Redskins at Bucs: A New Captain For A Sinking Ship

Washington Redskins (3-6) vs. Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2-7)
1:00 p.m. Raymond James Stadium
So it’s already come to this. Jason Campbell will be the starting quarterback this Sunday in Tampa. Obviously this move was going to come eventually. But why this week? This may be the worst time to do it.

If Joe Gibbs really wanted to start Campbell earlier, then he should have put him in following the bye week. That way he’d have two weeks to prepare for a home game. Or after the disastrous performance that Mark Brunell had against Tennessee. That would have made sense too. Heck, why not start him at the beginning of the season.

If Gibbs never really wanted to start Campbell until the Redskins season was “officially over”, then why not start him next week. The Redskins have three consecutive home games coming up and I’d rather give the kid a chance to play at home a couple of times before throwing him in on the road.

Starting him this week makes little sense. While Tampa no longer has the feared defense it did a few years ago, they’re still pretty good. That Cover 2 will make a rookie’s head spin (and let’s call Campbell a rookie for the sake of argument, I know technically he’s in his second year). Plus he has to deal with being on the road with the stupid cannons going off everywhere and what not. Plus he has a short week. It took Gibbs 24 hours to announce his starter for the Bucs game, so it’s as if he played Monday night because he’ll only have five days to get ready for Sunday. Plus, Campbell will now have to play without his running back after Clinton Portis was put on the IR. Ladell Betts is a solid backup, but he’s not Portis. On top of all this, the Redskins are 3-6 but still have very, very faint playoff aspirations. Usually the season is over when you get loss number seven. But the Skins, through some oddity, are technically only two games out of a wildcard spot. They overcame more than that in less time last season. This reeks of a give-up move by Gibbs, unless he thinks Campbell can channel Joe Montana.

Now, I said this move made little sense because I can’t say the move makes no sense. Clearly Brunell is struggling. Even the Brunell supporters can’t deny this anymore. The losses early in the season were not his fault. He had poor protection, several injuries to deal with and his defense couldn’t stop anybody. In the last few weeks it has become clear that now Brunell is the week link in the offense. Last week’s game against Philly was just depressing. He couldn’t throw the ball downfield. He was afraid to throw it downfield, save one pass to Brandon Lloyd. The players around just seemed to have lost all confidence in him. And, if the offense with Brunell is bad enough that it can only score three points against Philly’s defense, it can’t do much worse with Campbell at the helm. I mean what, is Campbell so bad the Redskins can’t score three points against Tampa? Maybe, but I doubt it.

I’ve been on the fence on Brunell for his entire time here. I wasn’t thrilled when the Redskins decided to sign him in the first place. Nor was I happy about Patrick Ramsey getting unceremoniously benched. But Brunell, to his credit, played well enough last year to lead the Redskins to a playoff victory. In my opinion, his stats were worthy of a Pro-Bowl invitation (Mike Vick’s were not, but I digress). So I came in to this season with the hope that the Redskins, who had and still have the overall talent to make a run at a championship, could squeeze one more year out of Brunell. He was the clear choice to start at the beginning of the season because you don’t want to throw a rookie quarterback into a mix of young veterans that expect to win the Super Bowl. Brunell certainly wasn’t the best quarterback out there, but he was the best option that Washington had.

I don’t think much of Campbell. I wasn’t happy when the Redskins traded up to draft him. I wasn’t happy that the Redskins drafted him, period. I wasn’t impressed with Campbell while he was at Auburn. He played with two very talented running backs (who both currently start in the NFL) and behind a very talented offensive line (again, several of whom are playing in the NFL). Despite his “strong arm” he was never really allowed to chuck the ball downfield. This is a man who had four different offensive coordinators and none of them let him throw deep. That was a red flag with me. And other than his undefeated senior year, he had three unremarkable seasons for the Tigers.

Now, the players seem to love him. They love to talk about some of the plays he makes in practice. During training camp, some veterans wondered out loud if he should be made the starter for opening day. In the preseason games, the kid looks ok. Nothing special. I guess we’ll just have to see. We won’t know how good he is until he plays, and plays a lot. One game won’t be great indicator. The next seven games could be a little more telling. I guess this move had to happen eventually.

The Redskins have to face a Buccaneers team that is basically a mirror image. Tampa was a team that made the playoff (losing to Washington of course) and expected to compete for their division title again. But injuries and poor play have derailed that plan. Instead of Clinton Portis and Santana Moss, it is Chris Simms for the Bucs. Their injuries have slowed down their offense and left their remaining players looking less talented. Cadillac Williams looks ordinary after an impressive rookie campaign. Some of this can be attributed to defense preparing for him. Mostly it’s because there is no real passing game threat for Tampa with Simms.

Bruce Gradkowski fills in for Simms at QB. Gradkowski is one of those big MAC quarterbacks that everyone drools over because of Ben Roethlisberger. Except he wasn’t expected to start this year…or ever. He was marked as a career backup. He’ll make a few plays a game but is basically incapable of running an offense for 60 minutes.

Defensively, the Bucs are not as good as they’ve been in the past. There’s still plenty of talent there, and the Zone 2 still works, but it’s a far cry from the Hardy Nickerson-Warren Sapp-John Lynch days. It would be a decent challenge for a veteran offense, but it will be very tough for a rookie quarterback.

I’m not sure how much to expect from Campbell. All I know is that the move symbolizes that the Redskins are giving up on their season. Whether justified or not, that’s just extremely disappointing. For anyone to think that Jason Campbell can come in actually lead the team somewhere, anywhere, this season is unreasonable. It won’t happen. It’s hard to get excited, even to watch a player that many think could be the future of the franchise, when the team he’s playing for has already mailed it in.