1992-2003 The rapid fall of the Redskins and how it went down

[Redskins Anonymous]

I don't typically like to start new threads, but i figured I would bring something up that is relevant to our lack of success over the last few years that isn't another "Gibbs needs to retire" or "Al Saunders should be drawn and quartered" thread. I figured I would bring up the series of tragic events that reads like the fall of rome that lead to the downfall of a proud franchise into mediocrity.

On January 26, 1992 nobody would have foreseen what would have happened to our beloved franchise.

My question to you guys through the poll is what was the pivotal moment that sealed our fate?

On March 5, 1993 Joe Gibbs retires and is replaced shortly thereafter with Richie Petitbon.

Richie Petitbon is fired after one year and replaced with Dallas Cowboys' offensive coordinator Norv Turner.

Redskins draft Heath Shuler.

On April 6, 1997 Jack Kent Cooke dies of cardiac arrest at his NW Washington home leaving his will in a state of disorder.

On September 14, 1997 the Redskins open their new stadium against the Cardinals. Fans have whined about missing RFK since.

In 1998 the Cooke family puts the Redskins up for sale due to the fact they could not resolve who got what in his will. The Redskins cannot sign / resign quality free agents for the 1997 and 1998 seasons. Norv gets a free pass to suck and keep his job.

In May of 1999 the NFL approves the sale of the Washington Redskins to Dan Snyder who outbid John Kent Cooke, son of former owner Jack Kent Cooke who was left out of his father's will.

Redskins win the NFC East in 1999 leading to the "Jeff George / Deion Sanders / Bruce Smith / Mark Carrier" offseason spending spree of 2000 which would cripple the team's salary cap for two years.

Redskins fire Norv and bring in MArty.

Redskins fire Marty after doing EXACTLY what Gibbs did in 1981 - go 0-5 and finish 8-8.

Redskins hire Steve Spurrier and sign nothing but UF losers such as Wuerfell and Ashamed Matthews. Spurrier destroys the roster leaving the skins in a state of total destruction as he quits after two years.

I guess my point is to provide some perspective on how the downfall happened and see that Gibbs took over a franchise in 2004 that was in far worse shape than the one he took over in 1981. Gibbs has provided stability to a franchise that DESPERATELY needed it. Yes, it is frustrating to watch our predictable offense, but remember he has had to build this team from the ground up. And I think that in his 4th year given the events I just laid out, he's done a good job.

[USS Redskins]

Stop making excuses for this coach. He is 26-31 in the "return."

Pretty lame for a HOF coach. Many coaches would have been sacked after the 2006 debacle.

His first go round he had a great GM in Beathard who, worked with Gibbs and together they built a great team that dominated the NFC East for a decade. Gibbs stuck to coaching and not trying to be everything.

The team he has built this go round is made up of over paid underachievers. Gibbs brings in a new offensive coordinator (along with 250 other coaches) who is known for aggresive offensive playcalling and then for some strangre reason, he runs a conservative grind it out game.

The list is endless and this coach looks every bit of his 66 years. He is old and fragile and clueless as to what it takes to win in the modern NFL.

[drowland]

Gibbs is partly to blame for the Skins fall. In '92 he left an old team in decline, with no young talent. He and Casserly had some terrible drafts.

[Badgerrocks]

Hey Redskins Anon, I appreciate the thread. I agree that at the very least, Gibbs has built a solid foundation for the future. Still, would be nice to have some assertive wins.

[RalphZero]

I guess my point is to provide some perspective on how the downfall happened and see that Gibbs took over a franchise in 2004 that was in far worse shape than the one he took over in 1981. Gibbs has provided stability to a franchise that DESPERATELY needed it. Yes, it is frustrating to watch our predictable offense, but remember he has had to build this team from the ground up. And I think that in his 4th year given the events I just laid out, he's done a good job.

You certainly understand. When Gibbs was hired in 1980. His ONLY job was to coah the offense.

Jack Kent Cooke and Bobby Beathard were building that team for a couple years before they hired Gibbs. Theismann, Riggins, Art Monk, some of the Hoggs, Richie Pettibone and the Defense were already there. Gibbs did not need to rebuild anything. Durring the 70's the Redskins always had one of the best defenses in football thanks to George Allan.

All through the 80's including the 1991 and 1992 season, the team was basically the team that Beahard put together.

Bobby Beathard left the Redskins after the 1987 season. At this point the majority of the power was given Gibbs.

The Reason for their downfall was "The Hoggs". The Redskins did not rebuild their Offensive Line when they should have. They did not have good replacements for the Hoggs. They had the 4th overall pick in the draft in 1992 and they picked Desmond Howard. That was a terrible decision. Cooke, Gibbs and Casserly did not under understand salary cap and free agency.

In 1994, they drafted a hot-shot college QB, when they should have drafted offensive and defensive linemen. I am not sure who was calling the shots in 1994. Jack Kent Cooke loved Norv Turner and gave him more power than he gave Casserly. Norv Turner managed to screw everything up. It was Turner's decision to draft Shuler and Westbrook.

After this, it's been one bad decision after another.

[DaBoys84]

I'm curious, as a Boys fan, what the general feeling is about Snyder. We tend to look at him as a fan that bought his team without any real knowledge of the game. He's made some VERY poor coaching choices/decisions over the years, not to mention the big money spent on FA's.

What do you fans think of your owner?

[nightbird]

I'm curious, as a Boys fan, what the general feeling is about Snyder. We tend to look at him as a fan that bought his team without any real knowledge of the game. He's made some VERY poor coaching choices/decisions over the years, not to mention the big money spent on FA's.

What do you fans think of your owner?

Oh man, don't even get us started on that one.

[DaBoys84]

Oh man, don't even get us started on that one.

Something tells me that that's a sore subject...

[Taylor 36]

I'm curious, as a Boys fan, what the general feeling is about Snyder. We tend to look at him as a fan that bought his team without any real knowledge of the game. He's made some VERY poor coaching choices/decisions over the years, not to mention the big money spent on FA's.

What do you fans think of your owner?

There are literally 100,000 threads on that topic that you could look through. Never mind that there are a dozen threads on the front page right now that have posters laying out their feelings for the entire organization, including Snyder.

[RalphZero]

I'm curious, as a Boys fan, what the general feeling is about Snyder. We tend to look at him as a fan that bought his team without any real knowledge of the game. He's made some VERY poor coaching choices/decisions over the years, not to mention the big money spent on FA's.

What do you fans think of your owner?

That's exactly it.

Snyder gave most of the power to Gibbs. Gibbs was never a GM. Just a coach. The Team has no GM. They are not making any attempts to build a superbowl team. Snyder wants to buy one. The Redskins overpay for FA's, not leaving any money left for backups. When Jon Janson got injured, the entire O-Line needed to be shuffled because they did not have a decent backup for Janson.

Some teams attempt to spread their cap evenly thoughout their players. On the Redskins, 90% of the Cap is going to 10% of the players.

For the Cowboys, Jones is the GM and a good one also. He's very stingy with the salaries because he wants quality backups also.

Danny is convinced the team is a couple FA's away from a Superbowl. Danny is confused as to why he is spending all this money on random FA's and the team does not immediately start winning.

[TD_washingtonredskins]

Gibbs is partly to blame for the Skins fall. In '92 he left an old team in decline, with no young talent. He and Casserly had some terrible drafts.

The option I want to vote for is whenever we fired Casserly as the GM. That's when this team went from "in decline" to "having no shot" in my opinion.

The obvious answer is that we haven't recovered from Gibbs leaving. The reason is, he loaded up in 1990-1992 to make one last run with his veterans. I truly believe we would have eventually recovered if we had a GM to give us direction!

[SkinsHokieFan]

The downfall of the Redskins? Simple, it was having a bunch of old guys to start the 1993 season, then bringing in the wussiest head coach in NFL history

JKC and Casserly wanted Bill Parcells when Gibbs retired, but he was already scooped up by the Pats

Had Gibbs indicated to JKC and Casserly that he was going to leave in January of 1993, then they would have had a shot at getting Parcells

In turn Reggie White would have been signed by us, and I have no doubt the good times would have kept rolling

Huge mistake of Gibbs leaving in March compounded by hiring Norval a year later

[Dan T.]

You certainly understand. When Gibbs was hired in 1980. His ONLY job was to coah the offense.

Jack Kent Cooke and Bobby Beathard were building that team for a couple years before they hired Gibbs. Theismann, Riggins, Art Monk, some of the Hoggs, Richie Pettibone and the Defense were already there. Gibbs did not need to rebuild anything. Durring the 70's the Redskins always had one of the best defenses in football thanks to George Allan.

All through the 80's including the 1991 and 1992 season, the team was basically the team that Beahard put together.

Bobby Beathard left the Redskins after the 1987 season. At this point the majority of the power was given Gibbs.

The Reason for their downfall was "The Hoggs". The Redskins did not rebuild their Offensive Line when they should have. They did not have good replacements for the Hoggs. They had the 4th overall pick in the draft in 1992 and they picked Desmond Howard. That was a terrible decision. Cooke, Gibbs and Casserly did not under understand salary cap and free agency.

In 1994, they drafted a hot-shot college QB, when they should have drafted offensive and defensive linemen. I am not sure who was calling the shots in 1994. Jack Kent Cooke loved Norv Turner and gave him more power than he gave Casserly. Norv Turner managed to screw everything up. It was Turner's decision to draft Shuler and Westbrook.

After this, it's been one bad decision after another.

You severely underestimate Gibbs' role in the success of the Redskins the first time around.

The reason for the downfall was the Hogs? That's an absurd statement.

Gibbs, Cooke, and Casserly didn't understand the salary cap? There WAS NO salary cap then.

[Redskins Anonymous]

Stop making excuses for this coach. He is 26-31 in the "return."

Pretty lame for a HOF coach. Many coaches would have been sacked after the 2006 debacle.

His first go round he had a great GM in Beathard who, worked with Gibbs and together they built a great team that dominated the NFC East for a decade. Gibbs stuck to coaching and not trying to be everything.

The team he has built this go round is made up of over paid underachievers. Gibbs brings in a new offensive coordinator (along with 250 other coaches) who is known for aggresive offensive playcalling and then for some strangre reason, he runs a conservative grind it out game.

The list is endless and this coach looks every bit of his 66 years. He is old and fragile and clueless as to what it takes to win in the modern NFL.

I'm not trying to make excuses, as much as I truly believe Gibbs was brought here to BUILD the team. Compared to the team he took over, vast improvement and we have a future after he leaves that looks bright. As opposed to the way Spurrier left us...

Once again, i am not saying that Gibbs is not responsible for the chokes this year. But how many times did Spurrier blow 4th quarter leads; not too much because he didn't have many. We are far closer to winning now than at any point in the last 15 years.

[SkinsHokieFan]

The option I want to vote for is whenever we fired Casserly as the GM. That's when this team went from "in decline" to "having no shot" in my opinion.

The obvious answer is that we haven't recovered from Gibbs leaving. The reason is, he loaded up in 1990-1992 to make one last run with his veterans. I truly believe we would have eventually recovered if we had a GM to give us direction!

Casserly was around in the 1990s and was fired prior to the 1999 season

He even told Snyder "you are firing the wrong guy" which Snyder later acknowledged

However Casserly was a fairly worthless GM in the 1990s

[Redskins Anonymous]

On a side note, John Kent Cooke probably wouldn't have been any better than Snyder. By all accounts John was truly a rich, spoiled brat / drunk. Snyder blows at times, but how good would John have been. Maybe he would've hired a GM, that's about the only difference i see there.

[RalphZero]

What lead to the fall of our beloved Redskins?

In 1987 when Bobby Beathard Left.

[SkinsHokieFan]

On a side note, John Kent Cooke probably wouldn't have been any better than Snyder. By all accounts John was truly a rich, spoiled brat / drunk. Snyder blows at times, but how good would John have been. Maybe he would've hired a GM, that's about the only difference i see there.

I am not sure if he was a spoiled rich kid, no clue where you got that from.

John Kent Cooke knew though how an NFL operation should run. He wouldn't have made money hand over fist though like Dan Snyder does, and did stupid things like have green walls up at Jack Kent Cooke stadium so it looked like we were the damn Jets :laugh:

His mistake was not firing Norv right after the 1997 season, allowing Casserly to sign Stubblefield and trade for Wilkinson, and having to fight to keep the team so we couldn't re-sign Trent Green

[SnyderMustGo]

The downfall was when Daniel Snyder purchased this team.

But, even before that, I think you are correct that the passing of JKC without any plans in place for the franchise was the proximate cause of the team being in a position to be purchased by Snyder.

As much as people don't want to admit it, all franchise owners have a powerful position that can greatly affect the product on the field. Snyder's results speak for themselves--the only thing he has been good at is generating revenue for himself.

[SkinsHokieFan]

The downfall was when Daniel Snyder purchased this team.

But, even before that, I think you are correct that the passing of JKC without any plans in place for the franchise was the proximate cause of the team being in a position to be purchased by Snyder.

As much as people don't want to admit it, all franchise owners have a powerful position that can greatly affect the product on the field. Snyder's results speak for themselves--the only thing he has been good at is generating revenue for himself.

Ultimately it is results on the field

Snyder himself made the mistake of not immediatley getting rid of Norv Turner, even if it was July when he finally took control of the team

6 years in, a team that started off 0-7 the year before only to finish 6-10, he should have bit the bullet then but got rid of Casserly instead

I think Snyder has done just fine since hiring Gibbs and the failure since 2004 is a result of Joe Gibbs, not Dan Snyder

Do I think an all powerful GM would help? Well look up the road in Baltimore, or look in SF or hell look at San Diego. There is no one formula

[Dan T.]

That's exactly it.

Snyder gave most of the power to Gibbs. Gibbs was never a GM. Just a coach. The Team has no GM. They are not making any attempts to build a superbowl team. Snyder wants to buy one. The Redskins overpay for FA's, not leaving any money left for backups. When Jon Janson got injured, the entire O-Line needed to be shuffled because they did not have a decent backup for Janson.

Some teams attempt to spread their cap evenly thoughout their players. On the Redskins, 90% of the Cap is going to 10% of the players.

For the Cowboys, Jones is the GM and a good one also. He's very stingy with the salaries because he wants quality backups also.

Danny is convinced the team is a couple FA's away from a Superbowl. Danny is confused as to why he is spending all this money on random FA's and the team does not immediately start winning.

Jansen went down, and the Redskins had either Todd Wade, a journeyman tackle with starting experience, or Stephen Heyer, a diamond-in-the-rough rookie, to fill in. I'm not sure what else you would expect for replacing a starter.

And your criticism of Snyder is about three years old.

[Redskins Anonymous]

I am not sure if he was a spoiled rich kid, no clue where you got that from.

John Kent Cooke knew though how an NFL operation should run. He wouldn't have made money hand over fist though like Dan Snyder does, and did stupid things like have green walls up at Jack Kent Cooke stadium so it looked like we were the damn Jets :laugh:

His mistake was not firing Norv right after the 1997 season, allowing Casserly to sign Stubblefield and trade for Wilkinson, and having to fight to keep the team so we couldn't re-sign Trent Green

I talked to a guy who went to HS with him. Also, I think I remember some legal problems he had; that and his dad writing him out of his will made me put two and two together.

[RalphZero]

Casserly was around in the 1990s and was fired prior to the 1999 season

He even told Snyder "you are firing the wrong guy" which Snyder later acknowledged

However Casserly was a fairly worthless GM in the 1990s

Correct!!

Casserly was not a good GM. He took over after Beathard left in 1987. The job was way over his head. However, luckily for him, there was no salary cap and free agency and the Redskins were able to keep the players that Beathard brought in.

When Salary Cap and Free Agency started, that's when things went south fast.

[PeterMP]

If I had to pick one thing, I'd pick something not on your list. In 1992, we traded two first round picks (6 and 28) to move up and get Desmond Howard w/ the #4 pick.

Here our first round picks for a series of years prior to and in the beginning of the down turn:

1984 No draft pick [21]

1985 No draft pick [22]

1986 No draft pick [23]

1987 No draft pick [24]

1988 No draft pick [25]

1989 No draft pick [26]

1990 No draft pick [27]

1991 17 Bobby Wilson DT Michigan State [28]

1992 4 Desmond Howard WR Michigan [29]

1993 19 Tom Carter DB Notre Dame

1994 3 Heath Shuler QB Tennessee

1995 4 Michael Westbrook WR Colorado

1996 30 Andre Johnson T Penn State [30] [31]

1997 17 Kenard Lang DE Miami (FL)

Wilson and Lang were guys that started (for some bad teams), but really would have been better off as spot players, and other than that really nothing out of those first one picks.

[RalphZero]

Jansen went down, and the Redskins had either Todd Wade, a journeyman tackle with starting experience, or Stephen Heyer, a diamond-in-the-rough rookie, to fill in. I'm not sure what else you would expect for replacing a starter.

And your criticism of Snyder is about three years old.

Janson plays left tackle. If they had a quality backup at left tackle, they would not have needed to move Samuels from right tackle to left tackle when Janson got injured. That messed up the chemistry of the O-Line.