W.P.: Dan Snyder says he fired Vinny Cerrato for letting him hire Jim Zorn(M.E.T.)

[Mr. Sinister]

Well, at least once we knew we weren't going to win during that era, there was plenty of comedic relief for entertainment purposes.

I think one of the best was Portis being guaranteed an escort to the endzone on a 90+ yard TD run against the Chiefs, but either trips up and gets tackled, or trips and bumps into Mike Sellers and gets tackled. On that play, that pretty much told me that he was undeniably finished. Butterbean could've run that one in.

[GothSkinsFan]

Danny blame shifting all over the place. Maybe if Dan and Vin didn't undermine Zorn at every step and completely botch the Front Office/Personnel situation Zorn would have had a chance.

No kidding. Look what Norv had to work with in Dallas, but he's been a disaster at every stop since. Give Zorn a star QB, OL, WR, RB, TE, and a top-5 D -- he'd win too.

[SonnyandSam]

The difference was that Spurrier was his guy, and Zorn was Vinny's.

Spurrier was not a bad decision. EVERYONE in the NFL was going nuts trying to convince Spurrier to turn pro. Snyder was the only one willing to pay the price. In hindsight, it was a very bad choice. But most everyone, including all us fans, liked the selection. LOTS of other NFL teams had tried to convince Spurrier to become an NFL coach.

As for Zorn.....just never made any sense. OC maybe....but head coach...nope.

And all of us fans are partially to blame for Snyder getting Zorn. This board and the radio talk shows blew up with fans enraged about the rumor that Jim Fassel was the next head coach. Fans hated the rumored choice.....which forced Snyder to look elsewhere....but by then it was too late....nothing else left to sign, except to promote Zorn.

[VABlitz]

I would be surprised if Snyder doesn't start winning back fans quickly. Is he still vilified?

Still villified in some circles. Most people just see him as a greedy businessman that owns their beloved team. I don't think many people would be a fan of his when he gouges his paying customers. The only two positives is he has a lot of money to spend on this team and he is truly a fan of the team. However, JKC he is not.

[Momma There Goes That Man]

I think one of the best was Portis being guaranteed an escort to the endzone on a 90+ yard TD run against the Chiefs, but either trips up and gets tackled, or trips and bumps into Mike Sellers and gets tackled. On that play, that pretty much told me that he was undeniably finished. Butterbean could've run that one in.

That was actually the 2nd Redskins game I ever attended. It was pouring down rain, freezing and we lost to the 0-5 Chiefs. That game and that run particularly will always live on in my memory unfortunately.

Coincidentally, the first game I attended was the Rams game the year before. Another in classic list of Zorn era failures.

[roanoker]

Zorn was bad but Williams could have been worse.

[VABlitz]

Zorn was bad, but he shouldn't take most of the blame from that cluster of a team. The blame falls mostly on the architects of that team, and Zorn had no hand in personnel decissions.

[sjinhan]

Zorn was bad but Williams could have been worse.

ok I guess your are referring to the Bounty Gate. Other than being the scapegoat for the league on this particular issue, I think Gregg Williams would have been a great coach for us. Actually if Gregg Williams stayed with us then probably the whole Bounty Gate thing wouldnt have come up to surface or at least maybe the bscape scapegoat would have been someone else.

Now as how it all turned out, I am happy with how the Redskins organization is bring run now with Shanahan but I just have disagree with you on Zorn > Williams assessment.

[RabidFan]

I think one of the best was Portis being guaranteed an escort to the endzone on a 90+ yard TD run against the Chiefs, but either trips up and gets tackled, or trips and bumps into Mike Sellers and gets tackled. On that play, that pretty much told me that he was undeniably finished. Butterbean could've run that one in.

Actually if you look at that play Portis was running in stride behind Sellers who ended up not blocking his guy and falling forward on his face instead of just screening the guy for the entire run. The defender then was free to try and stop Portis. I put that on Sellers. He faulted on that and it wasn't like when he plowed the road on that one TD run when Portis just held onto his jersey in tow...that was awesome but not the same Sellers on the Chiefs play you mentioned.

[TheLongshot]

And all of us fans are partially to blame for Snyder getting Zorn. This board and the radio talk shows blew up with fans enraged about the rumor that Jim Fassel was the next head coach. Fans hated the rumored choice.....which forced Snyder to look elsewhere....but by then it was too late....nothing else left to sign, except to promote Zorn.

The funny thing is that Fassel probably would have been the best choice of the bunch that they interviewed. Spags turned out to be a bust as a head coach. So did Jim Mora Jr. Schwartz is now on the hot seat in Detroit. Looking back on it, there really weren't good options for the Redskins.

Gibbs retiring created a bad situation that there was no easy answer for. Not having a guy at the head of the football organization that was not the head coach left a power vacuum that Snyder had little choice but to put Vinny in that spot, and Vinny wasn't ready for it.

ok I guess your are referring to the Bounty Gate. Other than being the scapegoat for the league on this particular issue, I think Gregg Williams would have been a great coach for us. Actually if Gregg Williams stayed with us then probably the whole Bounty Gate thing wouldnt have come up to surface or at least maybe the bscape scapegoat would have been someone else.

Now as how it all turned out, I am happy with how the Redskins organization is bring run now with Shanahan but I just have disagree with you on Zorn > Williams assessment.

Even back then, Williams had some red flags on managing personnel that made me think that he wasn't a guy that you'd want being the head coach of an NFL team. It wouldn't have worked anyways, because Vinny was bound and determined to turn the Redskins into a WCO team and I don't think Williams shared that vision.

[8181]

Can people stop blaming Gibbs?

He left behind a 9-7 wildcard playoff team.

He left beind a team with STARTERS that were good enough to go 6-2 under ZORN AND CAMPBELL, TWO OF THE MOST INCOMPETENT PEOPLE AT THE TWO MOST IMPORTANT POSITIONS ON A TEAM - HEAD COACH AND QUARTERBACK

He left behind practically a FULL SLATE OF DRAFT PICKS.

How did he leave the team in shambles? He didn't! He left the team with the opportunity for success. Instead management from the owner on down completely destroyed everything!

How about blaming the front office for hiring Zorn? How about blaming the front office for keeping Cerrato? How about blaming the front office for wasting all of their ****ing picks!!!!

Some of the picks we could have taken and used!!! And before someone says some bull**** about hindsight, how about it's not our (fan) ****ing job to realize who is good at the time, it's the front offices who get paid millions to do this for a living!!!!

And remember, we were all clamoring for LINEMEN on both sides and RECEIVERS at the time so this isn't no ****ing rocket science!

It isn't like 31 other teams passed on these players who we had a chance to get depending on whether we traded down or not:

1st Round Tackles: Sam Baker, Duane Brown - Both good enough to START for playoff teams, so who the **** cares if Baker is no Chris Samuels?

2nd Round Receivers: Jordy Nelson, Eddie Royal, Desean Jackson - We wasted TWO of our THREE picks... THIRD pick we used on a TIGHT END we didn't need who turned out to be our best pick... Except as this season showed, we don't even need him to win!!!!!

And the bull**** goes on through the rest of the draft... In the NFL you either need good coaches or good players, or preferably BOTH. The front office failed us on BOTH fronts. NOT Gibbs.

[NLC1054]

Can people stop blaming Gibbs?

Gibbs left Dan between a rock and a hard place, and whether people like it or not, without a general manager like Bobby Beathard to build the team, Gibbs was very much in a "win-now" mind set. His retirement seemed to come out of left field; no one was really expecting Gibbs to leave when he did. He was a big proponent of drafting for need and strictly for need, which time has shown time and time again hasn't been the right way to build a team.

It was Gibbs who drafted Jason Campbell. It was Gibbs who basically revealed that we were going to be drafting Campbell right before the draft. Even in hindsight, Jason was a fringe first rounder at best. He got his big armed quarterback who could throw it deep talent-wise, but he never scouted him enough to see if he would be willing to throw it deep. That was Gibbs. That wasn't Vinny or Dan. That was him.

Remember that Gibbs didn't want to draft Sean Taylor; he wanted Kellen Winslow. Our scouts had to beg Gibbs to draft Sean Taylor and had to convince him that Cooley could be just as good, and even then it took Portis' prodding to push that over the top.

It was Gibbs who was at the top of the organization when we let Ryan Clark walk and signed Adam Archuleta instead, which meant that we had to blow a high draft pick on another safety (LaRon) because of the gaping hole in our secondary. It was Gibbs who traded draft picks for aging veterans.

Coach Gibbs was an incredible football coach, an he motivated what was, to be be really honest, not that talented, to heights and a level that should've been damn near impossible. If Gibbs had a Scott Pioli or Ozzie Newsome or a genius general manager, we'd probably have a fourth Lombardi right now. But he didn't. He had Vinny. Gibbs was an incredible football coach, but he was not an effective personnel man. I think if you asked Coach that, he'd probably admit it straight up.

He decided to retire again at a really, really awkward time, when the best coaches were out of the running. And he left when the bottom was about to fall out on the team. All it took was one or two injuries to basically derail the 2008 season. Our depth was crap, our starters were old. We only had three good players at wide receiver, tight end and running back. Gibbs failed to get a complementary receiver for Moss while he was here. It was Gibbs who traded for Brandon Lloyd, Antwaan Randle El was Gibbs' guy.

That team was right on the ragged edge, and Gibbs leaving probably pushed it off the cliff. The 6-2 start was a mirage. When Gibbs was here, he was the decision maker. Vinny and Dan weren't going to force Gibbs to do anything he didn't want to do. So we got a short-term boost, and when Gibbs left we probably needed a rebuild. Something that fans around here were not exactly going to put up with after making the playoffs.

Now this doesn't absolve Vinny, because he was still a ****ing moron who wrote bad contracts, overpaid talent, and a good general manager talks their head coach out of boneheaded ideas. Vinny completely and utterly botched the 2008 draft, and his botching that draft negatively impacted our ability to draft in 2009. By then the team was old, the cap space was thin, the inmates were running the asylum. Vinny is not absolved of any of the wrongdoing he did, because he did a lot.

But so did Gibbs. The combo of Dan, Vinny and Gibbs someone how managed to find a way to cobble together a team that won some football games, but in so doing they exaggerated the talent level they had. Losing to the Seahawks in 2007 was about our ceiling. We weren't going to the Super Bowl. We weren't going to the Super Bowl in 2008 either. The 2009 season just toppled a house of cards that had been built by trying to win now and win fast.

[skinfan2k]

Gibbs also traded a 3rd for Scott Brunell who was going to get released.

[TMK9973]

Gibbs left Dan between a rock and a hard place, and whether people like it or not, without a general manager like Bobby Beathard to build the team, Gibbs was very much in a "win-now" mind set. His retirement seemed to come out of left field; no one was really expecting Gibbs to leave when he did. He was a big proponent of drafting for need and strictly for need, which time has shown time and time again hasn't been the right way to build a team.

It was Gibbs who drafted Jason Campbell. It was Gibbs who basically revealed that we were going to be drafting Campbell right before the draft. Even in hindsight, Jason was a fringe first rounder at best. He got his big armed quarterback who could throw it deep talent-wise, but he never scouted him enough to see if he would be willing to throw it deep. That was Gibbs. That wasn't Vinny or Dan. That was him.

Remember that Gibbs didn't want to draft Sean Taylor; he wanted Kellen Winslow. Our scouts had to beg Gibbs to draft Sean Taylor and had to convince him that Cooley could be just as good, and even then it took Portis' prodding to push that over the top.

It was Gibbs who was at the top of the organization when we let Ryan Clark walk and signed Adam Archuleta instead, which meant that we had to blow a high draft pick on another safety (LaRon) because of the gaping hole in our secondary. It was Gibbs who traded draft picks for aging veterans.

Coach Gibbs was an incredible football coach, an he motivated what was, to be be really honest, not that talented, to heights and a level that should've been damn near impossible. If Gibbs had a Scott Pioli or Ozzie Newsome or a genius general manager, we'd probably have a fourth Lombardi right now. But he didn't. He had Vinny. Gibbs was an incredible football coach, but he was not an effective personnel man. I think if you asked Coach that, he'd probably admit it straight up.

He decided to retire again at a really, really awkward time, when the best coaches were out of the running. And he left when the bottom was about to fall out on the team. All it took was one or two injuries to basically derail the 2008 season. Our depth was crap, our starters were old. We only had three good players at wide receiver, tight end and running back. Gibbs failed to get a complementary receiver for Moss while he was here. It was Gibbs who traded for Brandon Lloyd, Antwaan Randle El was Gibbs' guy. ....

This.... I hate when people say Gibbs 2.0 did nothing. After all - in the 16 years since Gibbs 1.0 left, The Redskins made the playoffs twice. In the 4 years he was here - We made the playoffs twice. He was still a great coach..no...the best coach this league has ever saw. He made the most out of the talent he had.

As a personal guy - Forget it. Not his strength. But if Gibbs had stayed another 2 years we probably would have made the playoffs at LEAST 1 more, if not 2 more times.

[NLC1054]

This.... I hate when people say Gibbs 2.0 did nothing. After all - in the 16 years since Gibbs 1.0 left, The Redskins made the playoffs twice. In the 4 years he was here - We made the playoffs twice. He was still a great coach..no...the best coach this league has ever saw. He made the most out of the talent he had.

As a personal guy - Forget it. Not his strength. But if Gibbs had stayed another 2 years we probably would have made the playoffs at LEAST 1 more, if not 2 more times.

We may have made the playoffs, but I don't think we would've won a championship. And we still would've had Vinny, and ultimately that was always going to be the problem.

Gibbs needed a personnel man. Or, he needed someone like Bruce Allen who wasn't the personnel guy, but wrote the contracts and got our cap space right, and then basically..."forced" Gibbs to listen to his scouting department. Like now, Shanny has the final say, but he defers to Scott Campbell and Morocco Brown, he lets his scouts do their work, and then he makes his decisions accordingly. Gibbs and Vinny basically ignored the scouts outright.

The outcome would've basically been the same in a couple years. The organization needed a tear down and rebuild. Gibbs retiring was probably the best thing for the team; without him, the talent (or lack thereof) showed what it was.