Boswell : If There's a New Day, It Hasn't Dawned Yet

[TK]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A22801-2004Aug21.html

If There's a New Day, It Hasn't Dawned Yet

By Thomas Boswell

Sunday, August 22, 2004; Page E06

MIAMI - The Redskins' exhibition season has an air of unreality and mystery around it. Not because Joe Gibbs has returned, but rather because he has not returned. Not yet anyway. The real Gibbs, the man who was the best offensive mind in football for a dozen years, has kept himself so deeply under cover he might as well be in witness protection.

Until the Redskins use a no-huddle offense with four flankers, shift every receiver to one side of the formation, then send a man in motion, fake a reverse and throw the bomb on a flea-flicker -- all on the same snap -- the real Gibbs isn't back.

In the Old Days, Gibbs probably never actually did all that simultaneously. But it often seemed like it. Every time the Redskins faced a crucial game, the first Redskins possession was a time to hold your breath. Would the Fun Bunch line up on each other's shoulders? The whole league knew that somebody with a star or a horse on his helmet was likely to get undressed.

Gibbs's running game may have been the Redskins' meat and potatoes, but everything else was dessert with a cherry on top. Once, his Redskins had three receivers with more than 1,130 yards. Contrary to myth, Gibbs only had six 1,000-yard rushers. But he had 13 receivers with 1,000 yards. The run beat you up. But the pass, or trick play, often closed the deal.

In these New Days, little of the traditional Gibbs arsenal, let alone any new inventions, has been seen. On Saturday night here in Pro Player Stadium, Gibbs unleashed an attack worthy of Woody Hayes on a grumpy day. Even the final score, a 17-0 victory, evoked a Big Ten winter day, not a South Florida summer night.

In his last five years in Washington, Gibbs's teams averaged about 300 pass completions a season. Not attempts, but completions. In this exhibition, Washington completed only one pass in the first quarter. Don't thrill us to death too quickly, Joe.

In the entire first half, the Redskins only directed one pass to a wide receiver. Somebody send Laveranues Coles a dog. He needs a friend.

During the time that quarterback Mark Brunell and the basic starting lineup were in the game, Gibbs did not just play it close to the vest. He put on a bulletproof vest then laced up a straight jacket outside it just for safety's sake. Gibbs was always secretive, but now he won't say what day it is.

The Redskins meekly say that their offense these days is "vanilla." Even that is an overstatement. This isn't even ice cream. It's more like plate after plate of broccoli. Every NFL team plays with one hand behind its back in preseason, hoping to keep its best new ideas a secret until Opening Day. But the Redskins are playing with both hands and a foot in shackles.

There's a special reason for it, but one that has risks.

Gibbs has a unique advantage, but one that will only last for the first few weeks of the regular season. He hasn't shown the world a game plan in 12 years. If he were an unimaginative fellow, nobody would care. But Gibbs was the leader of the X-and-O pact in his day. It's inconceivable that he hasn't had new ideas, maybe plenty. At Redskins Park, players and coaches say, "We've got a lot of new stuff." But they won't say another word. And, of course, they might not even be telling the truth.

In an ideal world, Gibbs could polish his new stuff in exhibition games to get timing and technique down perfectly. By hiding not only his latest ideas but also almost all of the ones that helped put him in the Hall of Fame, Gibbs runs the risk of fielding a team on Opening Day that executes sloppily. What's the value of surprise if the plays aren't run crisply?

If practice makes perfect and exhibition games are the time for practice, what on earth, you ask, is the harm in running all the old Gibbs classics in August? That whole era is all on tape anyway. Nobody burned the video of those four Gibbs Super Bowl visits did they? The answer is subtle. At the lower levels of football, plays are simple diagrams. But at Gibbs's level, especially with the sophistication of his assistants, every step, every blocking angle, is choreographed.

Gibbs is probably correct not to show anything, not even some tiny change in the way he screens a linebacker out of the pursuit of a Redskins running back on a trap. His secret is probably not that he will do a few big things differently, but that he will probably execute a great many plays slightly differently. Given a few weeks of film, the league will start picking it up. Why help 'em?

The necessity of hiding those minor changes in old plays, as much as maintaining top-security clearance on new plays, is the reason Gibbs has temporarily turned his offense into an eight-course feast of vegetables.

Nevertheless, the Redskins' offense did show progress against Miami. Partly, that's because the Dolphins are decimated by injuries and demoralized by running back Ricky Williams's retirement. If you can't thump them in their current discombobulated state, who can you beat? Even so, the old off-tackle Redskins running game made its reappearance. Washington's two first-half scoring drives -- 63 yards in eight plays and 43 yards in 10 plays -- were capped by the dullest of all plays, the one-yard plunge. Still, the relentless desire to bloody a few noses at the line of scrimmage, and the ability to sustain a drive, were encouraging.

Almost all of the rushing yardage should be credited to the offensive line -- or perhaps to Joe Bugel -- because few Redskins running backs broke any Dolphins tackles. Every quality gain, including a 22-yard run by Clinton Portis, was essentially untouched until the final tackle.

While the most famous aspect of Gibbs's coaching is under wraps, much of him is already in full view and functioning well.

Gibbs, the team builder and organizer, has been on view. With a whirlwind coast-to-coast recruiting blitz, Gibbs quickly assembled the most expensive coaching staff ever. The offseason was also filled with the signing of players that Gibbs needed to fill weaknesses. Finally, Gibbs, the motivator, has certainly brought vastly greater energy, focus and hope to Redskins Park. Of course, any 5-11 team that didn't get a huge shot of adrenalin from the return of a coach with three Super Bowl rings should be declared clinically dead.

But the Gibbs who was the most fun -- the shrewd fellow with all the midnight-oil trickery and brilliant halftime adjustments -- hasn't shown up yet. At this juncture, it's impossible to judge whether the Gibbs system will still work. The old Gibbs system, even a rudimentary form of it, isn't even on display yet. As for fresh delights, if there are any, wait until Sept. 12.

[Gilgamesh]

Why the pessamism? When has he let you down before?

[Sarge]

As a fan, the idea that the "real" Joe Gibbs hasn't shown up yet makes me feel warm all over.

AS for the opposition, after tonights game, in which the line emerged as a smash mouth unit that was opening huge holes for RB's and ran a ball control type offense, I think I would be getting a very bad feeling about seeing us on the schedule

[panthro]

Funny. Listening to Donnie Warren tonight on the post-game show, he said that the plays Gibbs has been drawing up in practice don't really add anything to what Gibbs used to do in the old days.

[PCS]

Geez Thomas.

[SkinsFTW]

Somebody cloned Gibbs? :cuss:

[bnacpa]

Funny ... the refreshing thing I saw was that we kept on running the ball and running the ball and running the ball. It was great to see that aspect of Gibbs.

As much as Gibbs has had a passing attack, one thing that Gibbs used to do so well was to call 7 or 8 running plays in a row. The defense would start second guessing after the 3rd or 4th play and start thinking "surely they are finally going to pass" but he wouldn't and it would be beautiful. The Miami game showed me that he hasn't lost that knack for just sending in the runs and seeing how they work ...

Of course ... that used to work because we would be averaging at least 4 yards a carry