Redskins Drop Two in a Row as Dalton Shreds Defense

Redskins Defensive Statistics
Game 1:
358 Yards of Offense
339 Passing Yards
3 Passing Touchdowns
(Longest 33 Yard Bomb)
3 Turnovers: 2 Picks 1 Fumble
Total Points Given Up: 32

Game 2:
452 Yards of Offense
301 Passing Yards
151 Rushing Yards
3 Passing Touchdowns
(Longest 34 Yard Catch and Run)
3 Turnovers: 1 Pick 2 Fumbles (1 for a Touchdown)
Total Points Given Up: 31

Game 3:
478 Yards of Offense
385 Yards Passing
93 Yards Rushing
4 Passing Touchdowns
1 Rushing Touchdown
(Longest 73 Yard Bomb)
Total Points Given Up:38

After 3 weeks our vaunted Skins defense is ranked 30th, 30th out of 32 teams. They are simply atrocious. The Redskins knew the secondary was thin, they added Brandon Merriwether, Madeiu Williams, Rookie Richard Crawford, Crezdon Butler and Cedric Griffin. Merriweather and Griffin didn't play this last game but its clear our secondary is ho-ho-rendous. DeAngelo Hall had too much on his plate with A.J. Green but was never given help, he stayed on him man to man and Dalton kept hitting him. The strength of the defense is the front seven, but lost staples Adam Carriker and Brian Orakpo for the season.

Special teams came through, making all the field goals and getting good punts off with new long snapper Snow. Our offense took some time to get into a rhythm and quickly came back from a 24-7 deficit in the second half, making it 24-24. They then had two more offensive opportunites with the score tied but failed to capitalize as the Bengals defensive genius Mike Zimmer figured out how to stop the Brandon Banks, RG3 triple option, giving time for the Bengals offense to strike back. They scored twice. Making it 38-24. The Redskins made a valiant effort on offense to come back but failed. Final score was 38-31.

The Good:
For the first time since 1991 and the Mark Rypien era we have a quarterback in D.C. Redskins fans have to excited after the likes of Heath Shuler, Patrick Ramsey and the like. Griffin is displaying remarkable decision making is able to escape pressure and make plays. He keeps his eyes downfield and has good deep ball accuracy. He needs to work on fumbling and feeling the pressure a bit more but he is only 180 minutes into his professional career.

Alfred Morris is solid and here to stay. He appears to be set as the started barring injury and hasn't disappointed. Scoring at least once in all three games. The top rookie running back of the draft class.

Our offense has put up 28+ points in 3 straight games and that is remarkable after a decade of lackadaisal offense. Rarely putting up more than 17 points. They only won games because the defense was stout and kept the opposing offense in check.

This is also our third straight game with 3 turnovers forced. 2nd Straight with our defense scoring. This is a great change from previous years where our defense dropped interceptions and let fumbles get by.

Special teams made all the kicks and didn't have any blocks and Cundiff continues to knock kick-offs out of the endzone.

The Bad:
As stated previously our defense is giving up 30+ points a game and you can't have that period. RG3 can't keep playing catch up. Playing with a lead helps the running game and time of possession of an offense tremendously.

Our offensive line is banged up but thankfully Trent Williams MRI was negative so he won't be out for too long. RG3 has been sacked 9 times this season and been walloped a lot more. He can't keep taking these hits and pressure if he wants to stay healthy and produce.

Bottom-line:
As my old history teacher put it, "We got a quarterback." RG3 is the future and is sure to be a star and lead this team deep into the playoffs after another good draft or two. Mark my words, in 2014 if Mike Shanahan is still here the Skins will be a deadly team.

Science and God Complement, Rather Than Contradict

So yesterday I was bored out of my mind and ventured over to the wonderful writers on yahoo.com. (For those who don't know thats an example of the literary device known as sarcasm.)  My mouse soon clicked over a headline called "Will Science Someday Rule Our the Possibility of God?". For those interested the full article is available here. To summarize it briefly, the article discusses various leaps in science and how those leaps can further rule out the "need" for a God to answer what scientists cannot. My answer to the question posed in the title is flat out no.

If I created a coffee maker that grew its own beans, started the coffee whenever you woke up, added the right amount of cream and sugar depending on your mood, gave you a massage and a kiss to start your day, all without electricity or input form you I'd be considered a genius. Now, lets say scientists spent a good 25 years trying to analyze every aspect of my coffee maker and find out how every atom works. If they figure it out completely does that mean I no longer I exist? That just because the intricacies of my wonder can finally be explained I vanish and the coffee maker is just a by product of natural selection of previous coffee makers? Obviously not, but that is the point Ms. Natalie Wolchover is getting at.

She finishes off her introduction by asking "if science could really explain everything?". The answer to that question is no. People who truly understand the nature of this great universe and science in general know that with every discovery theres a thousand more things to learn about, new theories to test and many more to disprove. In essence, the more we learn, the more we realize we don't know.

Wolchover's first point is that scientists have pin pointed the Big Bang so thoroughly that they know what happened "10^-43 seconds" after the Big Bang until now. (For those unfamiliar with scientific notation 10^-43 is 0.00000000000000000000000000000000000000000001.) But also mentioned that the split second BEFORE that is still "murky" and cosmologists still haven't figured it out. She quotes a cosmologist from Cal Tech who says progress will eventually figure it out. And that an idea of a model that supports this theory is that the universe is like a big balloon that naturally deflates and inflates itself as time goes on. Even if this were true who put the universe here? Where did all the energy in the big bang come from? Basic physics states the matter and energy cannot be created, much less spontaneously appear from nothing. Its clear that there had to be an initial input at first, a creator, if you will.

She then mentions the point that "physical constants that define our universe" are so exact that modifying them "by a hair" essentially ruins the entire universe. But instead of saying that this is by design and God had a purpose in making the universe she argues the point of parallel universes; stating that there are endless universes in one complete multiverse, where every physical constant is represented, ones where electrons weigh a kilogram instead of 10^-31 grams. And thus, because all of them are represented we just got lucky by being in the perfect one. The problems with this are clear, where are all these multiverses and how in the grand scheme of things has not one been able to create a transportation method between all of them? And second even if this hail mary theory were true, it still requires a creator, a beginning. Universes don't just pop out of nowhere, life doesn't magically sprout from a lucky bacteria and turn into 1.7 million different species of animals. They are put here by design. There is a reason why no historical evidence exists of life spontaneously forming, because that isn't how it works and it never happened.

Science is breaking down and analyze the world around us. If belief in God meant no science then we would still be in our neanderthal days, playing with fire and finding berries for dinner. God created this world with a design, which why science works. Every electron is the same mass, gravity is equal throughout Earth, the Earth is the perfect distance from the sun to not burn or freeze us, the water cycle is a perfect way to replenish a finite water supply, there are simply too many phenomena to be explained by science. Laws of science simply state that things occur, they can't explain why my heart beats perfectly even when I'm not not awake, or how it happens to adjust to my needs when I'm exercising. "Oh but thats the sub-conscience of your brain!" Okay, care to explain how THAT works? How does my brain know what electrical impulses to send and when?

Any stat major will love to tell you how low the odds our of the right combinations of mutations to create a new living thing, which is yet another reason why it didn't happen like that.

Realizing that God explains what science cannot is key to understand the world around us. And Ms. Wolchover, whenever science does explain the entire universe it will confirm the existence of a deity, not disprove it.

Skins Fail to Stop Rams Rally as RGIII Throws First Pick

Before I get started on this train-wreck of a game let me begin a tirade on the tards working the NFL's corporate offices. The NFL is rich. The economy has not touched the NFL's revenue in any significant way. Through the sales of ridicously overpriced merchandise, insane television deals and revenue from all 32 teams the NFL is clearly one of the biggest financial powerhouses in the country, all because of a game called football. This begs the questions, why don't they pay the original refs?! I mentioned in one of my preseason blog posts about how the season would fare with these replacement officials and yesterday's game    is clear sign that the future does not bode well.

They botched so many calls I made from my couch at home. You can't challenge a play that's automatically reviewed. A late hit is only late if the hit is made AFTER the player is out of bounds. An unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on a touchdown play means the score counts and the 15 yards is assessed on the kickoff. In a case where multiple players are fighting the one who instigated it gets the flag along with the one who retaliates. The inability and sheer stupidity of these officials, who look like deer caught in the headlights every five plays, is slowing down games and ruining a good season of football.

In terms of the game, we played like Skins of the last decade. If not for Robert Griffin III's altheticism and sheer brilliant quarterbacking the score would have been 45-7 Rams, the only Skins score coming off the defense. Its a typical Redskin thing to do to lose to team you're beating 21-6. The defense gave up yards but got lucky and held them to field goals in the first half. Come the second half they gave up touchdowns to a weak receiving core and made Danny Amendola look like Jerry Rice and Randy Moss wrapped up in a nice white shell. 10 catches for a 130 yards in the first half? It should have clicked in WAY before then that dropping 7 and playing zone IS NOT WORKING, but no they continued to give up yards through the air.

And our vaunted front seven? What happened to them? My grandmother could have walked through the holes Jackson had to run through. But he got benched before halftime. In comes a 7th round rookie who looks like Jackson's clone, ripping our defense for 83 yards on 15 carries. The time of possession and all the statistics made it look like the Rams ran away with this one, all stats except one: the score.

In spite of all this the defense forced a strong 3 turnovers, two by ageless stud London Fletcher. You gotta love Fletcher, he played a great game and had this to say afterwards: “You know what, defensively we didn’t play well enough to win. I take responsibility for that as a captain of the defense, and I don’t feel good about that.” said LB London Fletcher. “We need to be hard on ourselves. We have to look at the film, see what mistakes we made and come back and be ready to play next week.” 

That is the attitude the defense needs to have, especially after losing defensive anchors, Brian Orakpo and Adam Carriker for the season. 

The special teams unit had another blocked punt. This is unacceptable. Teams are watching film and seeing that they can expect to get a blocked punt per game, when it should a max of 1 per season. I don't know whose fault it is but special teams coach Danny Smith needs to fix it before it costs us a game. 

There were some brightsides. Robert Griffin III was being abused by the Rams defense, taking hits (some of them uncalled late), a sack and being consistently pressured by a combination of a strong Rams defense and porous offensive line. But kept cool and was an efficient quarterback, hitting Leonard Hankerson on a bomb and hitting Aldrick Robinson in the hands with another. He rushed for 82 yards and 2 scores. Totaling a lovely 30+ fantasy points. He kept composure, rallying the team at the end of the game for a game tying field goal. I think all the start Kirk Cousins fans are putting their RG3 jerseys back on.

Speaking of composure, the last Redskin to catch a pass from RG3 that game didn't keep his. In a physical game where emotions ran high, Joshua Morgan caught a pass to put the team well within Billy Cundiff's field goal range. After the ball was caught he took a shove in the helmet from big mouthed cornerback Cortland Finnegan and instinctively threw the ball at him. You never throw the football at someone, and it was a penalty so obvious even the replacement refs called it. (Although the case could be made the both Finnegan and Morgan deserved a flag, both of which would offset.)

From my days as a benchwarming quarterback I learned that a player who can't control his emotions is never good for the team. RG3 kept his cool, and scored 3 times. Morgan didn't and cost his team a game. Whats left now is to learn from this, and make up for it by whacking the potent Cincinnati Bengals in the mouth.  

And because I hate Cortland Finnegan so much, here's a video of him getting dogged by Andre Johnson. The fun starts at 0:43. 

As always thanks for reading! 

Eleanor Roosevelt High School I.D. Policy Repealed

In breaking news today, Eleanor Roosevelt Principal Mr. Reginald McNiell announced that the school was cancelling its tedious I.D. badge policy in favor of a much simpler way to secure the building against trespassers. As in the last 30 years Roosevelt has had over TWO visitors without proper I.D. badges resulting in an astounding zero crimes. This is a clear need for stricter regulation as we're surely due for an act of violence by now.

Effective Tuesday, September 18th, every classroom will have a surgeon implant a RFID chip in every student's skull, complete with their birthday, full name, grade, homeroom teacher, ID number and suit size. The administrators and teachers will all have scanners to check attendance and make sure they have hall passes. The cafeteria is going to have to find other ways of getting kids trash duty...just kidding, I temporarily forgot the genocide that is 9 kids sitting at an 8 person table. No worries. Problem solved.

After spending most of the budget on the RFID chips and associated programming costs, Roosevelt's Budget Committee decided professional surgeons were out reach and settled for any med students. They also sent a memo illustrating the need for people with surgical experience and help setup an interview day for prospective surgeons. Everyone who showed up happened to be an Indian child whose parents stopped the reading the letter at the word doctor and simply herded up their kids and all their Indian friends and drove to the school while telling Aunty Sheela and Uncle Nandu that Rajesh is already a doctor.

Some parents spoke out against the policy, saying it should lab tested first, to which NHS Teacher of the Year in 2011, Mr. Hendley, replied: "Are you kidding me? IT'S TEST TIMEE!"

All the parents who spoke against the policy are currently unavailable for comment, three of which were quite irritated to find their cars dented as they parked in the student parking lot for over 15 seconds.

In other news Mr. Bagley announced his retirement, saying he just can't deal with in-school bums without letting off steam and yelling at the petrified freshman to get their I.D.s on.

"I TRIED CONVINCING THEM THAT THERE'S A POOL ON THE ROOF, BUT IT DOESN'T HAVE THE SAME JOY AS CATCHING KIDS WITHOUT THEIR I.D.S ON," said Mr. Bagley, who for some reason, has only one volume when speaking.

Roosevelt's student population also voiced their opinions on the issue. Here are some samples:

1. "Oh yeah girlaaa I ain't gots to wear my ID no mo! But I aint tryna get no surgery up in my weave!" -ShaniquabigBstaytattedratchetness Quarystulz (Pronounced Crystals)

2. "..." -That guy who never talks in class

3. "I dun care about no stupid IDs I just clutched a 2350 on my SAT!" -Asian guy whose lived long enough in P.G. County to learn the slang.

4. "Well, personally, I find the situation to be a staunch violation of my constitutional rights." -Educated person. (Representing a minuscule percentage of the student body)

5. "I.D.s? Who cares about I.D.s?! Chapter 1 is due TOMORROW and I STILL don't have a mentor!" -Science and Tech Student.

6. "Yolo" -Unknown.

This is sure to be a big milestone in the two time blue ribbon school, the perfect skin on the acne covered face of PGCPS. Other schools are slowly following Eleanor Roosevelt's innovate leap into the future, Charles Flowers is drawing blue prints of a dog collar that gives electric shocks when the student receives a text message, and a school in New York is mandating chemically unique uniform pants, that instantly dissolve weed, crack and heroin, making them unsuitable for sale. What do you think? Agree with the policy? Disagree? Email the editor at idontgiveadamn@aol.com.



As always, thanks for reading!

RG3 Stuns as Skins Upset Saints in the Season Opener

Tebowing is outdated. Griffining is the new thing

So many questions surrounded Redskins rookie, Robert Griffin III, before the season had even begun. First off, was he worth the 3 draft picks (2 first and 1 second rounder) to obtain him? You have to wonder, considering you are essentially giving up a starter each year with those first round picks. Or how Griffin was going to deal with all the hype in Washington D.C...; the pressure of leading a team that hasn't won its division in 12 years, a team that has only won two playoffs games since then (STILL 1 more than the Cowboys) a team that has reached double digit wins only twice in that span. Needless to say the new millenium has not been a good one for the Redskins, and its entire coaching staff and fan base is hoping Baylor product Robert Griffin III was the catalyst to drive this team into the winning ways of New England and the Manning led Indianapolis Colts.

We have yet to see if he is going to be this generation's Sammy Baugh but from what he showed in his first regular season game in New Orleans there is strong reason for hope in D.C. Now then, onto the game.

The Good

1. Robert Griffin III
By far the best rookie and probably the best quarterback on the field Sunday (Minus Matt Ryan). He was the only rookie quarterback to win on Sunday. He was the only rookie to throw for multiple touchdowns. He was the only rookie to throw zero interceptions. He out-rushed fellow rookies Trent Richardson and David Wilson. He was the first rookie quarterback to start the opener for the Redskins since the 1960's and the first rookie quarterback to lead a team to 40 or more points in its season opener. The first Redskin quarterback to lead a team 40+ points since Mark Brunell did it in 2005 against the 49ers.  Griffin showed remarkable poise and decision making ability in the game. He rushed when had to, slid when he had to and didn't take any unnecessary hits. He knew when to run and when to throw, as evidenced by a long pass to Santana Moss on a 3rd and 6 when Griffin had an open lane for a first down. He had good vision as well, finding Fred Davis for a 26 yard play all the way on the other side of the field. He only took 1 sack and turned many plays that weren't going anywhere into positive ones and didn't turn the ball over. Sure every game isn't going to be like this but Griffin is still learning and has no where to go but up.

2. Alfred Morris
Mike Shanahan's uncanny ability for finding running back gems in the late rounds continued this year with the 6th round pick of Alfred Morris. Morris showed tenacity on every run, finishing with a hit whenever possible; on his second touchdown he broke a strong tackle and toppled into the endzone on a first and goal, essentially sealing the game. He rushed for 96 yards and 2 scores, the only rookie running back to score on Sunday. He was also instrumental in dominating the Saints in time of possession. A whopping 39 minutes to the Saints 20 could only be accomplished from Morris's strong rushing attack.

3. Cedric Griffin, DeAngelo Hall, Josh Wilson and DeJon Gomes.
The Redskins were advertised as having a rather thin secondary but they proved otherwise. Griffin forced a redzone fumble after getting beaten by Marques Colston, saving a touchdown and breaking up several passing and finishing third on the team with 3 tackles. DeAngelo Hall also didn't allow any big plays and made solid tackles in the running game and also had a sack of Drew Brees. Josh Wilson also broke up a couple of balls, including a deep one where he landed hard on his shoulder. He had 3 tackles and 2 assisted tackles. DeJon Gomes is a Redskins late round pick from Nebraska and filled in for Brandon Merriwether and picked off Drew Brees just when it looked like he was mounting a comeback. He then returned it to the 3 yard line, setting up a Morris touchdown.

4. Billy Cundiff
Cundiff won the kicking job without competing in it and, yesterday, showed why. He nailed all four of his field goals and extra points with a long of 45 on the day. He also scored more than both Alfred Morris and Robert Griffin III. If he can keep his nerves set the Redskins should many close games they lost last year.

5. Offensive Line
Either the Redskins offensive line is seriously underrated after all these years or RG3 scares off defenders trying to rush him. Probably a combination of the two but a a bad offensive line doesn't allow 153 rushing yards or allow no more than 1 sack in a game. If the line can stay healthy and keep up this level of play, things look good for the Skins offense.

6. Defensive Front 7 

While it wasn't a sack Kerrigan gets a good lick on Brees.

Jim Haslett's front seven is as dangerous as we thought they were. They logged two sacks in the game but pressured Drew Brees the whole game, not allowing him to set in a rhythm until late in the 4th quarter. Orakpo blocked two passes near the goal line and nearly had an interception. Kerrigan had a sack and caught an interception but had it knocked away by Darren Sproles. The linemen were a relentless force, consistently pressuring Drew Brees regardless of who was trying to block.

The Bad

1. Shutting Down in the 4th Quarter
Early on in the 4th the Redskins had a decent lead but started running a vanilla offense, running the ball all three downs, trying to burn clock with 12 minutes still on it. This lead to punts, which lead to Drew Brees touchdowns and an imminent Saints comeback. Luckily Gomes bailed them out and allowed the coaches to learn this lesson the easy way.

2. 4th Down Defense
We gave up two touchdowns on two fourth down plays. 'Nuff said.

The ball makes up 25% of Bank's body mass

3. Brandon Banks
Banks needs to keep the ball secured if he wants to keep returning kicks. Hopefully today was an anomaly but if he keeps up this 2 fumbles per game look then Santana will be returning kicks and Banks will be looking for a job.

4. Penalties
Granted we do have some not so bright replacement officials but still, most of the penalties called were legitimate and the redskins racked up 127 penalty yards on 12 penalties. This is not acceptable, winning NFL teams have discipline and don't make stupid mistakes like this. The Redskins had 464 total offensive yards, imagine how many more they would have had they not went backwards for 127 yards.

5. Too much praise on Griffin
Griffin deserves the glory for playing a spectacular game but its important to put in perspective. The Saints had NO tape whatsoever of Griffin's actual offense. All they had to go on was Shanahan's vanilla'd down preseason offense. The element of surprise was helpful and definitely kept the Saints off balance, but pretty soon teams will be able to watch and observe Griffins weaknesses and capitalize on them. This is essentially what happened in 2008. Jim Zorn started the season 6-2 but once teams caught on to the tape and stopped his infamous stretch play the Redskins plummeted to an 8-8 record.

6. Punts
Yes a punt did get blocked and got the Saints back in the game but Danny Smith won't let that happen again because he's Danny Smith. Plain and Simple.

Next week is a real test for the Redskins to see if they dominate the Rams like they should or play down to the level of their opponents as they've done in years past.

Note: My hiatus from blogging is mostly due to schoolwork. College applications, 3 A.P.s and working in a lab does't leave as much to write as the summer did. And as always thanks for reading!