Two interesting little nuggets per Covering the Redskins regarding the recent signing of Randall Godfrey, to replace a released Lemar Marshall (WTF mate) and an interesting Joe Gibbs/Washington Post scuffle. First the former:
Phillip Daniels is a close friend of Godfrey and was lobbying the linebacker to come back.. The D-end said he's been in touch with Godfrey for the last 3 weeks trying to work on him.. Daniels joked now that he is here, "he owes me 3% commission."
And that's the crux of the matter. Lemar Marshall has been with the Redskins since 2001 and throughout the entire Gregg Williams era. He was an integral part in both our '05 and '04 defenses that finished so well, starting 30 games over those two years. He is like having an additional coach on the field. The knock was that he was, at a listed 225, simply too small to play linebacker, a criticism that sounds more accurate against him as an inside linebacker than on the weak side. Godfrey is allegedly around 245, though I can find no info on that and encourage reader(s) to track it down.
None of that is to say that Randall Godfrey will fail to contribute defensively, but what was so bad about Marshall? How does this impact his teammates? If Lemar Marshall can be cut, beyond starters (and even some of them) it's hard to imagine which Redskin player feels safe. As Marshall himself said, he was totally shocked by the move.
[Note: Pretty damning commentary from Redskins 360 as we get the opportunity to see how the Eagles treat their departed linebacker (a former Redskin, incidentally, Jeremiah Trotter) and how we treat a departed linebacker. Marshall deserved better, and I'm not even talking about his treatment after-the-fact, which is all window dressing anyways. He should be wearing Burgundy and Gold right now.]
In other news:
That said, I'd be interested to hear what Coach Gibbs' thoughts are on Dillweed's excellent picture-by-picture breakdown of the Keisel sack. What it (definitively in my opinion) shows is that Heyer commits himself to blocking a linebacker who shows blitz but backs into coverage, and does so in a way that prevents him from adjusting to Keisel, who swims past him anyways. The blame game could be played a lot of ways -- Mike Pucillo could have stopped Keisel as well -- but without knowing the presnap assignments it's difficult to know just what went wrong. What I do know is that Stephon Heyer didn't block anyone adequately on this play. He set up to block someone who didn't go after the quarterback, then picked a target he couldn't cover. I'm not jumping all over Heyer, but it's difficult to protect your quarterback when the left tackle doesn't cover anyone, verdad?
Update [2007-8-22 14:39:26 by Skin Patrol]: Lee Gibbons at Redskin Report weighs in on Heyer.