivated partisans. Is that really so horrible? I don't know that it's any worse than losing to the Giants 24-17 in our own house, which is what we did early last season and still managed to make a success out of the entire affair.
• Looking back on the score, as pissed as I was at the defense for much of the game (50% third down defense won't cut it, period) we can win if the other bastard only scores 16 points. Eli was held to 6.1 yards per pass, meh, with a pick and no touchdowns. Their 4.8 yards per rush was troubling but not terrifying.
• Terrifying was our useless offense. 3.5 yards per carry sucks. Clinton Portis looked ok but not good (sometimes he did look great, though). We didn't reach the line of scrimmage on 4 rushing plays or, put differently, 1/6th of the time.
• Rock Cartwright is awesome.

Good way to end it. Let me sleep with nightmares on this one and leave it at that, before I get sore on Jim Zorn's clock management or Jason Campbell's future. Way too early to indict either of them.

I know most of you probably don't want to think about the debacle against Carolina, but the good news is that disaster may be the ass-booting the team needs to get back on track. It also occasioned the return of Post Game Heroes' phenomenally done Redskins game reviews. We've all gushed about the good work done at PGH which has also received high marks from a number of people, to quote one:

Post Game Heroes does some phenomenal breakdowns of games that blow what most mainstream media writers do out of the water.

And that's true, indeed they are some of the best reviews I've ever seen and continue to be today. I'm told via email that Dillweed has returned and intends to remain returned each and every week of the season. His game breakdowns against Carolina can be found here and here for offense and defense respectively. You'll need to go read both for full content, but I'll happily repeat his criticism of the offensive line. They bombed. Although no one was particularly good, both Jansen and Kendall were especially bad. Dillweed on Pete Kendall:

Started out looking confused...even flat out missing blocks due to lack of hustle. But later on he stepped it up with solid lead run blocking. Unfortunetly just when he was hitting his stride, JC and Betts coughed up the ball.

Kendall was 1/4 on +/- which Dillweed figures by watching the offensive linemen individually and determining whether they deserve high or low marks for their performance. He was equally down on Jansen (0/3), emphasis added:

Picked up where he left off last season against Miami. As far as the run game goes, we might be better off with Stephon Heyer. As far as the pass game goes...I don't know what we do with our RT position. Hopefully I'm wrong about Jansen being way past his prime and it was just lax pre-season preperation that did him in.

After starting 80 straight games for the 'Skins Jansen has since played just 32 in the last four seasons. He missed all of 2004 and virtually all of last year. In his last four years as a Redskin, Jansen has completed a full season just once, in 2006. At 32 Jansen is the 11th oldest player currently on the roster.

I hope Dillweed is wrong. There has hardly been a more quintessentially Redskin kind of guy than Jansen over the past decade, save maybe Chris Samuels -- Jansen is entering his 10th season as a 'Skin. Favorite memories are sparce for an offensive linemen and, really, the greatest offensive linemen are the ones you never hear about ("X just got beat there, John"), though I still fondly recall him playing through one broken thumb and one fractured thumb. Quite well, I might add.

Jansen gone clubbin'

via media.washingtonpost.com

Dillweed's offensive breakdown is likewise a real gift as he goes play by play explaining why and how fail happens. I'm already worried I've pilfered too much of his post, so let me just close with his blitz breakdown:

In other words we blitzed 5 out of 31 plays (that Dillweed saw) which is ~16 percent of the time. And we sucked at it; average gain was something like 11 yards a play for Carolina.

Looking forward, and a gameday open thread plus a potential game preview is pending here, NFL.com has their Redskins season preview up. It's mostly boilerplate new coach, new scene, etc. They characterize Campbell's coming season thus:

On the hot seat

Quarterback Jason Campbell. If the Redskins don't get off to a fast start, there will be calls for Todd Collins, who was superlative in the final three-and-a-half regular-season games (5 TDs, 0 interceptions, 106.4 passer rating) last season after Campbell was lost with an injury.

And that is true. Jason Campbell is approaching the NFL's age of majority. A 4th year quarterback needs to show more marked improvement from day one to the present in order to keep his status as an NFL starter. And while I think Campbell is absolutely capable of doing so, the fact remains that he has to go out there and do it. There can be no more excuses about coordinator musical chairs. Reasonable milestones would be to maintain an above 60 completion % and improve those yards per pass to 7.0 or higher. More importantly he needs to start finishing games and absolutely must put the quietus on costly fumbles and picks.

Finally... a friend of mine called me a while back to let me know that I'd reached the pinnacle of modern existence; I was found via google. He had forgotten the URL for this space and decided to find it himself by simply entering my name into the world's largest search engine. It worked and, for now at least, my name is identifiable through a google search with the fine work done by Football Guys. I recently received an email from them and they managed to tie down John Keim of the Examiner (which is also the host of Mark Newgent's excellent blog). Their lede:

In This Episode:  Cecil Lammey and Sigmund Bloom interviews John Keim, Redskins beat writer from the Washington Examiner and Warpath Insiders.  Topics Include:    is this a make or break year for Jason Campbell, does Marcus Mason make this team and will they carry 4 RBs, the 2008 outlook for Santana Moss, is Colt Brennan the QB of the future, plus more!

Answers and commentary are available on the podcast here, though I imagine they will have a written transcript up at some point. Enjoy.

More posts will be forthcoming later, as I have some catching up to do.

I promised I would return yesterday yet, here I am world, and there's nothing happening with Your Washington Redskins. It was a busy, crazy week for me. Rather than apologizing for not being around to post all the super-nuts-cool things that were happening, I'll do you a favor by not boring you with details on why my week wasbusy and/or crazy.

If you can call this news:

Actually everything Chris Cooley does is badass, so I will call this news. Hey everyone, Captain Chaose got hats, family, friends. My fav is the yellow striped one because it reminds me of the sweet Johnny Chimpo Afghanistanimation from Super Troopers. In other news, I'm almost completely blind.

Chris Samuels loves ballet school haaaaaaaaaaaah! (But seriously, that's good people on him. We support giving back to communities and applaud Samuels for doing so.)

Hat tipped to Football Outsiders for pointing me to Pete Prisco's Top 50 Players. The following Redskins made the list:

He also has a "Just Missed" section. The following Redskins made that list:

I'll address that later this week, as I think there are a few Redskins deserving of mention on at least one of those lists.

This offseason thing? It lasts forever.

Eric Karabell (hat tip to Extreme Skins) of ESPN has the Fantasy scoop (or does he?) on... the offensive line?

On the line: Keeping tackles Chris Samuels and Jon Jansen healthy is critical, especially with Campbell being a bit fumble-prone. Jansen missed the entire season because of a dislocated ankle, while right guard Randy Thomas has not been durable. It's an old, brittle line learning a new system it might be able to thrive in, although that shouldn't hold back Portis. The defensive line welcomes former Viking Erasmus James, but he's not guaranteed to start. Andre Carter can be an impact guy in deep IDP leagues, but for the most part, fantasy owners need not worry about this defensive line.

Despite the fact that the article hails from ESPN's 2008 Fantasy Football Draft Kit, the author obviously went off the fantasy sports reservation, because I've never played a fantasy football league where the offensive line garnered points. Maybe he's focused on the indirect effects a struggling line has on your RB and QB and everyone else. Who knows?

There is no news, so we'll talk about the defensive line, I suppose. Issue is which or whether either of James or Chris Wilson will make the team. I have absolutely no read on how this non-battle has played out so far, as there's sufficient print supporting both of them to give me pause. For instance, you can read about Erasmus James at ESPN or Wilson at TSN:

PERSONNEL ANALYSIS: Two backups could play prominent roles for the defense this season. Chris Wilson is a lightweight in terms of bulk, but the DE comes off the ball with a great deal of explosion. He's quick enough to get around most offensive tackles, and fast enough to get to the QB before the pass is thrown. Defensive coordinator Greg Blache plans to play to the individual strengths of his players, and that could mean Wilson gets more snaps in passing situations. ...

I think I've said it before, but if the team wants to keep both Wilson and James it could mean the end for Demetric Evans. We've got a lot of Defensive Ends, including recently signed draft pick Rob Jackson, undrafted FA Dorian Smith. Not everyone can make the team.

They weren't kidding about Wilson being on the small side, either. The team lists him at 240 lbs, which makes him the smallest by over 10 pounds. Then again, Carter was the 2nd smallest on the line last year but by far the most productive. From the looks of it, lean and mean is the strategy for rushing the bad guy's passer.

Situational defenders are great so long as the starters remain healthy.

There really is nothing going on right now, these are the offseason doldrums. Enjoy.

Usually when I find a nice YouTube gem I just post it on fanshots and then promote to the front page so as not to put you all to sleep with my extended commentary on why a video is entertaining, usually using erudite descriptives such as "awesome" and "really" and "I mean, seriously." But I mean, seriously, please enjoy this really awesome video of Chris Samuels seducing the world all smooth-like:

He appears shirtless, strike one ladies, and then proceeds to introduce himself with a booming voice that would inspire the faithless:

Chris Samuels: Chris Samuels, number sixty, University of Alabama, Roooooll Tide.

At this point, I've converted to the University of Alabama.  (Naw, not really.)

On his boat, which is in Washington, D.C.: "It's actually in Virginia Beach." Silly question may get the inquirer smited later.

Does the team know where you're at, Chris: "No they don't. They might not want to pay me if I get hurt." Laughter follows: they'll pay you, because your contract is approaching 100% guaranteed money with each passing year. Hah hah hah hah!

The entire video is populated with Super Nintendo era music and Chris Samuels just being ridiculously cool. I might kill someone to have a voice as deep as his. I'm convinced he has magical powers like Michael Clarke Duncan in The Green Mile. (Magical powers Magical powere Magical powers!)

It's not clear from the video that, while tubing, Samuels is actually moving fast but I guess that's why 300 pound linemen go their entire lives without tubing; it's not as fun if you're pulling the boat. (Admittedly, later in the video he does get some speed.)

Video is close to being unmatchable in sheer grace and wonder and then... Mike Sellers shows up tenderly hugging a tube next to Samuels, immediately graduating it to youtubery Hall of Fame status. Fade out: Mike Sellers, stranded in the water, cackling like a crazy person. Well played, Boating Life Magazine. Your move, Marine Engine Digest.

Football Outsiders has their post-draft analysis of the NFC East up, go enjoy. Author is a guest, one Mike McGibbon, and all seems to be in order in the story. I found no glaring errors, though I'm not sure the Redskins got, as McGibbon wrote, 10 draft picks as a result of our 1st round draft pick trade (I thought we gave up a 1st, 3rd, 5th ro a 2nd, 2nd, 4th. It's been a minute, though, so maybe my memory doesn't serve).

Either way, McGibbon knows a lot more about our undrafted free agents than I do, and thus I direct your attention to some guys to watch, per him:

Undrafted Free Agents

In all, the Redskins brought in 13 undrafted rookie free agents. Of those 13, four were offensive linemen. And of those four, Florida State’s Shannon Boatman and New Mexico’s Devin Clark may have the best chance to make the team, given that both started for most of their final two seasons. Dorian Smith, an All-Pac 10 first-team defensive end from Oregon State, will also challenge for a spot.

Quick look at the roster reveals that Shannon Boatman has already been lost. He, uhh, failed a physical. Tough break, guy. But both Dorian Smith and Devin Clark are, as of this writing, still with the team. The team has a lot of defensive ends (nine) and certainly more than we will by final cuts. Locks would be, in my opinion, Phillip Daniels and Andre Carter as starters with Demetric Evans and Chris Wilson backing up. Let's speculate that the team keeps 9-10 defensive linemen, and you have to imagine Kedric the Barbarian, Mt. Gomery, and Cornelius Griffin, with Lorenzo Alexander and Ryan Boschetti both in good position to make the team (although Alexander could make the team in any number of his superhuman capacities, so maybe he wouldn't even count as a D-Linemen). We're in need of upgrade on the defensive line, but that doesn't mean any rookie can just step in and take the spot of one of the more established veterans. That might've been the case a few years ago, but young linemen Anthony Montgomery, Chris wilson and Kedric Golston have started a youth movement at that position. Until Griffin and Daniels take the long walk, the Dorian Smiths of the world will have to earn a place on this team.

At offensive line I think recent injuries may encourage Coach Zorn -- a former expansion team quarterback who knew a thing or two about the perils of a bad offensive line -- to keep a larger than normal contingent of offensive linemen on the roster. Locks are the starters, obviously, in Jon Jansen, Randy Thomas, Chris Samuels, Casey Rabach, and Pete Kendall. I think Fabini and Stephon Heyer will probably be around as well. I hope Chad Rinehart makes the team, and he should. On Todd Wade I'm indifferent, as he hasn't done much to impress. We'll need to keep someone about to backup Casey Rabach at center; with versatile Mike Pucillo gone, the spot as of now belongs to Kyle DeVan, unless there is someone else on the team who can snap the football and block effectively.

Question to readers is: We've got a good crop of undrafted rookie free agents. These things are remarkably difficult to predict, and we are really at the mercy of the team in telling us who has impressed thus far, but is anyone willing to go on record on who will or will not make the roster? Who will be this year's Stephon Heyer (acknowledging that his position was aided in large part by factors outside control or prediction: injuries)? I'm aspecifically soliciting commentary on players local to reader(s) markets that maybe the rest of us haven't seen play so much.