Bruce Allen, Scot McCloughlan, Jay Gruden, and all that stuff like that there

[DC Lumber Co.]

On 8/21/2017 at 8:51 AM, Skinsinparadise said:

Also, I detect in some of your pro-Bruce rhetoric, you really like the dude a lot and are excited about him as an individual or maybe its all about Jay.  Look I spent 2 hours with Scot, it to this day was my coolest football experience I had by a mile.  We got into a lot.  It was very cool.  I met Bruce for a few minutes, he seemed like a cool guy.   Ditto Jay.  My fandom though on any of these guys doesn't exceed the team.    To me is still about the structure. 

 

My take has always been more pro-Jay than Bruce. I'm mainly just arguing against the notion that since Scot is gone we reverted back to Vinny or something. The positive impact Bruce made prior to Scots arrival were too quickly forgotten for me and just think he deserves more benefit of the doubt than he gets. He ran a draft in between Mike and Scot that was pretty damn good so I think hes capable of doing so again.

 

And the "final say" situations happen way less often than people make it seem. Crowder is the only example we know of, and have no idea if the other option would have panned out as well. And if we miss on one player where Doug/Bruce side with the wrong coach/scouts choice once in a while, your draft should be solid enough otherwise that it shouldn't be a huge deal.

[goskins10]

6 hours ago, DC Lumber Co. said:

 

My take has always been more pro-Jay than Bruce. I'm mainly just arguing against the notion that since Scot is gone we reverted back to Vinny or something. The positive impact Bruce made prior to Scots arrival were too quickly forgotten for me and just think he deserves more benefit of the doubt than he gets. He ran a draft in between Mike and Scot that was pretty damn good so I think hes capable of doing so again.

 

And the "final say" situations happen way less often than people make it seem. Crowder is the only example we know of, and have no idea if the other option would have panned out as well. And if we miss on one player where Doug/Bruce side with the wrong coach/scouts choice once in a while, your draft should be solid enough otherwise that it shouldn't be a huge deal.

 

First, I admire your compassion and optimism. I mean that genuinely. I have to admit not signing Kirk to a LTD took a hit on my enthusiasm. I didn't even watch the GB and really didn't care. Now it is pre-season which I have never been a big fan of. But I still always watched as I was hungry for Redskins football. Maybe the season will change that.

 

But back to the point. It's not just about missing a draft choice here or there. It's the construction of a roster. A true football personnel guy looks at things more holistically. So it's also the guys on the back end of the roster, something Scot did not get enough credit for from some. It's the day to day personnel decisions.

 

I get Bruce is not an idiot. And I agree he does not get enough credit for the 2014 draft which has actually turned out pretty well. I have made that point myself before. But for him it all seems to be about winning the negotiation. A true personnel guy will fall on the money sword a few times where it's important. Now I am not advocating we go back to the Vinnie days where they totally over pay aging stars like it's fantasy football. But from time to time you need to step up.

 

The admittedly unfair thing here is had he signed Kirk to a LTD I would have a completely different outlook. But they needed to do one thing for the fans (meaning Bruce and Dan). Just one thing that could have really made the fans feel great about the team and the organization. Just this one thing to show they really care about the fans. But they just could not get past their egos to get it done. They are right and the rest of the ****ing world is wrong. It's exhausting and honestly I am just tired of caring and kind numb. I will use that energy elsewhere for now. Again, the season may change that. Hopefully so. This feels really odd after 48 yrs of never being able to get enough Redskins football.

 

 

[Darrell Green Fan]

On ‎8‎/‎20‎/‎2017 at 8:31 PM, DC Lumber Co. said:

 

It really does irk me that Doug Williams is being written off so easily. If he has ANY say in the draft it means we are screwed? Thats a little harsh man. Sure, we cant say with certainty the level that Doug Williams contributed to the scouting process of college or pro talent since his arrival, but everything I've read suggests he contributed much more than you're giving him credit for. I'd also argue that he actually has proven himself in multiple arenas and isn't the talentless, under-qualified idiot he is being made out to be.

 

 

 

 

As my post clearly indicated Doug Williams simply does not have the resume that would lead me to believe he can be a top level talent evaluator.  Another poster pointed out that I left out the one year he ran the Buc draft. Yeah that was to his benefit.  Go look up the 2009  Tampa Bay draft and get back with me.

 

I'm not being mean, I love Doug Williams.  But I'm being totally fair and I never called him an idiot.  He has simply not proven that he is a talent evaluator that will be better than his competitors. He simply has not. You seem to think being a Super Bowl winning QB means anything when it comes to picking players. It does not.

 

 

[Darrell Green Fan]

Here guys let me save you the trouble of looking up the only draft Doug Williams was in charge of in 2009.

 

1st:  Josh Freemans.  Out of football after a few promising early years.

3rd:  Roy Miller DL:  5 unproductive years, out of football since 2013

4th  Kyle Moore DL:  4 unproductive years, out of football since 2012

5th  : Xavier Fulton, OL:  4 NFL teams gave him a shot, never made it.  Currently playing in Canada

7th  EJ Biggers.  Bounced around several teams but was never any good.

 

 

As you can see the one draft Doug ran was a complete wash out, not one player had any impact what so ever.

 

 

 

[BatteredFanSyndrome]

8 hours ago, DC Lumber Co. said:

 

 

When you apply for a job, do you list your entry level experience first or most recent experience? Same applies here. You're kind of ignoring his experience as a NFL executive/personnel guy and making it seem like he went from player/college coach straight to his role now for the Skins. He has a lot more experience than that.

 

His experience as a SB winning QB and college head coach are more bonus resume bullet points here

His recent experience is less than impressive, and the primary reason why folks feel the need to bring up Super Bowl wins and Grambling coaching history.  We didn't have to promote Doug to keep him because there are no other suitors vying for his services.  He's a likable guy with a Super Bowl ring for this franchise that has a friendship with Bruce Allen, whose pitch for the gig was that this team doesn't really need a GM.  All that says a lot more about his promotion than anything on his resume related to player personnel.

 

And I'll say it again, it's not fun having to throw shade on Doug Williams.  He came in and won the first Super Bowl I can remember watching as a kid.  I have no issue with him or Bruce having prominent roles in the organization, I'd just prefer they leave player personnel up to those that have dedicated their entire life to it and bring with them a proven track record of success.

 

 

 

[Skinsinparadise]

19 hours ago, DC Lumber Co. said:

 

My take has always been more pro-Jay than Bruce. I'm mainly just arguing against the notion that since Scot is gone we reverted back to Vinny or something. The positive impact Bruce made prior to Scots arrival were too quickly forgotten for me and just think he deserves more benefit of the doubt than he gets. He ran a draft in between Mike and Scot that was pretty damn good so I think hes capable of doing so again.

 

And the "final say" situations happen way less often than people make it seem. Crowder is the only example we know of, and have no idea if the other option would have panned out as well. And if we miss on one player where Doug/Bruce side with the wrong coach/scouts choice once in a while, your draft should be solid enough otherwise that it shouldn't be a huge deal.

 

Whether the people who were under Bruce with the Bucs who made the personnel decisions or ditto the Redskins were good or not -- that's really IMO the discussion at hand since they are the ones making the recommendations and IMO its an odd discussion versus a normal one and the oddness of it is the crux of my point.  When you talk for example Seattle, the question is how good is John Schneider at his job.  He's not a figurehead where the point about him is how good are the people he hires and stays out of their way or not or how does he pull his favorite opinion from people in the building who know much more about football than he does.   That same discussion pertains to most of the rest of the NFL's FOs.   Schneider, the guy actually making the call has the rep in that building to be the smartest football guy. That's how it generally works.

 

It would be like my neighbor asking me, hey who do you like as an electrician.  And I tell him, I don't really have one directly but I hire this guy who comes to my house, we talk and have coffee and he brings another dude with him and he does the work.  It's just odd.    And in Bruce's case judging by what we've heard about the Kirk contract, he referees between multiple opinions so he does have some say in that regard.   You can talk up Jay's power.   But the bottom line is if you buy into Mike Jones' narrative on Kirk, Jay's take wasn't heeded to from Bruce.   We read multiple accounts of the building being divided on Kirk -- Jay supposedly was the guy in the lets get the deal done camp.  Jay didn't win that argument.    So if Bruce isn't running with Jay's take on QB (his speciality), not sure where the confidence is that Jay's say will be the overriding one on other spots. 

 

Getting into the discussion as for how good Bruce is at hiring people or working with them and supposedly getting out of the way.  Really is off topic, but the idea that the dude is a really really good GM is questionable at best at least reputation wise.  Buc fans didn't seem to love the dude when he ultimately got canned there.

https://www.bucsnation.com/2012/3/10/2859849/bruce-allen-worst-gm-in-football

In his defense though, I don't think he was making the calls.  But again that's a running theme with him.  The GM who isn't a personnel guy.  Nothing personal with me against Bruce.  I just don't want ANY guy that fits that profile.  

 

In another post you seemed to imply that people forget all the glow about what we felt about Bruce before the Scot hire. That is, if I understood your point right.  If so, I think you are forgetting what people felt after 2014.  Any afterglow of hey Vinny is gone was over at least in terms of fans fist pumping that we got Bruce in the fold.  Grant Paulsen questioned Bruce in that infamous post season press conference, with something to the effect of hey why not a traditional GM for once?  Bruce goes well we had Casserly years back.  Paulsen said something to the effect that yeah Bruce but that was long ago.  The sentiment for a chunk of fans then, as I recall it, (I was among those fans) at the time was lets get a real traditional GM for a change.  Then it happened with Scot!  It was great.  It wasn't that Scot just joined an operation that we already liked a lot and now we are forgetting about -- where Scot just added to the good feelings that already existed.   Far from it. The feeling was the ship was sinking.  

 

As for Bruce versus Vinny, its irrelevant to the point.  But I'll humor it for entertainment reasons.  Both of them were here while really dumb trades happened that involved giving up high draft picks.  Both of them had a bunch of FA lemon signings.  Though who doesn't?  So no biggie there.  Both has up and down drafts, some good, some bad.  Yes, Bruce is by a mile the smarter fiscal guy and I'd love it if he just stayed in that lane but that doesn't seem to be what he wants to do at least in the moment.  I'd take Bruce over Vinny.  However, If Bruce is the guy who can't lock in his franchise QB (unlike every other team on the planet) he in my book would be easily worse than Vinny.  It really to me comes down at this point to Kirk to me.  And I think I'm far from alone in that take.  As Ross Tucker said months back (in his optimsm that a Kirk contract would happen), Bruce doesn't want his legacy to be losing the only franchise QB this team has developed in decades, so he won't.  I guess that remains to be seen.

[JSSkinz]

8 hours ago, Darrell Green Fan said:

Here guys let me save you the trouble of looking up the only draft Doug Williams was in charge of in 2009.

 

1st:  Josh Freemans.  Out of football after a few promising early years.

3rd:  Roy Miller DL:  5 unproductive years, out of football since 2013

4th  Kyle Moore DL:  4 unproductive years, out of football since 2012

5th  : Xavier Fulton, OL:  4 NFL teams gave him a shot, never made it.  Currently playing in Canada

7th  EJ Biggers.  Bounced around several teams but was never any good.

 

 

As you can see the one draft Doug ran was a complete wash out, not one player had any impact what so ever.

 

 

 

He was director of scouting that year, show me something that says he was responsible for those picks and not the GM.

 

 

[JSSkinz]

Scot McCloughan on Kirk Cousins’s contract: ‘We kind of messed up’

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/dc-sports-bog/wp/2017/08/22/scot-mccloughan-on-kirk-cousinss-contract-we-kind-of-messed-up/?tid=sm_tw_ps&utm_term=.697ebdec0113

 

 

 

[Califan007 The Constipated]

OMG...I went to click on the last page of the thread and accidentally clicked on page 4 instead...it took me about a minute and a half to realize all the posts I was reading were from March 7th lol...

[BatteredFanSyndrome]

2 minutes ago, Califan007 said:

OMG...I went to click on the last page of the thread and accidentally clicked on page 4 instead...it took me about a minute and a half to realize all the posts I was reading were from March 7th lol...

I've made the same mistake twice...

[Califan007 The Constipated]

10 minutes ago, BatteredFanSyndrome said:

I've made the same mistake twice...

 

It's scary how little things have changed lol...

[Darrell Green Fan]

1 hour ago, jschuck12001 said:

He was director of scouting that year, show me something that says he was responsible for those picks and not the GM.

 

 

 

My post was simply a response to a poster who pointed out that I had omitted this year when I said he did not have the experience.  Sorry if it was misleading, I'm just showing the results of that year that he had major input.  Again he has absolutely nothing in his history that tells us he is better at picking out players than the New York Giants are. And that remains the point.

 

 

[dyst]

If Scott had full authority over the previous two drafts then it's lookings pretty bad. The guy worked miracles with two other franchises in a short amount of time but stunk it up here. Just our luck. And I am/was a fan of his.

[DM72]

18 minutes ago, dyst said:

If Scott had full authority over the previous two drafts then it's lookings pretty bad. The guy worked miracles with two other franchises in a short amount of time but stunk it up here. Just our luck. And I am/was a fan of his.

 

That might be a misconception. Just how much did Scott contribute to the success of SF and Seattle? I've heard different stories.

[justice98]

Shanahan drafting Kirk Cousins prevented the Scot M era from essentially being a miserable failure.

[BatteredFanSyndrome]

At this point it's absolutely looking really bad from a high draft pick standpoint.  If Doctson can get right and ends up playing to his potential, that changes things.  Scot has done a better job with later picks, UDFA, and guys off the street.  Free agency, I'm somewhere in the middle and the performance of Swearinger, and in particular -the Mc's will tell us all we need to know.

 

I still don't think any of this can be used as evidence that Bruce did the right thing with canning him.  First off, Bruce is the one that hired him in the first place, lied to the world about his responsibilities, and then fired him in an ugly fashion.  At this point, Bruce could have probably won some points with the fanbase if he actually came out and said it was performance related due to some whiffs at the top of the drafts.  The cherry on top is that there was no expansive search for his replacement and the FO went back to the old way of buddy system business.

[Jacoby66forHOF]

Jay Gruden's role in player personnel should not be discounted in the firing of McClou.  John Keim hinted at Gruden's influence of the roster around the time the McClou situation started heating up.  How it has grown since McClou was hired then Gruden gets an extension right around the time McClou gets fired.  Then there was the comment Gruden made at the end of last season in regards to the 1st round picks made by McClou:

 

Quote

"We’re getting there, but we’ve had, what, two first-round picks since I’ve been here? One of them hasn’t played a down, or played one game, and the other one is a guard," he said. "We have got to utilize our picks."

 

http://www.csnmidatlantic.com/washington-redskins/injured-player-and-guard-jay-gruden-wants-more-out-1st-round-picks

 

A month or so after this leaks and rumors about McClou started.  I don't think its a coincidence.  A power struggle between Gruden and McClou came to a head and Allen backed his fellow member of the Tampa Bay Mafia, Jay Gruden.  

[justice98]

I take it Scot hasnt chimed in on Cravens yet? He's been pretty chatty the last month or so about some of his failed moves.  He certainly didnt shy away from talking about Matt Jones.

[BatteredFanSyndrome]

It's not crazy talk, given the timing and all that.

 

But when Jay was asked about Scot's departure, he went out of his way to say that a decision was made that didn't have to be made.  It didn't exactly come across as a decision that he was happy about.

[TimmySmith]

41 minutes ago, Jacoby66forHOF said:

A month or so after this leaks and rumors about McClou started.  I don't think its a coincidence.  A power struggle between Gruden and McClou came to a head and Allen backed his fellow member of the Tampa Bay Mafia, Jay Gruden.  

Had nothing to do with any mafia, you always back the coach, unless you want to fire him.  Same thing happened with Norv/Charlie.  Skins lost that one.  Skins won this one, Scot had too many warts to take his side. 

[Jacoby66forHOF]

Just now, TimmySmith said:

Had nothing to do with any mafia, you always back the coach, unless you want to fire him.  Same thing happened with Norv/Charlie.  Skins lost that one.  Skins won this one, Scot had too many warts to take his side. 

 

Allen took a chance hiring McClou, and his warts, so that wasn't necessarily an always back the coach situation, IMO.  

[TimmySmith]

2 minutes ago, Jacoby66forHOF said:

Allen took a chance hiring McClou, and his warts, so that wasn't necessarily an always back the coach situation, IMO.  

IF Gruden and Scot did not get along, and IF it was to the point that one had to go, then it was Scot who had to go. I don't see where there can be any debate in this.

[skins4eva]

Bold prediction: I think this will be Gruden's last year.  He has all the hallmarks of a good coordinator who was promoted one level above his competence.  

[Voice_of_Reason]

2 hours ago, BatteredFanSyndrome said:

At this point it's absolutely looking really bad from a high draft pick standpoint.  If Doctson can get right and ends up playing to his potential, that changes things.  Scot has done a better job with later picks, UDFA, and guys off the street.  Free agency, I'm somewhere in the middle and the performance of Swearinger, and in particular -the Mc's will tell us all we need to know.

I know folks like to bash the Sherff pick, but I think Scot knew that he had to get the best damn OL available with his first pick, because at that time, the 'Skins had exactly 1 OL that they thought could play: Williams.  Moses didn't start and was hurt, Long handn't played yet (I don't think), and Luavao is eh.  He knew that if he got the best OL he could with the pick, that player would play SOMEWHERE on the line, and start from day 1.  

 

They got REALLY lucky that Moses turned out to be good, and Long has contributed.  But I don't knock the pick.  

 

But that said: 2015: Sherff (Starter), Preston Smith (Contributor), Matt Jones (Cut), Jamison Crowder (Stud), Arie Kouandjo (Cut), Spaight (Contributor) Jarrett (Sadly injured), Tevin Mitchel (Cut), Evan Spencer (Cut), Austin Reiter (Cut)

 

So 2015 draft has 2 starters, 2 contributors, and thats it.

 

2016: Doctson (progressing nicely to be the new version of the player we do not mention), Cravens (gone for now), Fuller (contributor), Ionnidis (Contributor), Sudfeld (Cut), Daniels (cut), Marshal (Cut).

 

So, already, just 1 year in, we're down to only Doctson, Cravens, Fuller and Ioannidis on the roster.  1 has left the team, the other is oft injurred, 2 are contributors.

 

Overall, could be a lot worse, but could be a lot better.  

 

[BravesontheWarpath2]

2 hours ago, BatteredFanSyndrome said:

I still don't think any of this can be used as evidence that Bruce did the right thing with canning him.  First off, Bruce is the one that hired him in the first place, lied to the world about his responsibilities, and then fired him in an ugly fashion.  At this point, Bruce could have probably won some points with the fanbase if he actually came out and said it was performance related due to some whiffs at the top of the drafts.  The cherry on top is that there was no expansive search for his replacement and the FO went back to the old way of buddy system business.

 

This is really important. There is certainly a debate to be had about the overall success of Scot's draft (although I still think its a little too early to make any definitive statements on the matter), but there's no question that his dismissal was handled poorly. While there still would have been vitriol from the fanbase if Bruce had come out and said "look, we just don't think Scot's doing a very good job, so we're letting him go", I'd at least respect the way they handled it.

 

The more things change, the more they stay the same. This is Dan's team, with Bruce operating as an extension of him, and the Redskins are going to continue to operate in this dictatorial fashion for as long as Dan is at the helm.