A fundamental problem: We don't understand what kind of bad owner Snyder is

[Voice_of_Reason]

I think this idea that Gibbs controlled Snyder is the biggest misconception of the Snyder Era. From what I could tell, Gibbs bought into the Snyder approach more than any other coach or executive. We never had fewer draft picks or more big money free agent signings than during the Gibbs Era. And we are still paying for that in a way as he left the cupboard utterly bare when he left. I think Gibbs absolutely enabled the worst tendencies of Snyder. Because when a legend says the draft is over-rated, free agent talent is what we should go after, and the coaching staff should be as bloated as possible....well....I don't know what an owner "learns" from that.

I think the general point is that Snyder didn't tell Gibbs what to do, Gibbs had the ability to do anything he wanted, and Snyder would provide anything he wanted.

 

The moves that Gibbs made were Gibbs moves.  He was always a veteran first guy, and not a draft guy.  He was also in his 60's and not really in for a true, bottoms up re-build through the draft, type of thing.  

 

Ultimately, Gibbs did what Gibbs wanted to do.  Snyder enabled it. The issue is that what they really needed was a personnel/cap guy who Gibbs trusted who could help build the roster.  The guy they had was Vinny.  

 

What Gibbs SHOULD have done is boot Vinny out the door Marty Style and got somebody else.  But he didn't do that. 

[Voice_of_Reason]

It was thanksgiving 2012, Snyder and Robert stayed in Texas for a few days while the entire team went back to the DMV. That's awkward and sends a bad message to the other 52 guys who fought their guts out for you.

 

I don't think they hung out in 2013, but I could be wrong.

Ok, that's probably not ideal.  But did they hang out, or did Robert simply just skip the trip back go home, because he lives in Texas?  Save the trip back and forth? He's down there all the damn time anyway.

 

Here's the other thing, and this isn't going to be an extremely popular opinion: I don't think it matters.  In life, there are always guys who get treated a little differently.  Jimmy Johnson famously said that he treated everybody differently.  So what?  Emitt and Michael I. could get away with things nobody else could.  And they got special treatment.  But they brought it on the field, and nobody cared.

 

Snyder probably is closer to some guys on the team than others. The question is, so what? Pat Bowen was close to Elway.  Bob Kraft is close to Brady.  The Irsays were pretty close with Peyton.  It doesn't get reported, because it's a non-story, but you don't think that every now and then Brady and Bob Kraft have dinner together without the other coaches/players? You'd be crazy to think that didn't happen every now and then.  

 

But because it's Snyder, it's a problem.  Now, with Portis phoning in draft selections, that was a problem.  Having dinner with a few guys, probably not a big deal.  

 

My 2 cents.  

 

There is so much to critisize about Snyder, his style, his ownership, and his record, I tend to ignore some of the more mundane things.

 

He was a meddling idiot for years. Now, I think he's less of a meddling idiot, and more of a bumbling idiot, just not able to find the right people to do the job.

Injuries happen to everybody. Good organizations don't fall apart and fire everyone and start rebuilding again every time a season turns rocky.

But injuries hurt a team that doesn't have a consistent core of talent more than it does the consistent teams.

 

If the Packers lose a few guys, the entire system has been in place for decades, so the backups all know what the hell is going on.

 

If the 'Skins lose a couple of guys, everything is amplified, because the system is new to everybody.

[Sacks 'n' Stuff]

Gibbs let Snyder play football guy. That's a fact. There are quotes from Joe Gibbs himself.

 

“The three of us [Gibbs, Snyder and Cerrato] normally at the end of it try and come up with a final game plan for the draft....Dan’s philosophy is to be aggressive. We fall in the category of being more aggressive and it’s based on Dan being as aggressive as he is.”

 

“We talk a lot. We are back and forth all the time. We work down the hall from one another. I count on his opinion. He’s very instrumental on the draft, the salary-cap, free agency, strategy on how the team should be built.”

 

 

And reports from newspapers about our draft prep

 

"The highest-rated players are brought in for meetings with owner Dan Snyder, Gibbs and other organization members. A meal is arranged as a final effort to find any nugget of new information....Snyder, Gibbs and Cerrato also will meet during this period to review how well certain prospects might fit in the organization."

 

"Gibbs is holding several days of talks with owner Dan Snyder about the direction of the team. The coach said he’s “willing to talk about anything,” but he called “incorrect” any assumptions that he was open to hiring a general manager or that he would change the team’s aggressive approach in making offseason moves."

[StephenDavis]

Ok, that's probably not ideal.  But did they hang out, or did Robert simply just skip the trip back go home, because he lives in Texas?  Save the trip back and forth? He's down there all the damn time anyway.

 

Here's the other thing, and this isn't going to be an extremely popular opinion: I don't think it matters.  In life, there are always guys who get treated a little differently.  Jimmy Johnson famously said that he treated everybody differently.  So what?  Emitt and Michael I. could get away with things nobody else could.  And they got special treatment.  But they brought it on the field, and nobody cared.

 

Snyder probably is closer to some guys on the team than others. The question is, so what? Pat Bowen was close to Elway.  Bob Kraft is close to Brady.  The Irsays were pretty close with Peyton.  It doesn't get reported, because it's a non-story, but you don't think that every now and then Brady and Bob Kraft have dinner together without the other coaches/players? You'd be crazy to think that didn't happen every now and then.  

 

But because it's Snyder, it's a problem.  Now, with Portis phoning in draft selections, that was a problem.  Having dinner with a few guys, probably not a big deal.  

 

My 2 cents.  

 

There is so much to critisize about Snyder, his style, his ownership, and his record, I tend to ignore some of the more mundane things.

 

He was a meddling idiot for years. Now, I think he's less of a meddling idiot, and more of a bumbling idiot, just not able to find the right people to do the job.

But injuries hurt a team that doesn't have a consistent core of talent more than it does the consistent teams.

 

If the Packers lose a few guys, the entire system has been in place for decades, so the backups all know what the hell is going on.

 

If the 'Skins lose a couple of guys, everything is amplified, because the system is new to everybody.

You can treat guys differently.......IF you're winning. We won 7 games in a row. Those Cowboy teams won Lombardi Trophys. HUGE difference.

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

I think the general point is that Snyder didn't tell Gibbs what to do, Gibbs had the ability to do anything he wanted, and Snyder would provide anything he wanted.

 

 

The thing is: I think the only two coaches Snyder gave orders to were Norv (and Robiskie by extension) and Zorn. That's the whole point of this thread. Snyder is NOT the meddling Jerry Jones/Al Davis type.

 

His incompetence is its own unique animal.

 

Seriously...read the original post.

[Boss_Hogg]

As far as Dan being toxic, I think that's kindof crap.  And I don't think that Allen is a yes man.  

 

If Allen was a yes-man, then Haslett would have been fired at the end of the season, Byrd would probably have been a Redskin, and Gruden most likely would not have been the HC.  Those are all Allen moves.

 

I've said this before: I REALLY think Snyder is trying to do the right thing.  I just don't think he knows what that is.  Sure, he wants to make money, and I can't fault him for that. 

 

What he needs to do, but just hasn't grasped yet, is keep Allen as the President, and then have Allen hire a new set of eyes, outside of the organization GM to work for him. He wants to have somebody he trusts, and I get that too.  But Allen by himself is just not a personnel guy, and however talented our personnel guys are, they've been around too long.  Time for a change. 

 

Snyder is so toxic, he's nuclear. Just look at how he's handled the name debate.

[Sacks 'n' Stuff]

The thing is: I think the only two coaches Snyder gave orders to were Norv (and Robiskie by extension) and Zorn. That's the whole point of this thread. Snyder is NOT the meddling Jerry Jones/Al Davis type.

His incompetence is its own unique animal.

Seriously...read the original post.

He was involved in the draft and free agency for every coach up through Zorn... Except Marty... So he fired him.

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

Gibbs let Snyder play football guy. That's a fact. There are quotes from Joe Gibbs himself.

 

“The three of us [Gibbs, Snyder and Cerrato] normally at the end of it try and come up with a final game plan for the draft....Dan’s philosophy is to be aggressive. We fall in the category of being more aggressive and it’s based on Dan being as aggressive as he is.”

 

“We talk a lot. We are back and forth all the time. We work down the hall from one another. I count on his opinion. He’s very instrumental on the draft, the salary-cap, free agency, strategy on how the team should be built.”

 

And that's not Snyder being a meddler. If Gibbs had said "Stay out," I'm actually pretty sure that Snyder would have stayed out. Hell, he listened to Marty for a year and no one likes Marty Schottenheimer. He would have listened to Gibbs forever.

 

But that story really reflects the point of this thread. The Gibbs years are the high point of Snyder's tenure as owner. And we were probably more screwed up organizationally then than we are now. Gibbs was in charge but Snyder and Vinny had a say and we had sixteen assistant head coaches who all had a say. And sometimes the fans meeting Gibbs at the airport had a say, I think. It was weird.

He was involved in the draft and free agency for every coach up through Zorn... Except Marty... So he fired him.

 

I actually don't have a problem with that. EVERY owner is involved in the draft and free agency. The story is that Dan Rooney broke a tie between Cowher and the personell guy when the decision to draft Roethlisberger was made.

 

I have never ever advocated that Snyder have no say in the draft, free agency, or anything else. That's why I never advocate the "Hire a GM and give him the keys approach."

 

The problem is that we never develop anyone to act as that bridge between the coaching staff, front office, and Snyder. I don't think anyone in the organization trusts anyone else. THAT is Snyder's failure. There has never seemed to be a chain of command. There has never seemed to be any kind of real goal and certainly no plan to reach that goal.

 

The approach has been let's get drunk, fly to Denver, and somehow win football games by doing that.

I actually hate this kind of nonsense, but "The Patriot Way" is a thing even if it's a bunch of bull****. Seattle certainly has an organizational philosophy. The Steelers have done things the exact same way seemingly since the 60s. Baltimore has a coherent plan - which apparently had no chapter on how to handle domestic violence, but such is life.

 

What is "The Redskins Way?" What kind of players do we draft? What is the team's culture?

 

Is it the militarized Patriot system? The weird family Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Giants thing? The paranoid San Francisco culture? The lasseiz faire "Everyone is a star" Dallas approach? The rah-rah Seattle thing?

 

(Dallas is often a disaster, but it's a disaster by exquisite design, I think. I give them credit for that).

[Boss_Hogg]

Ok, that's probably not ideal.  But did they hang out, or did Robert simply just skip the trip back go home, because he lives in Texas?  Save the trip back and forth? He's down there all the damn time anyway.

 

Here's the other thing, and this isn't going to be an extremely popular opinion: I don't think it matters.  In life, there are always guys who get treated a little differently.  Jimmy Johnson famously said that he treated everybody differently.  So what?  Emitt and Michael I. could get away with things nobody else could.  And they got special treatment.  But they brought it on the field, and nobody cared.

 

Snyder probably is closer to some guys on the team than others. The question is, so what? Pat Bowen was close to Elway.  Bob Kraft is close to Brady.  The Irsays were pretty close with Peyton.  It doesn't get reported, because it's a non-story, but you don't think that every now and then Brady and Bob Kraft have dinner together without the other coaches/players? You'd be crazy to think that didn't happen every now and then.  

 

But because it's Snyder, it's a problem.  Now, with Portis phoning in draft selections, that was a problem.  Having dinner with a few guys, probably not a big deal.  

 

Rob had only played 12 games with the Redskins before Snyder wanted to hang out at the Sizzler.

 

Aikman, Brady, Elway have won superbowls and MVPs - big difference.

[StephenDavis]

Snyder is so toxic, he's nuclear. Just look at how he's handled the name debate.

Snyder definitely has not handled the name debate well. As Redskin fans I believe we can all appreciate his firm stand, but he's the owner and needs to play his role as owner and not as a fan. That's the ultimate problem with Snyder. He's a rich fan who has no idea what he's doing. Spitting on the floor in AZ in disgust after that challenged fumble wasn't overturned? Sure I would have done it but I'm not the owner.

[Sacks 'n' Stuff]

Snyder was more than just a tie breaker. He was picking the free agents! He was drafting the friggin' players!!! The guy never even played Pop Warner football. The next random person you come across at work is likely to be more qualified than Lil Danny is and he somehow felt like he should be handling evaluation and analysis of NFL talent for a decade?!?!?!?!? Gibbs should have never even been in position where he had to Tell Danny to get out (which I guess he wouldn't do, I suppose because he comes from that generation that deferred to authority like bosses). 

[Boss_Hogg]

The conversations I had with #Redskins owner Dan Snyder when I played there,were like talking to fantasy league owner. He has no clue
— Tony Banks (@tonybanks12) December 9, 2013

 

To be fair, neither did Tony...but the point remains.

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

Well, yes, there's a big difference between being "involved in the draft" and picking players. Being involved means sitting in on high level meetings, breaking ties, and agreeing that "Next year, we really need to bolster our interior line" play instead of focussing on skill positions or whatever.

 

I don't think Dan needs to be locked in a broom closet.

[gortiz]

LKB, read your entire post and I wholeheartedly agree ... I saw this quote the other day and it just made me sad and I've never really said this saying before and really meant it, but I really, really, mean this ...

 

Bless his heart ... but I after reading this, it just confirmed how he really does not get it ... 

 

“I said that I think the lower bowl sections are going to want to rock the stadium like the old days,” referring to the sections of RFK that bounce around like a rickety carnival ride even at sparsely attended DC United soccer games. Hopefully Snyder (or whoever winds up paying for a new stadium) will invest in upgraded struts and hydraulics.

 

 

http://www.washingtonian.com/blogs/capitalcomment/sports/dan-snyder-says-hes-working-on-designing-a-new-football-stadium.php

 

those stands bouncing was organic, it was also part of an era gone, it was a great, but it's over. You can't reproduce that ... you can't buy our love. Jesus. 

 

 

[DC9]

You want a vision... give me a team that can stay healthy for the majority of the season.

 

Injuries happen in football... but last year we were uncharacteristically healthy throughout most of the 16 games.

[knighthonor]

I still don't understand how this is all his fault. Yeah the defense and ST underperformed, and the Oline been crappy for a decade now, but that doesn't mean he is to blame for that.

[TD_washingtonredskins]

I think the general point is that Snyder didn't tell Gibbs what to do, Gibbs had the ability to do anything he wanted, and Snyder would provide anything he wanted.

 

The moves that Gibbs made were Gibbs moves.  He was always a veteran first guy, and not a draft guy.  He was also in his 60's and not really in for a true, bottoms up re-build through the draft, type of thing.  

 

Ultimately, Gibbs did what Gibbs wanted to do.  Snyder enabled it. The issue is that what they really needed was a personnel/cap guy who Gibbs trusted who could help build the roster.  The guy they had was Vinny.  

 

What Gibbs SHOULD have done is boot Vinny out the door Marty Style and got somebody else.  But he didn't do that. 

 

Honestly, just like Maximus planned to do in Gladiator, what Gibbs should have done once he was given full control was:

 

- Immediately fired himself as head coach

- Insisted on a 10-year contract extension as Team President

- Fired Cerrato and hired a true GM

- Worked with that GM to hire a young, dynamic coaching staff

- Given Snyder all of his game film from the 1980s to keep him occupied for a couple years while we built the organization the right way

 

What Gibbs can do (other than coach, which he does very well too) is run an organization and identify the right people. He would have been the perfect figurehead to oversee a functional and productive franchise over the past decade. 

[gortiz]

Snyder is so toxic, he's nuclear. Just look at how he's handled the name debate.

 Nothing he does is ever done stoically.  

 

• Sending Coles the flat screen,
• the vanilla ice cream incident,
• the yelling "when you play physical you win" in the locker room,
• Marty,
• relationship with Lavar,
• relationship with Clinton,
• relationship with Robert,
• modeling the sneakers,
• and yes, I'll pin the salary cap pentaly on him, I will. it was on his watch. 

[TD_washingtonredskins]

The conversations I had with #Redskins owner Dan Snyder when I played there,were like talking to fantasy league owner. He has no clue

— Tony Banks (@tonybanks12) December 9, 2013

 

To be fair, neither did Tony...but the point remains.

 

Give him credit...Tony Banks had that one audible he was permitted to use memorized to the T. 

[abdcskins]

Nothing he does is ever done stoically.

• Sending Coles the flat screen,
• the vanilla ice cream incident,
• the yelling "when you play physical you win" in the locker room,
• Marty,
• relationship with Lavar,
• relationship with Clinton,
• relationship with Robert,
• modeling the sneakers,
• and yes, I'll pin the salary cap pentaly on him, I will. it was on his watch.

I'd love to know the story behind some of these. Yelling when you play physical you win? What's the source for that? Modeling the sneakers? What does that refer to? Sending Coles the flat screen?

I don't even know what my stance is regarding Snyder. He wants to win obviously. I honestly just don't know what his level of involvement is anymore with the team management and if he still meddles with the coaching.

*edit* Thank you for this post. I learned a lot about Snyder today.

[Peregrine]

I would agree.

 

Dan Snyder knows nothing about football, and he doesnt know how to hire someone who does.  The problem with the Redskins is, has been, and continues to be people are hired based on a buddy buddy name system.  Bruce Allen was hired because his dad was famous with the Redskins.  Then, Gruden was hired because he had ties to Allen at the Bucs.  Haslett was kept on because he had ties to Gruden in the AFL.  Well gosh, everybody just knows everybody, so I guess parties are great.  Meanwhile, this franchise sucks.  

 

Until the day that Dan Snyder gets really lucky with the right hire, when he tries to mess it up but somehow gets a guy who knows football, and has NO RELATION to the Redskins franchise, this franchise will be terrible.  Bruce Allen is a terrible GM, and he is the guy who has made these bad football moves.  Any guy off the street has seen for years our problems are at the offensive line, and defensive secondary, and yet we get a high priced receiver and put young QB's in a position to fail behind a heavy pass rush.  RG3 is a better QB than Russel Wilson, but no one will ever know because Seattle knows how to develop a young QB and take the pressure off of him.

[Destino]

 

I don't even know what my stance is regarding Snyder.  He wants to win obviously. 

Which NFL owners want to lose?

[Sacks 'n' Stuff]

He wants to win obviously.

I want curly blonde hair, but it ain't happening.

[abdcskins]

Which NFL owners want to lose?

 

I dunno, good point.  I guess all I meant was that he comes off as doing all he can, at least financially, to win.  He wants the best players and will spend (sometimes stupidly overspend) on premium players and coaches.

[Boss_Hogg]

I have two personal Dan Snyder encounters. My kids went to a fabulous school in Maryland. We had been part of that community for years when a horrible thing happened. Dan Snyder enrolled his daughter and became a fellow parent at that school. He demanded 2 rules when he enrolled his child: 1. The other parents weren’t allowed to approach the "Big Man" and, 2. when we were in a conversation with him we were to address him as Mr Snyder (Mr Snyder my ass. Money doesn’t buy you respect. Respect is earned).

 

Now I’ll tell you that Danny boy wasn’t the most famous parent in the school nor was he the wealthiest. We had Presidential nephews and nieces, Ambassadors kids, and more than 1 Forbes 500 parents. Bill Marriott, CEO of Marriott had multiple grandchildren in the school. During parent visiting days, Bill was one of us. Sitting on the floor with the kids and the parents. Insecure and supercilious Dan would be in the back of the room, in his blue suit, white shirt, red tie, big shot crossed arms stance, and chauffeur with the car running in the fire lane of the school. Danny didn’t fit in, he was not compatible with our culture and fortunately he opted out after 1 year. Thanks Danny!

 

http://drivenforward.com/blog/dan-snyders-redskin-toxic-culture