What the Redskins Need

Well another season of ineptitude has come and gone for my beloved Washington Redskins.  Now it's time to think about the future, and the immediate future is the NFL draft.  The Skins will be drafting Number 6.  The question becomes what do they need: QB, WR, DB, OL are the concerns (ranked from most important).

Obviously a Quarterback is a must.  You cannot win in today's NFL without solid QB play (see Brees, Drew, Rodgers, Aaron, even Stafford, Matthew).  The Broncos are a prime example: Tebow manages the game they win; Tebow is wildly inaccurate and turns the ball over they lose.  The Redskins have not had a manageable QB since Mark Brunell and haven't had a decent QB since Brad Johnson (although it's pretty clear they gave up on Jason Campbell too early and stupidly for an aging former superstar).  Rex Grossman should never put on a Redskins jersey again as he single-handedly destroyed any hopes the Skins had of being competitive with his inability to simply manage the game: completion percentage under 60%, 20 INTs, 6 fumbles lost (26 turnovers and he didn't even play in 3 games!).  So the most obvious need is a QB, which is good because this draft has a few promising talents to choose from.

The other area of huge concern is WR.  Part of the reason Grossman was so inefficient is there were few weapons on offense.  Santana Moss is one of my favorite Redskins of all time, but he cannot play forever and he's only 5'10 (at best).  Jabar Gaffney should never be anyone's number one receiver.  Ever.  And Fred Davis and Chris Cooley are great threats when on the field, they are both tight ends who are not going to stretch the field. 

The big concern is that this draft is not deep on WR especially since the conventional wisdom is that a great college receiver almost rarely translates into a great NFL one.  The main problem is that there is very little press coverage in college because a great college team has one maybe two pro-level corners.  So the WRs who tend to translate well can deal with the physical play of pro defensive backs.  The smart thing to do is to not waste a high round pick on a receiver, especially since even the best tend to take a year to adjust. 

That being said, with the depth at quarterback, and the lack of depth at wide receiver makes for an interesting situation.  Of the teams in front of the Skins one can assume Indy will take Luck (or a near contender will mortgage its future to take the pick from the Colts, something the Redskins shouldn't even think of doing).  The Rams, Vikings and Bucs all have young QBs they would be foolish to give up on.  The Browns could go QB, but it remains to be seen if they are giving up on Colt McCoy (who was a second rounder, so not a huge loss to do that).  So it appears the Redskins would have the pick of whatever QB they wanted.  I'm not as sold on RG3 as everyone else, since it is only this past season where he found accuracy in a conference not known for defense.  Likewise all the other big name QBs come from the Big 12, which I don't find a good bench mark for anything (Jason White, Heisman trophy winner, 0 passes attempted in the NFL). 

The one QB that does get me excited in Kellen Moore.  Most scouts probably kill him for his size and his competition.  But every game I've watched him play, he is smart, accurate, careful, and picking apart vaunted programs like Virginia Tech and Georgia.  Everyone said Drew Brees was too small; I'm not saying, I'm just saying.  But Moore could be had in later rounds most likely.

An interesting thought for the Skins is to trade down a slot or two for either more picks and take one of the two receivers who look like they could make the jump to professional football the easiest: Justin Blackmon and Michael Floyd.  Both are very good route runners and just get the ball into their hands no matter what.  But the more important part is the maturity.  Both have had off-field issues (DUIs) but both seem to have learned from it (if this doesn't make you believe in Blackmon as a person, you have no heart), and all reports about Floyd is that he took proactive steps to clean his life up (moving into the freshmen dorms to keep out of trouble), which takes a lot of maturity. 

Those are three players I think the Redskins should look at carefully.  Obviously the quarterback is the priority, but the Skins can always use more draft picks.  Since there is one sure-thing QB and a bunch of really close to sure-things, I hope the Skins take their time and try to think creatively with this draft.  A smart strategy is a must, and I'm sure the people working on it are working hard and are probably smarter than me (unless Snyder is in on it).  The big point I want to make is there are alternatives to making an impulse choice with that 6th pick, if time is taken to look at what traits have made current QBs successful and what they looked like coming out of college.*

*Of the QBs in the playoffs the only 4 drafted in the top 10 are largely considered the worst: Manning, Ryan, Smith, and Stafford, while the best 4 the highest drafted, Roethlisberger (11th overall) is probably considered not as good as Brady (6th Rd) or Brees (2nd Rd.) and the man with the title belt, Rodgers, was 25th overall.