MVN - Most Valuable Network

Win a date with the Redskins cheerleaders

In Aruba.

That’s more enticing than the upcoming Redskins Beach Blitz in Virginia Beach with the players.  

Redskins.com promotes a Win a Trip to Aruba … With the Cheerleaders contest for five days/four nights, air fare for two included.

The contest appears to be sponsored by the Radisson Aruba Resort & Casino, meaning if you enter you will surely get spammed with promotional materials by Radisson. But we are talking The First Ladies of Football here. It’s a small price to pay for the chance to spend time with them for the 2009 calendar photo shoot. The 2008 Calendar shoot was in Cancun, Mexico.

This contest closes Friday, May 16, so, it you are interested, hustle over to redskins.com and register.

Don’t know about you, but I’d much rather be in Aruba for the cheerleader shoot than in Virginia Beach for the Redskins Beach Blitz this weekend [May 17-18]. Aruba is more lush than Virginia Beach. The cheerleaders are more lush in their swim suits than are the players in theirs.

The Beach Blitz is a chance for fans to mingle with groups of players. Not that you would get up close and personal, but enough to see them as people.

Occasionally, real news occurs at the Beach Blitz as it did at last year’s Blitz when Clinton Portis wondered aloud why people were making a fuss over Michael Vick and his dogs.

During uproar that followed, he probably wished to have been in Cancun with the cheerleaders.

Five Players who could Decline in ‘08

Earlier this week, I looked at 5 Redskins who seemed to be good bets to improve over last year. Today, I’ll take a look at a handful of guys who could be on the decline.

Corneilius Griffin

This is a bit tough to fathom, as Griffin hasn’t really been a serious contributor over the last two years. The Redskins opted not to extend his deal in a potential cap room creating move, so it’s clear the front office is wary of his production. The Redskins defense is typically stronger when Griffin is healthy and getting a nice push up the middle. He’s got injury problems that limit his effectiveness, but he is at the age where age itself may start to limit how many games he can play. For a team that just went an entire ten-pick draft without adding any interior line help, the Redskins are counting on Griffin more than ever for at least one more season.

Pete Kendall

In two months, Pete Kendall will celebrate his 35th birthday. Now, there is reason to think that Kendall might improve during his second year playing with Casey Rabach and Chris Samuels. Kendall might have been the player on the OL who was least affected by the Thomas and Jansen injuries. However, since Guards can play late into their 30’s before a significant decline, we have to wonder if Kendall is just now nearing the end of his effectiveness. If he was an above average player who declined due to age prior to becoming a Redskin, then he should be alright this year–at a similar skill level to last year. However, if Kendall was merely a career average player who is due to decline this season, the Redskins might have to rush Chad Rinehart into the starting lineup much quicker than originally expected.

Shawn Springs

To date, the only thing keeping Springs from being an elite cornerback is injury trouble. Well last year, he was entirely healthy and played at a high level. Unfortunately, Shawn Springs is now 33 years old, and each year from here on out is going to cost him some speed. The Redskins have good depth at corner, and by the time Springs has enough time to show if he’s still got it, Carlos Rogers should be back in the lineup. That’s the good news. The bad news is that the Redskins will face Eli Manning, Drew Brees, Matt Leinart, Tony Romo, and Donovan McNabb in the first five weeks of the season. If Shawn Springs can’t mask his age, the entire football universe is going to know it by October.

London Fletcher

Fans who remember a 2nd year Fletcher playing in Super Bowl 34 for the St. Louis Rams probably think he’s ancient. In reality, Fletcher turns 33 next week. That’s not a bad age for a middle linebacker; Zach Thomas was incredibly effective through his age 33 season, and Ray Lewis will also be turning 33 this week. Fletcher can probably still be counted on for this season in the middle.

The really critical part is this: what if he can’t be counted on? The only possible solution the Redskins have at linebacker right now is HB Blades, and Blades probably isn’t experienced enough to succeed in the middle just yet. The Redskins really need Fletcher to stay on the field, but they also need to get a veteran backup LB in here right away.

Andre Carter

Carter was a very nice value signing for the Redskins, and he was their best defensive lineman in 2007. With that said, the best measure of who a guy really is lies within his three year production. For Carter, that was 4.5 sacks, 6.0 sacks, and 10.5 sacks in 2005-2007. That averages out to 7 sacks a season. Carter isn’t particularly old; he’s still in his prime and playing at his best position finally, but the Redskins would be foolish to expect 2007 type production ever again from Carter. His real talent probably lies somewhere in between his 2006 and 2007 seasons.

The real question is this: If Andre Carter is good for 6-7 sacks a year in each of the next two seasons, can the Redskins keep their defense in the top half of the league, or is the secondary going to get exposed again? Time will tell, but at the very least, it is reason for concern.

Vinny Cerrato to Anthony Mix: lose 15 pounds

Redskins chief honcho Vinny Cerrato said that wide receiver Anthony Mix needs to lose about 15 pounds to boost his speed. Cerrato made the statement on Redskins Radio broadcast on Comcast Sports Network yesterday.

Mix is listed on the Redskins roster at 6-5, 235 pounds, but Cerrato said Mix reported to mini-camp at 245 pounds.

The Redskins said they had to get taller at wide receiver to implement Jim Zorn’s West Coast offense. They did that quick with Mix and draftees Devin Thomas, 6-1, and Malcolm Kelly, 6-3.

Isn’t it interesting that, while the Skins want taller receivers, Zorn wants QB Jason Campbell, 6-5, to play smaller in the pocket?
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Popular opinion holds that Kelly and Thomas give the Redskins an advantage in the red zone for the “jump ball.” Apart from the inherent risks involved — jump balls can be snagged by anybody — it misses the point. The need for tallness in the West Coast offense is a matter of size as well as height.

West Coast receivers run through a lot of traffic for short distances in a fast paced passing game. Defensive backs smack them around within five yards of the scrimmage line, then they get covered by linebackers and the strong safety. West Coast receivers have more run blocking assignments to support tailbacks running or receiving to the edge of the line.

West Coast receivers need the bulk to take and make the hits. That’s a concern with smallish receivers like Antwaan Randle El, 5-10, 190, and 5-10 Santana Moss who weighs in at 200 pounds now. Moss was listed at 185 last year.

Terrell Owens is the prototype West Coast receiver among current players. He is 6-3, 213. Keyshawn Johnson, a very good possession receiver, played at 6-4, 211. Our own Art Monk, fearless in the middle of the field, played at 6-3, 210.

Cerrato wants receivers who play at receiver weight, right around 210 to 220 pounds. Anthony Mix could play linebacker at 245. The Skins want him to outrun linebackers. That’s the point of Cerrato’s message.
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The Green Bay Packers released wide receiver Koren Robinson, 6-1, 210, yesterday. I trust he will not show up at Redskins Park in a parade of out of work receivers as we saw last season.

Were the Redskins Swimming in Uncharted Waters?

What the Redskins did on Draft Day rightfully perplexed many fans and impressed many analysts.  They used multiple high picks to fill a single need: a target(s) in the red zone.

What I wanted to know about this is whether or not teams had used this strategy in the past, and if the results were favorable.  Should more teams attack an area of need multiple times in the off-season?  This is what history told me:

One current NFL coach is a fan of the drafting multiple players at a single position strategy, and that would be Denver’s Mike Shanahan.  Shanahan drafted Defensive Ends Jarvis Moss and Tim Crowder in the first two rounds of the 2007 draft, and he drafted three Cornerbacks with his first three selections in 2005:  Karl Paymah, Dominique Foxworth, and the late Darrent Williams.

The results on Denver’s strategies have been sort of a mixed bag.  Paymah and Foxworth are both still key contributors for the Broncos, and Williams was clearly the best of the three before he was tragically gunned down on the final night of the 2006 season.  Neither Jarvis Moss or Tim Crowder has made a dent in Denver yet.

The Cincinnati Bengals have twice drafted multiple linebackers with their top two picks.  The first time, they landed Takeo Spikes and Brian Simmons in 1998, and those two created a pretty nice LB duo until they both left Cincinnati following the 2003 season.  A year later, the Bengals tried to replace both of them in the 2005 draft, selecting David Pollack and Odell Thurman.  That didn’t work out well for them for fluky reasons:  Pollack sustained a career ending neck injury, and Odell Thurman has not played since 2005, he’s been suspended and just recently reinstated.

One of the more disheartening examples I found had to be the 1998 Carolina Panthers.  In that draft, the Panthers invested their first three picks, all day one selections, in Defensive Ends Jason Peter, Chuck Wiley, and Mitch Marrow.  None of those three ever got to play with 2001 First-rounder Julius Peppers, and the Panthers wasted an entire draft.

The 2004 Chicago Bears drafted Tommie Harris and Tank Johnson with their first two selections.  Johnson is in Dallas now, but appears to have been a good value pick, off-field issues aside, and Tommie Harris is one of the very best DTs in the NFL.

But only one comparison I found really hits home as a similar situation to the Redskins drafting multiple receivers in the first two rounds this year.  I’m talking about the 2003 Cardinals, and their draft that year.  In the first round, the Cards called for Wide Receiver Bryant Johnson, and supplemented him in the second round with WR Anquan Boldin.  Like the Redskins, the Cardinals had a clear need at receiver that year, and it was Bryant Johnson who was supposed to fill the void.  But it didn’t take the Cardinals very long to find out that the real gem in that class was Boldin.  5 years later now, Anquan Boldin is one of the top receivers in the NFL, and Bryant Johnson just finished a mediocre career with the Cardinals and signed a one year deal with the San Francisco 49ers.

The lesson to be learned here from all those cases is that very rarely are both players brought in to start.  More accurately, this strategy seems to be used to bring in players to compete.  For Devin Thomas and Malcolm Kelly, history shows that this competition could decide which of them will be a successful starter for the Redskins the next ten years, and which one will make a nice backup for another team down the road.

For the team, it’s clear they are taking the road less traveled here, but in most historical cases, the team was successful in fulfilling their need, moreso than if they had simply selected only one player and hoped for the best.