Do we, as Fans need to admit we have a problem?

[Destino]

1 hour ago, Veretax said:

We need to heal, we need to get back to loving the franchise that represents our hopes and dreams, and we need to give them a chance to earn our trust on the field, and it may take more than a year to do it.   

What if the team just starts winning a bunch of games every year. Let’s say 10 or 11 games. I bet that would go a long way to healing us. 

[KDawg]

8 minutes ago, Renegade7 said:

 

Honestly,  that wasn't my takeaway from your single line post in this thread.

 

I don't think it's a big deal, but I don't agree we're more or less compared to other fan bases with what we jus saw here this week alone.

 

It took us three years to get comfortable calling out Chase Young effort, it took less then 3 months for 49ers fans to get sick of it and say **** we'd probably never say like potentially benching him for the super bowl.

 

Some fan bases have notorious reputations, ours has been brutally eroded and gunshot over the years.  Many more then I was expecting went from "Anything but Snyder" to "OMG, it's like Snyder again" like they were recovering from codependency or something.

 

Yes, our fan base needs helping having lost two generations in a row and a level of reassurance that frankly only results can rectify.  Seeing so many folks ready for this to fail already is depressing, that level of disappointment around Ben Johnson was clearly too soon for some.

I think the issue is your expectations for humans.

 

Go visit some of these team’s subreddits. 
 

The Patriot fans are acting like they haven’t won in ages at times. 
 

Every fan base says things that are the result of coping with their own traumas. We had Snyder. He was a trauma source. But so many fanbases have trauma sources. 
 

You notice it more here because you’re on this forum. But it’s not just a Washington thing. It’s a human thing.

 

I don’t think it’s fair to equate our fanbase not liking moves to our fanbase specifically have a problem… human beings are inherently distrusting on moves they don’t understand or like. 
 

I think it’s fairly reductive and short sighted to believe that we are unique in this.

 

I am very meh on Quinn. Would hate Kelly. That’s not my trauma talking. That’s just my opinion. Of course, there are others who are much more casual football fans that hate it because they never really followed it to begin with and thinking the worst is just what they do. 
 

But every fanbase has clueless folks. 
 

The people saying “OMG ITS SNYDER ALL OVER” are not prevalent. A lot of the people I see here doing it are mostly joking. Some are serious but those are folks that are generally not people we should be taking all that seriously anyways. 
 

But seeing issues with decisions the new regime makes isn’t a qualifier for our fanbase having to commit to a 12 step program.
 

 

[Die Hard]

11 hours ago, Veretax said:

Kevin Sheehan pointed out this week that we are a fanbase with severe trauma response when things don't make sense to us.  A lot of people are completey disheveled over the Quinn hire, and I laugh at this, because who among any of the Head coaches that were hired, were actually turning THIS debacle of a roster around in one season? I think Adam Peters is the right person for this rebuild, we needed him, like bread needs a little love to dress it up before being munched on. I think we as fans, all need to look in the mirror.  We didn't make our franchise this way, we are not responsible for its current condition. 

But we are responsible. We are responsible for how we allow ourselves to react, and how we allow the current state of the team to impact us mentally and emotionally.  I am as guilty as any of us, frankly, and I had to step away because I literally could not support cognitive dissonance on trying to support this squad while Snyder was still here any longer.  I watched from a far and said little, I feel a bit more whole today, because whether Harris will be a great owner or not, at least we have hope of having people who know football making decisions.

So while we remember that, let's consider this HC hire.  Were we really thinking we were going to land a HC, a top QB, and then its on like donkey kong?  Now I won't be surprised if we manage to win the East this year, as insane as that sounds coming out of my mouth, ALl three of our rivals are having internal strife and discord, maybe they fix it before we see them in FedEx, but a few things fixed, and this team is in the hunt for sure.  But let's be real, are we going to be perenial contenders, just plugging a couple of holes and moving forward?

No way.  

I wrote a lengthy comment on a YT channel earlier, and I had to admit, it may be even worse than we think it is.   

This team was historically, historically bad.  Make sure you get this.  They weren't just Historically bad the last few years, but they were so historically bad, that they set negative records for the Franchise predating Joe Gibbs 1 I believe.   How bad?

The 2023 Commanders have allowed the most points in a season in franchise history, with 480 points. 
https://commanderswire.usatoday.com/2024/01/03/washington-commanders-have-allowed-the-most-points-in-franchise-history-in-2023-nfl-season/#:~:text=After the Commanders allowed 27,when Washington allowed 478 points.

Sam Howell was sacked 65 times!  That's 16 more than Trent Green and Norm Sneed in 98/61!
Brian Robinson, our lead RB, had 15 Games he started, he had 178 attempts, and only 733 yards, with 5 Touchdowns.  For the lead back, that's the wost performance since:
1980 (but between Wilbur Jackson, and Clarence Harmon, we had 1100 yds) Going back this would compare to the 1976 Riuggins Season, when he had only 572 Yards but (14 games, I'd say its worse.)
1972, The lead back had 567 yards in 14 carries also.
That's How TERRIBLE our run game was.  Now as many will point out how many attempts did we have?

https://www.espn.com/nfl/team/stats/_/name/wsh/washington-commanders 
ESPN has us listed with team rushing total of 1,592 yards, but it includes a 2 yard run from Logan THomas, a Tress Way 'run' that went nowhere. A dyanmi brown one.  Sam howell had 263 yards rushing, 2 short of Antonio Gibson!, Rodriguez had 247, and no combination of any of the top 4 rushers is close to 1K.  Statistically BAD

The team had 39 Sacks

We needed a 17th game to Get Terry Mac to 1K yards receiving!  And the shocker to me is that puts him at 18th among WRs with 14 or more games started.   He was only targeted 132, times, that's more than Pierre Garcon in 2016 and COoley in 2008.

He had only 4 TDs this year.  which somehow, still qualifies him as 27th among Wide Receivers with 14 or more games started.

The next wr ws Samuel: with 613 yards and 4 TDs
Logan thomas? 496 yds and 4 TDs.
Jahan Dotson? 518 yds and 4 TDs

To say we were impotent on offense for much of the year would be underselling it especially in the Passing Game.

So what about that Defense?

We were DEAD last in total team defense giving up an obscene 6,612 yards to or opponents. and what's telling is only 3 other teams had to play more offensive plays on Defense:
We were also next to dead last in yards per play (5.9, to cincy's 6.0, denvers, 5.8, and Zona's 5.7, even the Hapless Giants were better than us with 5.6 yards per play.
Seattle with 1147, and Indy with 1137 (we were 1117)

We were the Tenth worse in takeways with a yawning, 18, tied with Phily, Green Bay, and New England  (Zona, KC, Atlanta, LA Rams, Titans, and Panthers all had fewer, the panthers only had 11. just wow) The point is, hardly one turnover a game.

We were 13th in Fumbles lost with 10.  
We were third in 1st Downs allowed and could not get off the field with 364 Only ahed of Arizona and Seattle, (369/380)
We were 7th in Completions allowed with 396 with only Jax, Tampa, Chicago, 49ers, Eagles, and Vikings allowing more. I was a bit surprised Eagles, and 49ers were higher than us on this one)
We were dead last in Passing yards allowed with 4457, nearly a 150 above the Eagles !.  
We were dead last in passing TDs allowed with 39 (4 more than Philly!)


Surprisingly we only threw 8 Interceptions.  That's actually 27th in INTs thrown.  Hard to know if that's a deceptive stats given the number of Sacks Sam and Jacoby Suffered combined.  (unles I'm miss reading this Interception's thrown stat, and its the oppositions passes being intercepted in which case that puts us at 6th?.)
We were 2nd worst in 7.0 Yards per pass completed allowed.

And I had thought our Rushing D was actually decent, I was wrong, we were 6th worse giving up 2155 yards. (only the packers (2181), Giants (2251), Broncos (2331), Seahawks (2352), Cards (2434) had more.
We were 11th worse in Rushing TDs given up with 11.

pro football reference's advanced team defense has us as 7th worst in Total Air Yards per completion with 2424, 2197 YAC allowed (8th worst), and we were 6th wors in hurries with 34, 1 better than Dallas astonishingly.  7th worst in Team sacks with 39.  

I could go on and on on the stats:

https://www.pro-football-reference.com/years/2023/opp.htm#all_team_stats

We have a ton, a ton of players who expired contracts, that's why we have so much Cap Space, let's not pretend we have cap space because the roster was managed well.


And as for talent, at last check, we do not have a SINGLE pro bowl player on this roster this year, not even an alternate (someone please correct me if I missed someone).

SO when I say historically, historically bad, I mean we were so bad, we reset historically bad as an expectation.  We were THAT bad.

AS for the coaching hire, I feel people are putting too much stock into what National Personalities said about who we were going to hire and why, and being extreme fans we all went and drank it whole straight from the hose saying 'let's go'.  Well folks, This isn't the Synder/Ceratto, or even Snyder/Allen group.  They aren't leaking like a screen door on a submarine to the press, so when people aren't talking, the press will talk to people with third or fourth hand knowledge, and spin speculation.  Local reporters had much more info than national folks for the most part only near the end when shefter started saying, don't presume that the projected stops in the HC carousel end up this way, one or both seattle and washington may turn out different.  (this is why you heard talk about Bellichick for example)

Now we have seen a lot of teams go from worst to playoffs, we may even make the playoffs next year, you just don't know, but when you look at our team, Washington fans needed a reality check.  Even with new ownership, a house cleaning, the #2 pick in the draft and wads of Cap Space, we were not the best opening in the League, nor where we the second.  It might be debatable if we were the third or fourth, frankly, we need to stop letting our overinflated opinions of this franchise dilute ourselves into thinking we are more than we are. We have to earn respect back, it may take time.

The best openings this year were in: San Diego, Seattle, Atlanta.... It's hard to rank Las Vegas, Tennessee, and New England since they went internal with their respective hires.  The Panthers were clearly the worse position.  


So as much as people may not like the Dan Quinn hire because - its a microwave league - we want those instant results, I feel its going to take time to fix everything.   Will we resign Curl and Fuller? If not there are two holes we know we need to fill somewhere  There aren't a lot of quality safeties in Free agency the last time I checked.  Corner might be more possible.

We all know how bad our Linebacking core has been.  Davis has 1 year left on his deal.  We may need a DT and at least one Edge Rusher (DE probably) because we traded Sweat/Young away. (I think there are some solid FAs that can be stop gaps or end their career here. 

I'll let someone else look at Offense and make suggestions on what we might be able to look forward to, I think we are scraping the barrel at RB after Robinson, and Tight Ends are hidden, but I don't see retaining Gibson, but I don't know who we replace him with either.

This is going to be a hard slow rebuild unless we really nail FA and draft, and while Peters is supposed to be ELITE as a talent evaluator, he can only pick from the talent that is available this year.  So, in conclusion, friends, I think we need to be patient, we need to recalibrate and get ready for a possibly slow ride, cheer this team on as we begin to fix things schematically and with fresh blood, but we need to give this team time to figure it out, we may literally be starting completely new for many of our vets even with new coaches.   I just wanted to take a moment to say what I've been thinking.  Am I elated by the Quinn hire?  No, but I remain unconvinced that there was a single person available that would have brought enough to justify the kind of expectations some people thought we would have with say Ben Johnson.  Maybe I'm just pessimistic, but we always tend to over value our guys, and I think we need to keep in mind, that we had inept personnel management, and likely, inept coaching for 3-4 years.  We don't really know what we have in any of these guys.  (maybe with Terry/Tress Way we do, Payne/Allen) other than that, It could be a lot of growing pains, and does it make sense to draft a top QB this year knowing this? if we do we may need to sit them and many will not like that, but it may take 6 weeks for a new OL to gel well.)

I'm optimistic that we are getting up off the mat, but we may have a bit of a climb ahead of us, because we were unfortunately, historically, just THAT bad.

I thank you for your time.  I would love to hear What positions people think we might be able to make appreciable changes to make us at least a bit more competitive next year, but I'm not even sure where we start when I look at this roster.


 












 

 

[Renegade7]

1 hour ago, KDawg said:

I think the issue is your expectations for humans.

 

Go visit some of these team’s subreddits. 
 

The Patriot fans are acting like they haven’t won in ages at times. 
 

Every fan base says things that are the result of coping with their own traumas. We had Snyder. He was a trauma source. But so many fanbases have trauma sources. 
 

You notice it more here because you’re on this forum. But it’s not just a Washington thing. It’s a human thing.

 

I don’t think it’s fair to equate our fanbase not liking moves to our fanbase specifically have a problem… human beings are inherently distrusting on moves they don’t understand or like. 
 

I think it’s fairly reductive and short sighted to believe that we are unique in this.

 

This isn't what im saying at all, we are clearly more distrusting then we thought we were and some other fan bases.

 

Saying other teams have had trauma...what?  Our name was forced to be changed, we tore down the statue of one our previous owners, our last one was getting called into congress.

 

We've lost at least two generation of fans over the near unique level of dysfunction and controversy cyclone...if you want to say other people have stuff goin in their loves then this, that's different then underselling what's happened in jus the last 4-5 years with our franchise.

 

1 hour ago, KDawg said:

I am very meh on Quinn. Would hate Kelly. That’s not my trauma talking. That’s just my opinion. Of course, there are others who are much more casual football fans that hate it because they never really followed it to begin with and thinking the worst is just what they do. 
 

But every fanbase has clueless folks. 
 

The people saying “OMG ITS SNYDER ALL OVER” are not prevalent. A lot of the people I see here doing it are mostly joking. Some are serious but those are folks that are generally not people we should be taking all that seriously anyways. 
 

But seeing issues with decisions the new regime makes isn’t a qualifier for our fanbase having to commit to a 12 step program.
 

 

It's not jus about subreddits. I live 20 minutes from DC and work in the city.  I'm not sure what perspective you get from talkin to folks in New York, but there's something to be said about watching in real-time going from one of the top in attendance to basically dead last.

 

You joke about a 12 step program, that's not what we need, but we also shouldn't consider what we're coming off the heels off normal because we got used to it and this close to universally accepting it would never change.

 

I have yet to notice any Cowboys or Patriots fans ready for an expansion team like many were before Snyder confirmed he was trying to sell the team, I did a thread and poll on this at the time.

 

Cowboys fans realizing Jerry is who is until he dies is not too far from where Raiders fans were with Al Davis.  Patriot fans shockingly are coming to gripes with cap-era dynasties aren't normal having not won a playoff game in almost 5 years now.  That's nothing compared ro what we've been through and I expect our overall fanbase's perspective to be very different because of it...not sure how that's controversial.

[DCF]

Fans are entitled to act ridiculous, and I don't think in this case the fan base was overreacting. I listen to Sheehan, and the one thing I can't stand about him is that he can be obnoxiously arrogant and stubborn on some of his takes. He does this while being wrong in the end over half the time. He will dress down the opposing opinion like it's ridiculously incorrect, and then end up wrong about it 6 months later. He spent all last off season and half of this season telling us the defense was top 10, until it was downright undeniable that they stunk.

 

I think it's condescending to suggest that because people don't agree with your take, they're just suffering from type of battered fan syndrome. Quinn does have red flags, and it's kind of odd how the league narrative is so high on him despite his record (I'm giving him a chance and think this could work, but let's be real about the guy). 

 

That being said, of course losing for 20+ years has it's effects and gives you a certain perspective. If we had done nothing but win the last 20 years, we would probably assume everything in the future would work and be wrong on that too.

[London Kev]

When the team wins or does something subjectively good it makes me happy.

When the team loses or does something subjectively bad it makes me sad.

For many years now there's been far too much of the latter and not enough of the former. so overall supporting this stupid ****ing team makes me sad.

 

As I seem to be unable to dump them and move on, then I live in the hope that they can turn it around, start winning and start doing good things, It's part of being a fan (an extreme fan anyway). I know that they're bad right now, historically so, but the bad can't continue indefinitely, right? right?!? 

 

None of the above has too much of an effect on my overall wellbeing. Sometimes they piss me off for a day or two, sometimes I'm elated for a day or two, but I have things in my life that are far better and far worse than this team.

 

I know that anything I say or do will not change the teams' outcome, but that doesn't mean that it's meaningless for me to express my opinions on what I think we should or shouldn't do. It's good to talk and exchange ideas, even though I lurk and learn a lot more more than actually posting.

 

PS. I know more about football than all of the idiots in charge put together and If I was the HC we would definitely, 100%, without doubt win the SB every year 😁,

 

Edited February 4 by London Kev

[KDawg]

7 hours ago, Renegade7 said:

 

This isn't what im saying at all, we are clearly more distrusting then we thought we were and some other fan bases.

 

Saying other teams have had trauma...what?  Our name was forced to be changed, we tore down the statue of one our previous owners, our last one was getting called into congress.

 

We've lost at least two generation of fans over the near unique level of dysfunction and controversy cyclone...if you want to say other people have stuff goin in their loves then this, that's different then underselling what's happened in jus the last 4-5 years with our franchise.

 

 

It's not jus about subreddits. I live 20 minutes from DC and work in the city.  I'm not sure what perspective you get from talkin to folks in New York, but there's something to be said about watching in real-time going from one of the top in attendance to basically dead last.

 

You joke about a 12 step program, that's not what we need, but we also shouldn't consider what we're coming off the heels off normal because we got used to it and this close to universally accepting it would never change.

 

I have yet to notice any Cowboys or Patriots fans ready for an expansion team like many were before Snyder confirmed he was trying to sell the team, I did a thread and poll on this at the time.

 

Cowboys fans realizing Jerry is who is until he dies is not too far from where Raiders fans were with Al Davis.  Patriot fans shockingly are coming to gripes with cap-era dynasties aren't normal having not won a playoff game in almost 5 years now.  That's nothing compared ro what we've been through and I expect our overall fanbase's perspective to be very different because of it...not sure how that's controversial.

I disagree with almost every bit of this.

 

The whole OP comes off as, “you don’t agree this was good, so we have psychological damage”

 

Your post comes off as, “yes, we all have psychological damage”

 

And I think both of you are making this too big of a deal.

 

The Washington Football Team is/was hemorrhaging fans because we’ve stunk and had a bad human as an owner. If we were winning, the fans would be “back”. 
 

Further, your response about other teams’ trauma not being as deep as ours is kind of a strange thing. Who are we to appoint a scale to people’s trauma and their trauma responses? 
 

what we got used to was losing. And a crap human being in charge. Now we don’t have a crap human in charge, but we absolutely do not know if the new regime is going to bring us back to winning. 
 

So there is a lot of positive here. Harris is in, Snyder is out. Good start.

 

But why do we have to buy in to moves that we may not love? Just because? And if we don’t it’s because we’re all damaged psychologically?

 

As Al Davis once said, “Just win.”

 

That’s it. That’s what will bring back more fans and more excitement and more acceptance and more trust. 

[Renegade7]

@KDawg

 

I would never say anyone should like something they don't because everyone else does, I've been pretty consistent with that over the years.

 

And I agree that winning in the long run will help resolve most anything at this point.

 

If you're main point of disagreement here sounds like how big a deal this is, we aren't required to agree.  I do believe talking to people gets different perspectives, some we might not all be on the same page about.

 

I'm dropping out here because I don't think it's OT anymore or the place for where I'm at on this. Too much checking if my notes are coming from the Internet or not.

[Koolblue13]

 

[justice98]

17 hours ago, spjunkies said:

 

 

I feel like we're being gaslit.  lol 

[CommandB11]

I am a fan. That is short for fanatic. I can have all the problems I want and dont have to admit it. I am entitled to every over and under reaction I feel like having. Do not tell me how to react. You may react however you want. I will do the same. This fanbase has been through the worst of the worst. Get out of here with the "we need to be patient and let these guys work." We aint in charge. We simply pays the money that lets them do the job. 

 

"This fanbase has a problem".... LOL!!!!!!!!! This fanbase is entitled to do as they please. You are on a message board formerly entitled "EXTREMESKINS". LOL!!!!!!!!!!!! Get out of here if you dont like the reactions.

 

\rant over

Edited February 4 by CommandB11

[SkinsFTW]

A problem? Who are we talking about here?