Washington Redskins fans have been dealt a tough hand by the NFL gods. The fan base in DC still appears to be working through the five stages of grief over the Redskins’ transformation from a formidable, well-run team, the pride of the DMV, to the paragon of organizational dysfunction and hometown embarrassment.
The team that brought us Albert Haynesworth has essentially become a talent cemetery, where promising athletes go to end their careers in a heap of humiliation. The latest manifestation of this phenomenon is the way the organization has handled QB Robert Griffin III, a tremendous talent who should have been the face of a team on the rise, not the laughing stock of the NFL.
Here are five ways the team has done wrong by RGIII:
1) Draft Day 2012. On April 26, 2012, the tone in Washington was hopeful with Mark Maske writing exuberantly in the Washington Post of the team’s elation, “On an evening they hope they will remember fondly for years to come, the Redskins made their long-anticipated addition of Robert Griffin III official.” Let’s just say their hopes were dashed. Or, rather, they dashed their own hopes. The Redskins have to have enough collective self-awareness at this point to know that they are destined to fail. They set RGIII up for failure merely by hiring him.
With hindsight 20/20, RGIII’s words that night are insanely sad: “A team finally fell in love with me. They want me for who I am, and I can’t wait to play for them.” Sigh.
Suffice it to say the day they hoped they’d look on fondly has become a day of infamy for the Washington Redskins.
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