2009 NFL season in review: Washington Redskins
Of all the bad teams in 2009 it is hard to say this bad team is in better shape than that bad team. However the St. Louis Rams and Detroit Lions have significant holes everywhere. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have big holes on one side of the ball, and the Washington Redskins are a whole lot better than most NFL fans want to give them credit for. Sure three of the four wins, came against bad teams, and the fourth against the slumping Denver Broncos, but they had a Head Coach who was clearly overmatched, and in fear of losing his job. On top of that they had no direction for their defense. Sure they were a mess, but there is a lot of talent on this ball club.
The offense scored 266 points, which was good enough for 26th best amongst the 32 NFL teams. QB Jason Campbell struggles a lot but did complete 64.5% of his passes. In all he threw for 3,618 yards, 20 touchdowns and 15 interceptions. However he was sacked 46 times and that is a lot of punishment and lost yardage. Added to that is the just 1,501 yards this team gained on the ground, even though they have Clinton Portis on their roster. All that seems to suggest that this team suffered from the ineffective play of their offensive line.
On the defensive side of the ball things were a little better, although that didn’t help he team’s results any. As a unit they gave up 336 points. That works out to about 21 point per game, or could enough for 17th best amongst 2009 NFL teams. When all the math is done they got outscored on average 4.4 points per game, and that is a total that is easily overcome.
So the Redskins probably need a new QB to go along with their new General Manager, Head Coach, and Coaching Staff, but the turn around isn’t as far off for the ‘skins as it is for some of the other bad football teams from 2009.
