The Kevin Sheehan Show - How To Fix The Redskins

Episode Date: January 3, 2019

Kevin opens the show with a response to the thought that the "anti-Redskins" sentiment has been media-fueled and mean. He went to the Maryland-Nebraska game and had a brief recap of that. Longtime NFL Exec Joe Banner was on the show and talked about how he would go about fixing the Redskins. Scott Van Pelt was on the show too. At the end of the show, the Reuben Foster news broke and Kevin reacted to that. <p> </p><p>Learn more about your ad choices. Visit <a href="https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices">podcastchoices.com/adchoices</a></p> Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You want it. You need it. It's what everyone's talking about. The Kevin Sheehan Show. Now here's Kevin. All right. I'm here. Aaron is here. This show's presented by Window Nation. If you're in the market for Windows, call 866-90 Nation or go to Window Nation.com and tell them that we told you to call. Tommy's not here today. He'll be here on Tuesday. Joe Banner, who was an NFL executive for 20-plus years with the Eagles in particular, will be on the show. today, Scott Van Pelt as well. This tweet from Cam, Aaron, to start the show, it's now gone too far, Cam writes to me on Twitter. You guys in the media have gone over the top. It's become mean. They were six and three and would have been a playoff team, if not a division champion, but the injuries hit. Stop it. They're not that far off. Well, that's one view, and I appreciate you tweeting me, Cam, at Kevin Sheen, DC on Twitter.

Cam, have you gone to the Redskins' Twitter account and looked at the responses to every single thing they tweet out? This is actually really amazing. For all of you that haven't done it, go to the Redskins' Twitter account and look at every single tweet over the last week and then just look at the responses. Yesterday they sent out a congratulations to Browell,

Ryan Arakpo who retired from the Titans the other day. Every single response was to fire Bruce Allen. It's actually remarkable for those that, if you haven't seen it, it's an unbelievable movement of sorts. It is as impressive a movement among fans that I think I've seen in a long, long time. It really is. I guess my point, Cam, is it's not just the media. I mean, come on, dude.

I mean, it's a reaction from the fan base. And in the media, by the way, most of the media members that have been passionate about this, and I would put myself into that category, I mean, I'm also a fan, and that's where my passion stems from. That's the root of it. But every single response to anything the team tweets out

is to fire Bruce Allen or some negative comment about the organization. organization. Seriously, if you haven't seen this, take two minutes and go to their Twitter account and look at the responses to every single tweet. I can't, I would only, I can only imagine what they're saying if they're reading these responses to these, you know, in some cases, very benign tweets. You know, it's, they congratulated Adrian Peterson yesterday from the Washington Redskins Twitter account. Make it eight career 1,000 yard rushing seasons for at Adrian Peterson, hashtag HTTR, and they've got a big graphic, a 1,042 rushing yards, seventh in the NFL, big picture

of Adrian Peterson. There are 1.7,100 likes. There are 288 retweets and 371 responses. Let me just read you the first five responses because they're all the same. That's really cool. Now let's get to what really needs to be done. Hashtag fire Bruce Allen. A next response.

Great. Hashtag fire Bruce Allen. Next one, hashtag fire Bruce Allen. And then the next one is hashtag fire Bruce Allen written seven times. Then it's nice job, Adrian, fire Bruce Allen. 12 crappy seasons for Bruce in the NFL, hashtag fire Bruce Allen. That's all. Sell the team is another one.

Sell the team, Dan Snyder. I've never seen a Redskins movement, fan movement like this. Never. Never. So much for apathy. I know. Look on the bright side. Yeah, you just wonder how many,

what percentage of that fan base or used to be fan base that really is. Anyway, Cam, thanks for the tweet. Look, I can only speak for myself. Every day, each show that I do, it's just every day is like this, you know, how am I feeling today? What do I want to talk about today?

I don't have an agenda. I'm totally open to changing my mind if the information changes, or if I change, which happens every once in a while. But the Redskins aren't close, Cam. They haven't been really close at any point during the Dan Snyder era. They haven't been close.

To be honest, the six years before Dan Snyder purchased the team, they weren't very good and weren't very close. But 139, 180, and 1. That's the record of the franchise during his ownership. Two playoff wins. And one of them came in 1999, and that wasn't really a season of his doing because he didn't take the team over until midway through that season. The feeling about the owner and the team right now by the fan base or what's left of it, the media, NFL fans in general, league office, everybody,

is universal and it's totally justifiable. It is that the Redskins are among the worst franchises in all of professional sports. You know, you can debate it. You know, you can say the Knicks, the Raiders, the Marlins. I mean, you can go through a handful, probably a half dozen to a dozen franchises. The Redskins are in that group.

They may not be the worst, but they're among the worst. And they are a source of constant local and national ridicule for many things most of them deserved. Some like the name, not deserved, in my opinion, but they are widely recognized for losing and losing in unseemly and mortifying ways. It's who they are. I mean, there isn't enough lip-examined.

stick and perfume to make them look or smell any differently. And by the way, on a somewhat different subject, but related to the Redskins and the feeling that everyone has about them right now, I personally don't feel it my duty to make ownership accountable. I don't think that way. But I don't have a problem with those that do. Zabe tweeted out yesterday, until Dan and Bruce show their faces, or at least give an interview, then it's incumbent upon those of us with a pulpit to keep hammering away.

Don't you get it? They want people like you, like Cam, as an example. You got to tweeted me. They want people like you, Cam, to say move on or lighten up. It's their strategy. You are their ally when you do this. You know what? Zab's right.

There's truth to it. But it's not why I'm hammering away at them or being mean to them. It's just how I feel as a longtime fan. I think they are dysfunctional. I think they are arrogant. I don't think they're very smart. And more than anything else, and this is the sad part and the sad truth,

more likely than not, it's never going to change. You know, what's the saying? A leopard doesn't change its spots. Dan Snyder doesn't think he's the problem. He's never thought he was the problem. So what makes you think he'll change at 54 years old? I hope for it.

I do, but I'm not expecting it. But, hey, I choose to continue to, follow the team, not just because I'm doing this podcast or I'm in the media. I'm not going to stop watching them. It's become my habit. I'm not spending dime one. I haven't spent dime one on the team in a long, long time. This past season, Aaron, I think I mentioned this on a previous podcast, was the first year since I was five years old that I haven't been to a Redskins game, home game. First time since I was five years old. It's not, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, It didn't matter enough to me.

Like, I'm not even, it didn't even occur to me until somebody said, did you go to Sunday's game? I said, no, and then I thought about it. I'm like, I haven't been to a game yet this year, and I didn't end up going to a game this year. I just have no interest in going, but I'm never going to stop watching. It's part of my, you know, fall habit. And I'll never stop hoping, you know, I don't, I'm definitely more apathetic than I've been. in recent years. I've gone through these phases like many of you have. And I'm resigned to what I said the other day, that the best it's ever going to be is, you know, occasionally having a year that you get

somewhat excited about. You know, a nine and seven or a ten and six year, probably not 11 wins. I mean, it's been 27 years. So they're the only team in the league over this stretch that hasn't won 11 games. every four or five years, you know, a nine and seven, ten and six, wild card, or maybe even a division champion and home game, and then, you know, lose and that's it. And in the moment, you know, if things are trending upwards, you'll get excited about maybe, hey, maybe they got a little bit of a run in them. But, you know, the league's designed to produce those, you know, one in five seasons. That's that, or one in four seasons, that's the rate for him, you know, 20 years for five playoff seasons, won every four years.

So occasional limited success is the best I can hope for. But I guess I just said it, Cam. That's why I'm critical. And as you say, mean, because I'm resigned to the fact that it's never going to be any different. But it won't stop me from watching. It's what I'll do. I went to the Maryland game last night.

Aaron was there. The Terps beat 24th ranked Nebraska, 74 to 72 on a Jalen Smith floater with 3.8 seconds left. It was the first win for Maryland over a ranked opponent in nearly three years. Yep. Now, to be fair, two years ago, they only played two games against ranked opponents. So, whatever. But it's been a while.

Maybe it's just me, and I don't want to be the wet blanket on a significant win. But beating Nebraska in basketball, when you're not. Maryland, it shouldn't be that big of a deal. It shouldn't. Like, I'm sitting in the arena last night, and I'll get to why, you know, one of the real issues I had with last night, I don't know why the program can't fix this. But I'm thinking to myself, they're 24th ranked and we're going to be, you know, we need this win. We need a big win, but when did we get to the point where beating Nebraska was a big deal in basketball? I understand the win was a big one in the context. I understand the win was a big one in the context of the moment,

the moment being this season right now in particular. You know, the last few weeks, they lost at home to Seton Hall, which would have been, as it turns out, a quality resume win. Seton Hall's really playing well. They beat St. John's. They were the first team to beat St. John's.

Did they kill Xavier last night? I think they killed Xavier last night. Looked that up for me. I thought that that's what they did last night. But they didn't win that game against Seton Hall at home. Personally, I'm not a big fan of the way Mark's schedules around the holidays. Maryland played two games in 18 days. They beat Zayahir last night, right?

8070. Yeah. So Seton Hall is on a roll here. Yep. I'm not a big fan of the way he schedules around the holidays. You know, they played two games in 18 days. The least amount of activity of any Big Ten team during the final exam portion of the schedule. And I think that seat and hall game, they were just out of sync.

They hadn't played. That's what Turgeon said after the game. I know. Well, schedule different. Right. You know, finals don't take 11 days. There were 11 days off before the Seton Hall game. That's a lot.

And then another week off before they played their next game against Radford. That's a lot. In the meantime, every other Big 10 team, and they've got finals at their schools, too, were playing more frequently. But anyway, back to last night. The Terps had a couple of decent wins going into last night, but nothing substantial. I was going to say, they had... Hofstra is going to look pretty good at the end of the year. Hofstra is going to be fine.

All right. Radford doesn't look that bad. I was going to say, Radford beat Notre Dame and Texas. The best wins are Hofstra and Radford, and that's why that game was important because over the past three years, they have lost that game every time. Last night was needed. It was needed. In the big context, in the context of this, it was big because they beat a ranked team, and a true veteran team Nebraska is.

I mean, Nebraska's a good team. Unique in college basketball. They've got some... Don't sell them short off. No, they're good. If you recall last year going into the tournament, I really wanted Nebraska to get in

because I thought they could have done damage in the tournament last year. Anyway, losing would have been, you know, it would have been one of those moments where the Maryland fan base, which right now is not very excited, but it would have brought major pessimism from into play. It would have brought it into play. play. Anyway, look, this Maryland team is talented. I've said this before. It's absolutely a team of enough talented players that should be a top 25 team, if not higher, top 20, top 15. A tournament team

definitely talent-wise, a team that could do some damage in March. And if it doesn't, it's going to be disappointing. Jalen Smith and Bruno Fernando are unique in college basketball from this perspective. Most teams, and I'm talking about great teams, don't have two 610 guys that are that versatile offensively. And by the way, Fernando is a true rim protector in college basketball. 18 and 17 yesterday? Beast. I don't think at this point we use them enough to stretch the floor. I mean, Smith showed he can do it last night. He had big threes. I mean, he can knock down the three. And at 610, 6-11, he can truly stretch the floor. He would never, ever be told anything but to take those shots, he'd have a never-ending green light from me with the way he strokes it. And Fernando

doesn't shoot enough, in my opinion, from the perimeter. They leave him open, you know, when he's at that high post and they sort of initiate some of the offense through him at the high post, he never even looks at the basket. Basket, he never looks at it. He's got an excellent stroke. his post plays improve so much. I mean, for those of you that hammer Turgent about not developing players enough, look at Fernando one year. In one year, how much different a player he is offensively. He's patient.

His feet are a million times better. He's got multiple go-to moves in the post. Every team is doubling him, and last night was the first time in several games, that they didn't double him every single time he got it. The coaching staff's done a really. really nice job with him. But Maryland has NBA talent, first round talent on its team. They should beat Nebraska at home. I don't care what they're ranked and I don't care how good they are.

They needed to beat Nebraska at home too. I'm not saying it wasn't going to be easy, but they needed that win. A couple of quick things on the game itself. First of all, I've said this so many times when it comes to Maryland basketball in particular. You cannot in a big city like Washington with a traffic problem that DC has and the surrounding areas, you cannot start a weeknight game at 630. If you do, you are going to have 5,000 less people at the game. People are not going to sit in traffic for 630 against Nebraska. They're not going to do it. The crowd was insignificant to start. They listed it at 11,000 plus, and you're playing a ranked team. I know it's Nebraska. And Nobody's going to get excited about Nebraska.

Is there any way, Maryland, that you can figure out and go to the Big Ten and say, hey, we are the only big city team in this league, the only one? You know, can we play the later game? And if you insist from a television standpoint that we have to play a couple of 630 games, can you wait till our students are back? So at least we get a crowd. There are two more 630 games on the schedule. The one is coming up, right?

No, I think that one's on, in fact, there's one February 12th against Purdue, and then one's the last game of the season. That's a Friday game, so that might mitigate it a little bit. Well, I mean, I just would make the, look, the Big Ten doesn't want Maryland to have a half-filled arena. They don't want, that's not good for the league. And you don't have these issues in Bloomington, Indiana, and West Lafayette and Lansing and Madison, Wisconsin.

You just don't. Let them play the early game. Let your big city team play the late games so the people can get to the game. And if you insist on everybody playing an early game at some point, at least allow Maryland to do it when their students are back. So you at least get some atmosphere into the building. There was none last night. None. And here's the thing about Maryland.

I've said this many times. It's as good a building as you will see in college basketball when the people are there and into it. It is great, and it provides a significant home court advantage. They didn't have it last night. Mark Turgeon after the game said, we're going to play, he said, he told his group after the seat and hall game that we're going to have 14 to 15 games like the Seaton Hall game, and we just got to figure out a way to win those, and we won one of them last night. I don't know why they're going to play 14 to 15 of these games. I know he will, because they've been doing it for years. I just think they've got some talent that they could blow some people out.

Can't they blow some people out? Like, I mean, when they play fast, and they didn't play fast enough last night, and they controlled the glass, I just would like to see him hammer some people at home in particular. They're good enough to do it. I love how hard his teams play. It's my favorite part about Turgeon.

I mean, all of you just want me to just kill him, and most of you don't think he's a very good coach and that Maryland can do better and that they have underperformed. The thing that I love most about him is he does have an intensity about him that the players take on more times than not. It's a Gary-like competitiveness.

I love that about Mark. He is a tough, hard-nosed competitor. He's into it. He is so, into it. I don't like his zone offense, and I never have. I don't understand why they can't figure out how to handle a one-three-one zone. They turned it over two to three times because they didn't, they didn't, I mean, quite honestly, and this is the youth coach coming out in me, so take it for what it's worth. But, you know, you start with just understanding where the players should be

against a one-three-one zone. They should be two-one-two. And then you got a lot of stuff after that you can do, but they're trying to screen it, and they got two players next to the next to. to one and they're turning it over, left and right, and then finally on the final possession, Jalen Smith comes out and looks like he's going to set a ball screen and then drops to the middle of the zone, the middle of the zone. It was nice to finally have somebody in the middle of that zone. He caught it and he hit a floater. And if the defense had sort of come to him, then he had two players open on each side as he attacked the rim. Oh, everybody was talking about not putting somebody on the ball at the end of the game.

like the Michigan game last year. Nebraska had it 3.8 seconds left after Jalen Smith hit the floater to give him the 74-72 lead. Last year at Michigan, they didn't put somebody in the ball. It allowed Michigan to throw the ball to half court and then get to the rim for the game winner. Or was it free throws that they ended? They ended up fouling them, I think, at the end. I forget how it ended at Michigan. But the criticism was he didn't put somebody on the ball. And I said at the time, I prefer if you put somebody on the ball because it means more times, and not with less than five seconds, the first pass is going to come into the back court,

and then they got a long way to go. But not every coach does it that way. He didn't do it last night, but he did have a nice defensive trap. They trapped the guy right when he crossed half court in one of those trap areas on each side of the floor, and it made it impossible for Nebraska to get a shot off. Ricky Lindo, the freshman from Northwest, from Wilson,

made a really nice play at the end. It was a good win. Now, I hope that Rutgers on Saturday. We're not sitting there 64, 63 with a minute to go. But I have a feeling we will be. I do. No reason to believe any otherwise. Before we bring Joe Banner into the conversation,

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Plus, wind donation will pay for your heating bill until the new windows are installed. Save today, save tomorrow, save forever. Call 86690 Nation or visit windonation.com. That's 86690 Nation or shopwindonation.com and tell them I told you to call. Let's welcome in Joe Banner to the podcast. for those that don't know and most of you do, was a longtime NFL executive, team president of the Eagles for 17, 18 years,

then was with the Browns for a few years. And I've been following you on Twitter, and I think you came on the radio show once, maybe two or three years ago. And I've been thinking about you recently as it relates to this particular team right now here in D.C. And getting someone like you with your background and experience, get your thoughts on what's going on.

And we'll start with that. From your perspective, from your experienced view, Joe, what's wrong with the Redskins and can it be fixed? Well, the answer, can it be fixed is yes. But I think it takes a mindset and a willingness to make the decisions and the changes necessary to get it fixed. And I think they have to start with a, you know, why isn't it working? And if they have any illusions that it is working, then that's a real big problem. but I think it's obvious it's not working. So the question is why isn't it working?

And the reality is teams that are win in the NFL, how to do it is easy. The doing it is really hard. The easy part is you need an excellent coach with a good staff, and you need someone who can make strong, consistent, good decisions about players. Now, finding the people that can do that well is very hard, but knowing that that's what you're doing is not hard. And I would challenge them to step back and ask them in those two areas, do they have the people in place to compete with the really smart teams in the league?

There's 10 teams that are kind of smarter than the rest of the league. Are they positioned with the people they have to make decisions equal to a better than those say 10 top smart teams? I don't think the answer to that's yes right now. It clearly isn't yes. But you do need an owner, Joe, don't you, that is capable of identifying that quality, that competence level. and then empowering it. And that seems to have been the problem here for a long period of time. So doesn't it start there?

Yes. I mean, I used to say when I was the President of the Eagles that had a fair amount of authority there, that the most important thing I did was decide who else got to work there. Because there's nobody, and I don't even really care if you're a Hall of Fame head coach or general manager, there's nobody that can succeed without surrounding themselves with other people that need to come.

compliment themselves or add to themselves. And I don't think there's any names you can exclude from that. So the number one thing an owner has to do, and has to do effectively, is decide in a couple of key positions who works for him and then allow them to figure out who the people are that should work for those people. And, you know, if the owner gets those decisions right, you're going to have a good team.

Now, getting from good to great is hard, but you're going to have a good team. And, you know, that is exactly where it starts. And if those decisions aren't made right, then you're going to be sitting here trying to figure out, you know, what do we do next? So let's get specific because for the first 10 years of his ownership, Dan Snyder empowered to a certain degree. And empowered would probably be an exaggeration. Vinnie Serrato as his key, you know, talent evaluator and roster decision maker. And that didn't work clearly.

And typically what they did, Joe, as you remember, is they overpay. by, you know, 20% above retail aging stars that didn't fit, you know, with their scheme or their locker room, and that failed. And then he brought in Bruce Allen, who was much more frugal and had some league experience. And for the last nine years, that hasn't worked. Specific to Bruce Allen, your thoughts on him as the lead person in an organization. Yeah, you know, I worked with Bruce on committees in the league. I know Bruce well. I think if you're dealing on the business side of the football side. So that's really strategy and cap. Bruce is strong and smart and capable of competing with the better people in the league. I think if you're

talking about the player selection and the building of a team element of the football side, it just doesn't seem to be compelling evidence as we look at decisions they make, the time we've had than he's had to get the job done, which is really the test. It's not my opinion or your opinion. I mean, the beauty of working in football for me was, they keep score, and in the end, you want, or you lost? And if you won, you're doing a good job, and if you lost, you're doing a bad job, and there are no other explanations.

And I like that. I didn't like, you know, being subject to somebody else's whim or somebody else's evaluation of how I was doing. I just wanted to be measured by tangible results. So, you know, it's hard to step back and look at the role that Bruce has played and the way the team has performed and say, this is good enough, or we're smart enough to compete against the very best teams in the league.

I'm not sure how familiar you are with the level of ire now among the fan base. And when I say among the fan base, it's eroded significantly, Joe. You know, this was one of the proud franchises and one of the, you know, more passionate fan bases in the league for a long time. And, you know, the attendance was insignificant this year. They didn't sell out a game for the first time and forever, at least, you know, based on the reported numbers. the TV numbers are down significantly when it comes to local television ratings for their games. And there's been a movement, a social media movement, with the fan base that's left that still cares. You know, hashtag fire Bruce Allen has gained incredible steam.

It's been a trending hashtag on social media. And I'm just wondering, based on what you know about Dan Snyder, do you think he cares? You know, again, got to know Dan through serving at owners meetings in different committees, and I would have said to you the answer is absolutely yes, without any hesitation. But I'm also a believer that actions speak louder than words. And Dan's a smart enough guy to be able to look around and go, listen, we are not consistently making good decisions that allow us to compete at the highest level. And, you know, you can find a way, especially if you like somebody and feel they deserve, you know, opportunity or time to rationalize, you know, a year, two years. You know, you have some injuries.

You have some bad breaks. You have this or you that. But once you've given somebody a long enough period of time, it's reasonable to interpret that the cost in your own mind of making change is not worth the benefits of possibly winning more. And so I think it's a legitimate question, although I can tell you my interactions with Dan and the way he talks about things is that he absolutely cares, but he's going to demonstrate that with the actions that don't make it seem like it's okay to just be okay or sometimes not even okay, you know, on the field. And, you know, we're not seeing that happen. Is it true when people say, and I've said this, is it true when people say that quality and competence, people of quality and competence, don't want to work

in Washington, that it's hard now for the Redskins because they don't just throw money at it, right, Joe? I mean, for years it was, you know, they were marks. It was, it wasn't about asking how much a cost. It was immediately the default was to pay 20% above retail, and that solved a lot of the problems with people they wanted. But is it fair to say now that most quality and competent people don't want to work in Washington? Yeah, I hate to say it because it sounds harsh, but I think the truth is that if people had multiple opportunities, it would be unlikely that the Redskins would be on the top of the list of where they would want to go. For the reasons we're discussing, I mean, you know, ownership plays an important but limited role.

And then, you know, let's say you're a head coach or let's say you're even a coaching staff person or somebody looking for a scouting position. You want to be where you feel like there's a realistic chance of winning. There are very few people in the league that don't care desperately about winning. I'm talking about players or people in front offices or owners. It's portrayed sometimes differently, but that really is the reality. So when you go somewhere where you're not feeling overly hopeful about being able to win, which means it's not a lot of fun.

These jobs are incredibly fun when you're doing well, and nothing but incredibly stressful when you're not doing well. So the idea that you don't have hope and you can feel optimistic that this team is likely to be in a good place soon is definitely going to discourage. some people. Now you get the head coach. There's only 32 jobs. It's not like somebody isn't going to come in and take the job that at least you can reasonably predict they'll do well and same with the general manager. But if you're asking, is it harder? Are they at a disadvantage right now when it comes to recruiting people to come and work there? That is a yes. Does the league

about the Redskins at one point in this league a marquee franchise and still based on you know, valuations created by magazines like Forbes as an example. And we know what those valuations are worth. They're not worth anything unless there's a market for it. But is it important for the league to get Washington back to being, you know, a relevant franchise? Or does it care? If the league had a wish list that it could make that no one would see and it wouldn't do anything other than be a wish list. list. The league just does not

interfere in individual team operations the way some people think. Ideally, places like Washington that are strategically important in large markets like L.A.s and Chicago's and Phillies in New York from a business perspective are better for the league when those teams

are successful and iconic. But I want to be careful in saying that. Contrary to the way some people try to portray things, there isn't an owner in this league that's going to let the league in any way interfere in their operation, their franchise, and their independence of it. So the league could have that fantasy because it's mainly responsible for doing business

things at the league-wide level, and the league is more successful when there are more eyes and more impact in large and strategic marketplaces. That would be on their wish list. But that does not mean they're going to do anything or in any way of any conversations or interfere anything that could make that all happen. You know, it's gotten to the point where I think a lot of fans would prefer the league to intervene at some point, but I understand what you're saying. Let's play fantasy here for a moment. If Dan Snyder came to you and said, Joe, I want you to be a consultant, where do I turn here? Who's the football person, you know, the team president slash GM to go after?

and then, you know, potentially an excellent football coach as well. What advice would you give them? Well, I actually think that the coaching potential people out there because there's been so many changes in recent years is very challenging. And I've been encouraging. I mean, we're hiring seven or eight coaches a year and maybe one is working out. I mean, the classroom just three years ago was seven new coaches. coaches, and Doug Peterson is the only one that hasn't already been fired.

It's amazing. Six out of seven. So I've been encouraging people to do some non-traditional thinking about the head coaches. So I hired Andy Reid in Philadelphia who'd never even been a coordinator. So look at that pool of people instead of just the coordinators. I'm a believer that there are some people in college. There are some people that won't work in the NFL that are in college. But there are some college coaches that are worthy of consideration.

I mean, I've just in the last few days kind of put out Matt Rule, who's at Baylor now, who was his temple when I was in Philadelphia. I mean, these guys, and he has a little bit of background in the NFL, when you interview head coach is the hardest thing to project is their ability to really lead an entire program, hire people, and really manage them well. None of them have really done that. If you get a head coach who's been in college,

and especially a head coach who's turned around multiple programs, what's so very hard to project about an offensive coordinator, for example, in terms of their leadership skills, is very easy to project when you're dealing with, the dynamic college head coaching. So I think there are a couple of pools in the coaching ranks that aren't really being taken advantage of right now. The general manager is the opposite.

We've had so few changes that I actually think there's a lot of very talented people up there that deserve an opportunity to be general managers who aren't getting them because they're kind of standing in place while the league is kind of letting general managers have endless opportunities to prove themselves. and there are a group of young guys out there that are working in some of the franchises that are kind of turning themselves around here in the last few years or have had sustained success, a place like Seattle, you watch what's going on in Indianapolis right now,

you look at the Philadelphia Eagles and the sustained success they've had. All of those people, all those organizations, and there are more, have tiers of people in them that have done outstanding jobs, been part of winning organizations, and at least deserve an opportunity to stand in front of some owners and present why they think they could be the next general manager. I would not be afraid of that pool of people at all. Give me some names in that pool of people.

Who would be the names you would give to a Dan Snyder if you were consulting the Redskins? Well, I'm not going to give the exact days, but I think that if you just go, like I just mentioned Seattle, Indianapolis, Philadelphia, those are places in which there's a lot of depth, even below the general managers. Of course, of Philadelphia, you have a structure. where you have Howie Roseman was really a final thing than someone else who's really the general manager. I mean, there's tears of people in that organization that's very good.

Chris Ballard has not only done an outstanding job in Indianapolis of the decisions he's made in the turnaround, but he actually brought some people into that organization from other organizations, by the way, including one that came from Seattle, that are really good people. The Seattle organization is just outstanding in the depth of talent they have with their player personnel people. And again, I wouldn't limit it to those,

but, you know, if you want to look it up, there were very strong names below the top people in all those three organizations, as well as others around the league. It's very easy to do a minimal amount of research and come up with some very strong names to interview for general manager positions. You know, there was a decision, it wasn't even a decision, but there could have been a decision that the franchise may have been faced with a few years ago. Everyone in the organization knew that Sean McVeigh was a star and was a future head coach and potentially a really good one. And you had Jay Gruden here through two years, three years at the time, I guess, that had had no success, mediocre record, one playoff season in his first three. As a team president, would you have ever thought about elevating the offensive coordinator to head coach and moving. on from the head coach in that spot. It would have been odd. It would have been outside the box thinking McVeigh had only been a coordinator for a year. But how would you have handled a situation

like that? Well, you know, 2020 hindsight, that's clearly what they should have done. I can't tell you, with McVeigh only having been there one year, Jay only three years into his tenure, would I have actually done that in those shoes? I don't think that's fair. Should they have had a serious conversation about yes? You know, remember at that point, McVeigh is, what, 30 years old, maybe 29 years old. A very difficult decision to make. And I can't tell you in trying to be fair to the people who are making the decision that I would have done that in their shoes.

But, you know, that's a little different, though, when it gets to year four or five of Jay's tenure, and now McVeigh's taking head coaching interviews. That's the question in my mind at that moment. I think he'd been there three years at that point. You know, should there have been a different discussion then about should we stay the course, or should we making a change to somebody you have right in the building? I mean, the Rams answer that question, yes.

The Redskins answer that question, no. The Rams got it right. The Redskins got it wrong. One team is winning. One team still struggling. You know, when it comes to things like vision and anticipation, it just seems that this organization has been

behind the eight ball for a long, long time now. I mean, I know, and I've heard you weigh in on Kirk Cousins, and I think you did it with me. now's not the time to make the case for Kirk Cousins, but they certainly had a chance to sign him at a low number. And when they didn't, they certainly had a chance to trade him and get value back for him. But I did, on the GM front real quickly, would you think outside the box like Denver did in hiring a John Lynch who came right from the broadcast booth into that position?

See, I probably wouldn't just because I think there's really, really good, I'm going to say, more traditional candidates that I think are ready to go and, you know, craving an opportunity. You know, I would be picking from that pool. The coaching thing is different. I really think we've proven that current pool is so used

that we need to think a little non-traditional if we're really going to get somebody who's going to be exceptional. Remember, we're trying to get to great, you know? There's a lot of guys that can come in and do okay. I mean, I think Jay Gruden can do okay. But if we're really trying to get a coach in who really is a difference maker, who elevates everything by his performance,

I think in the coaching, you really have to think outside the box to find that. I think there are a lot of guys in the general manager's position, and you couldn't decide which one to bet on until you sat down face-to-face and really talk to them and listen to how they think and what they do that can do the job. You discussed Matt Rule, and he did a phenomenal job at Temple. And, you know, the opposite of the opposite of,

of that, I guess to a certain degree, even though he is a college coach, would be to go and pay a bunch of money for a Jim Harbaugh. Your thoughts about whether or not, A, he'll be back in the league as a head coach, and B, would that be something that an organization that's never had any sort of discipline and structure, or it's been a long time since they've had that at the head coaching position should consider? Yes, but it would require a complete change of mindset. that of Dan and if Bruce was still there in that structure of Bruce. I mean, these Jim Harbaugh type of coaches, you basically say, how do we support you? Not how are we parallel to you, not how do we boss you, and how do we manage you?

We say, we're entrusting this to you, and how can we support you to have the success that we want you to have. That is very, very far from how the franchise is operated for a very, very long time. but, you know, Jim Arbaugh has won every place he's been. I think he's going to continue to win every place he's going to be. And I do not think he'll be back in the league this year, although it's possible, but I do think at some point he'll be back in the NFL. You were in Philadelphia at the time as a long time, you know, born and raised Washingtonian and Redskins fan and then, you know,

being in the media for the last 15 years. I think the single biggest mistake that Dan Snyder made was moving on from Marty Schottenheimer after one year. I don't think that the organization since Dan Snyder's owned it has ever been close as close as they were with Marty to having a stable organization and a winning team. Do you agree or disagree with that? Yeah, I mean, listen, I didn't consider Marty innovative and I thought we were entering an era where innovation was crucial. Right. So Marty probably isn't my guy, although he certainly deserved, you know, more than a year. But I think the bigger point that Marty represented

was what we were just touching upon when he asked about Jim Harbaugh. You know, it is a totally different mindset to have a head coach like a Marty, like a Jim Harbaugh, like an Andy Reid, like a Bill Belichick. The guys that when someday we have a conversation about what kind of coaches are at the very upper echelon or maybe even guys that deserve Hall of Fame consideration, these guys don't fit in the mindset

that the Redskins have had for as long as Dan. and has run the team. And if some moment he woke up and said, you know what, I'm willing to make that shift, I recognize that if I can find the right guy, it's the best path to success. And you can have a serious conversation about how long, you know, should Marty have been there, or how do I get a Jim Harbaugh here, or a John Harbaugh, or the next, you know, Jim Harbaugh or John Harbaugh. But it would take a volcanic change of mindset for those types of people. to want to be in Washington or for the organization to be looking for that type of person. Take a massive change in personality. I mean, you can't be that narcissistic and then move

away from that more times than not based on life experience that you've had and a lot of us have had. I want to move to the league real quickly before I let you run because I think it's been a fascinating year in the league in that you had that Monday night 54 to 51 Chiefs Rams game and the offensive explosion that we had for much of the year and the discussion about this is where the league is heading. And then all of a sudden, over the last month, maybe five, six weeks of the season, you know, Dallas, what they did to New Orleans, the Bears, what they did to the Rams. And you've got great defensive teams. And, you know, you don't always have great defensive teams, Joe, in the league. This year, you do. Do you think that when we get to this postseason,

starting on Saturday, that defense, as it has over a long period of time, wins when you get to the postseason, do you think that that will be the case or that these great offensive teams will prevail? So when we were in Philadelphia talking about how to build teams, we felt that you had to have a top five-ish unit on at least one side of the ball and be at least solid on the other side of the ball to compete with the best teams in the league. And for many years, the conventional wisdom and usually supported by who was standing at the end the season was, you were better off if that, let's say, top five unit was defense.

And then your solid good unit, not great, but good unit was on offense. Right. I think that's changed. And even in that old era, there were offensive teams that won Super Bowls, but you were more likely to win it being a defensive team. That's right. So my comment means a defensive team can absolutely win the Super Bowl still, but I now think it's shifted so you're slightly more likely to win if the offense is your top, top unit,

and your defense is good, but absolutely can still be done either way. And I think that's a combination of the rule changes, which we've seen taking place over many years. And really the implementation of these, I'll call them spread concepts into the offense, which, even though people have been saying this for years, they weren't doing it, really requires you to cover every inch of ground on defense. It really takes advantage of the full width and length of the field in a way that makes it much harder to play defense. So I am still a big believer in how important defense is.

I won't be shocked if a good defensive team were to win the Super Bowl. I think it's more likely what we saw last year, we saw a fairly high-scoring game between Atlanta and New England, and those are the teams that are standing at the end. But it's not so out of balance that it's just, you know, one or the other. It's just a slight advantage in terms of a probability that I think has shifted from defense being a little bit more important to offense being a little bit more important, but either can get it done.

Joe, how quickly you forget that last year was Philadelphia over New England, not Atlanta over New England, but that was a high-scoring game too. All right, real quickly, NFC, can anyone go to New Orleans and win in the Superdome? No. In the AFC, if I told you that you had to pick the top three-seated teams, Kansas City, New England and Houston for the AFC champion, or the bottom three, Baltimore Chargers and Colts, which of those two groups would you pick the Super Bowl participant to come out of? Well, you're killing me there because I've got so many former Eagle people that I'm rooting for in both of those groups. I think I'm going to go with Kansas City, but just a smidge over my Baltimore boys. What do you make of the Ravens in the way they're playing? I'm fascinated by it. I thought they were the best defensive team in the league last year, and they didn't make the postseason on that fourth and 20, you know, bomb at the end by the Bengals on the final play of the game.

But the way they are playing football offensively is really interesting. It's much different. than the way, you know, the Redskins played with Griffin in 2012 or the Niners did with Kaepernick. It's really totally reliant on running the football and eating clock. Yeah, I think that this is unsustainable. I think that Lamar Jackson is going to have to get better over time at passing the ball for them to succeed. But in the short term, where we haven't really seen the answer to it, and they're playing so well defensively. I think it can beat anybody at any time.

I do think that if they're smart when they get into the playoffs, we'll see them pass a little bit more early in the game, fairly safe stuff, just to help keep the defense a little bit honest. We did see an adjustment last week when they played the Browns, where the Browns squeezed the defensive line in a little bit and started bringing the corners in to play the run, and it looked pretty effective.

So we may be seeing the beginning of what's the defensive response to that going to be. We'll see if San Diego, I'm sure, watched that tape, and picks up on it this week. But I think what Lamar does, combined with just a modest improvement in his passing ability, could be really dynamic. But he has to get better passing the ball for them to win with him long term, is my opinion. I wonder if John Harbaugh believes, and it's impossible to make the switch here. but that he believes that his chances to win the whole thing right now would be better with Joe Flacco.

Well, that's an interesting question. I got asked last week in an interview, if the Ravens were losing by two points, five points, whatever, with two minutes to go in the game, do you think they bring in Flacco for the last drive? They leave Lamar. I said I think they leave Lamar in, but that's different than saying,

what do you say gives them the best chance to win? And I would actually say the answer to that would be to bring Flacco in. Well, I think if they get behind two scores in a game, it'd be very hard for them to come back. And they haven't been in that position since Jackson took over. They also played up until recently a lot of bad defensive teams there for the first three or four weeks when they were rolling. And I'd even throw the Chiefs in there. I don't think the Chiefs are good enough defensively to win it. It sounds like you do, though.

Well, I'm worried about the Chiefs defense for sure. here's the only thing I'm counting on. They do get pressure on the quarterback. They're just breaking down behind that. And so that gives me some faith that they can at least play defense well enough for the offense to carry the day. But don't take that prediction as if I'm not really worried

about their defense. I mean, it really is not played well. But I'm hoping that the fact that they can get pressure on the quarterback almost against any line will help them enough that they can outscore somebody and win these games now 30. to 30 kind of things. You give the Eagles any chance of making a run of a win or two or not?

You know, I think they're legitimately the underdog and they should be, but do I give them any chance? Absolutely. I mean, it's a talented team. It's well-coached, and they're the full. It's almost hard to explain, but also hard to deny. I mean, he's playing really well. They're really responding to him.

So, you know, forced to predict, I wouldn't expect them to win a couple of games, but is it possible certainly? What would they do if he took them on another Super Bowl run? What would they do at the position? I think they'd sign once to a long-term deal. That answers that one. Hey, thank you so much. Happy New Year to you, and I really appreciate the time.

Same to you. My pleasure. All right, thanks to Joe Banner. I enjoyed that conversation. If you're thinking about new office space, you're working from home and it's hard because of the kids or the dogs, and you live in Bethesda, Chevy Chase, Upper Northwest D.C. I want you to consider launch workplaces in Bethesda.

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Scott was rather passionate the other night on Sports Center talking about the Redskins, which we'll get to in a moment. I want to start with Maryland. I was there last night. And I want to start with just a pet peeve, I guess I would describe it as. And I don't understand why these things can't be addressed. Why you're just going to tell me to be quiet and you don't have anything to do with it. And so I'll just acknowledge, I know you don't have anything to do with it.

But I'd ask you why they can't do anything about the start time for their games at home in the Big Ten. 630 is never going to work in this city with the traffic problems they have, but it can totally work in West Lafayette, Bloomington, and places like that, Madison, Wisconsin. Does Maryland, do you have any idea if it's ever been an issue with Maryland that they've pushed with the league? All right, a couple of things. Number one, you're right, I have nothing to do with when the Big Ten network starts games. that memo never crossed my desk since I don't work for the Big Ten network. I share your frustration.

It's obvious and it looks the, I hate this term, but this is true, the optics of it. It just looks terrible. The students are away and it's a 6.30 start time and you get heckled like Van Pog, I thought Maryland was basketball school. Well, come to D.C. And, you know, people make comparisons. Well, it would never be like this. Kansas. Of course not. It's Lawrence, Kansas at 9 o'clock at night. It's idiotic to make any comparison to

that. Your question, I assume, boils down to this. I don't assume in West Lafayette or in Madison or in East Lansing or any place they want a 630 start time because it's harder to get there. But it's going to be hardest to get there in Washington, D.C., period. And I think it must just be sorry, you're in this league, and these are when, on occasion, you're going to be playing games. So it's just going to be what it is. If I'm Turgeon, if I'm Maryland, I go to Delaney and the Big Ten, and I go, listen, we need as as few of these as possible, because it just isn't feasible in the D.C. area to have people expected to be able to be there, especially not during water break.

Right. And I said earlier in the show that if you insist on making Maryland play a 630 game in College Park, at least do it when the students are back later in the season. So you at least have a chance at an atmosphere in a crowd and a legitimate home court advantage. Look, it doesn't benefit the Big Ten game to have six, seven thousand people short of a sellout. And that's what you're going to get. It just seems so logical. It's like I don't understand why some of these things can't be discussed and understood

by either the school or the league or both of them together prior to doing it. They have two more of these at home at 630 this year. Do they really? Yeah, they've got another one. Well, they have a 7 o'clock against Indiana next Friday night. Seven o'clock's not great either. It's better than 630, but it's not great. They have one against Purdue at 630, and they have one.

Aaron, you told me there was one other one. Minnesota final game of the season. Or either one of the, a week. end game is fine. Those are both weekday 630. Yeah, you can't do weekdays at 630. What did you think? I agree. I mean, it's tough and it looks bad and I assume

the big 10 would just shrug and go. Sorry. But that doesn't make any sense to me because it's in their interest for more people to come to the games, to allow, you know, to make it more accessible and more convenient

for people to go to the games of the teams in their league. What did you think of Maryland last night? It was their first win over a ranked opponent in three seasons. Well, that's not the staff. It's pretty unacceptable. You know, you've got to beat good teams. And I know that the script, I can't tell you how many games in the past three years followed the same script as last night, where it's competitive. And in the end, you come up two points short. So the fact that they got the win was really big. I'm sure that there are Maryland basketball fans who would have a hard time with or would make some cynical comment about, oh, man, pretty sad that went over Nebraska.

I never thought it would come to this. Well, that comment is just dumb and lacks any context. Nebraska is actually good. They've got veteran guys. They've got talent. They're ranked for a reason. Maryland would have put away a lesser team last night, I think, Nebraska just kept coming.

And it was a significant win. It's significant because Nebraska's ranked. It's significant because that win for the resume is helpful. And it's significant because at this very early juncture of the season, you know, to have dropped your second Big Ten game would have been problematic because, listen, they're going to lose to people that you don't think they're supposed to lose to. They could lose to Rutgers this Saturday. And it wouldn't shock me just because of the youth of this team.

and the depth of the Big Ten this year is such that every win is going to be very, very necessary. So it was what I thought of it was, I'm really happy the script was different at the end. I'm really happy they beat the team that's better than people might think. And I believe it's significant for a young group to experience the emotion and the satisfaction of the accomplishment of that win. Yeah, I mean, I think it just would have been a much more significant. loss than it was a significant win. I understand the context. I understand they're good and they're a veteran team and

and it's going to look decent on the resume at the end of the year. I did, and I told you this last night, I did have this sense of, we just beat Nebraska in basketball. We should beat Nebraska in basketball. And that's a bigger picture

program picture. I'm painting and I'm feeling there. But I mean You know, this isn't, last night was not some sort of momentous win. No, but I don't think anybody's framing it as such. I just think in the context of not of what your perception of their program historically and Maryland's program historically is, it's the context of what's their team right now and what's Maryland's team right now, and Maryland needed to get a win.

Can't afford another loss like they had to see in Hall where, Seaton Hall is pretty good, and that's a game that you'd expect if you're Maryland, you'd win, and they weren't able to solve that riddle, right? And if they would have lost another game in the same kind of frustrating way, that would have been really difficult to stomach. And so they didn't. So let's let us let's let ourselves be happy about it rather than looking at it like, well, we're supposed to beat Nebraska.

You can't really say that right now. Right now you say, hey, that was a good win. You know, just real quickly, and then we'll move to the Redskins. You know, the Big Ten was not pre-season supposed to be this strong. And obviously, it had a non-conference success like it hasn't had in recent years. Who's great? Is Michigan great? Is Michigan State great?

Are they great teams in college basketball? I'm having a hard time figuring out if there truly is a dominant team in the league. I think Michigan and Michigan State will both prove to be really tough, really tough teams to beat. Michigan State's got experience. They've got a bunch of guys, you know, in Winston and Langford and Ward. Like, they got guys. Michigan, I didn't know they're going to be this good. Right.

But they're surprising to me. Like, are they dominant good? I don't think so. I watched them play at Northwestern. They won a game in the way college basketball almost always seems to go, where the home team had a shot at the end, and they missed it, they lost by two. Like dominant? Are they going to roll through the Big Ten season?

No, there's too many good teams in the Big Ten. There's too many teams like Maryland and Indiana and Nebraska that at their place, you're not beating them. Or if you do, it's going to take all you got. So I don't think they're dominant, but I think those two teams, I think the Michigan teams are the class of the league by a lot. I'll tell you that, Nick Ward, man. I mean, I'm watching Fernando last night.

We've watched every game, and so we know how much better he is this year. What a force, physical force he is in college basketball. But, man, Ward is like the same. I mean, he's impossible to stop from getting to the rim when he's on the low post. I'm looking forward to some of these games. You know, I am. And last night made it such that. that we can start to look forward to Indiana a week from Friday night.

Indiana's ranked right now. That's a big home game, you know, and if somehow they can beat Rutgers, which they should be able to do, but I feel the same way you do, it's probably going to be a tight game down the stretch, then maybe there will be some big-time juice for the Indiana game next Friday night. It's a Friday night. That helps a little bit that you don't have to get up, and most people don't and go to work the next day, even though it's an early start.

All right, let's get to the skins. You were very, very eloquent and passionate, and I think it really hit a nerve for a lot of Redskins fans because it was a national thing, and everybody recognizes you're from here. But, you know, all of us have been hammering on this locally, but to hear somebody do it the way you did it nationally, I think people were pleased with most in the fan base were.

What sort of sent you in that direction? Why did your passion for the team in the past, you know, there was a nerve hit. What was it? I think, and you and I have had lengthy conversations before and after, I'd say what I said on the show. And you've made the point, I know you've made it on the podcast, that Sunday wasn't some one-off. I mean, I know you made the point to be that, you know, coming home, that first game, really, against the Colts where you've got a 1-0 record. and the place isn't close to filled. It should have sent bells and whistles off.

For me, it was the fact that at the end of this year, they had the most precipitous drop of fan support at the stadium of any NFL team. The fact that the Liz Clark article in the Post pointed out they were bottom three in attendance for the season in the NFL. And just to turn on your television, and see a division rival in a game to make the playoffs, take over your stadium, to me, was such an insult to the idea of what the Redskins once were that if it didn't resonate with ownership, if it didn't resonate in the front office, if these people that have somehow managed to insulate themselves from reality,

if they didn't have a repulsive reaction to that. If it didn't make them physically ill, then that makes me physically ill. And my fear is that they're so, so detached from anything close to reality that it didn't hit home. And so I felt like the other thing, Kevin, about this game, as opposed to the first game, is this is the last image you have of that franchise for the entire offseason. The last chapter of the book is the one where 40,000 Philadelphia fans or whatever the number was, came in and had a party at your house and is running around the concourse singing fly eagles, flying and Channing, Let's Go Bears.

And if they hadn't been there, no one would have been there. And that to me is just, I hate unacceptable. That's too dramatic. It doesn't have any impact on my life. If it continues to go on that way, it's whatever. It's not hurting me in any way. It ought to be unacceptable to them. So is it?

What are you prepared to do? Is it as simple as moving Bruce Allen? I mean, you can hashtag fire Bruce Allen only want. It doesn't make any difference if Dan Steiner brings in somebody else that is the same as that. So what difference is to make? I don't know what the fix is. I just felt like it was important to just say what I felt. And clearly it resonated with a lot of people who, to your point, were happy just to hear it said somewhere that had a megaphone that was plugged in from, you know, D.C. to L.A.

Yeah, I mean, it's, it was great. I mean, the analogy of royalty, you know, the fact that the Redskins are Sears now and they think their royalty was, and I told everybody about, you know, you. contacting me when you're at the Super Bowl and she said, who are these people? Who are these people? I know. I just couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe it. But I had told you for a while that that's who they were, you know, from a front office standpoint, that it was just, it was, it was incredible, the lack of success and the disconnect from, from reality. But it's strange because I feel like, and I've talked about this a lot, that we've been here so many times, as a fan base.

Like, there, there have been these rock bottom moments. And every single time you're in that rock bottom moment, it's the same story. Like Liz and Maskey and Carpenter did a good job with that story, but it's a same story with some new quotes and some new pieces of information that's been written multiple times over, you know, a 10 to 12 year period. I mean, when Zorns... But hold on, but hold on. But hold on. Hold on.

I'm sorry to interrupt you. Over a 10 to 12 year period. In 2005, the Redskins set an NFL record for attendance. So we're talking about the level of support and buy-in, even in the face of declining accomplishment, continued. This year was a complete bottom falling out that had to have shocked them. I'm not saying that it wasn't. I'm not saying that it wasn't. What I'm saying is what I'm saying is that these rock-bottom moments,

have been very similar to one another in that when you're in it you don't think it could get any worse you know at the end of 2009 at the end of the zorn season that season if you go back and look at it there were multiple games with half-filled stadiums the the kansas city game from early in in the year it was the first time i remember using the description apathetic that apathy was much worse than anger and a portion of the fan base was becoming apathetic. At the end of 2013, the Shanahan ending with the owner picking RG3 over the coach, it seemed like a new rock bottom. At the end of 2014, Gruden's first season at 4 and 12, it was the same conversations.

It always seems like you're in a rock bottom moment, but I think what we've learned here is that there's always further to go. I will tell you this from an attendant standpoint, One of the reasons the drop is reflected the way it is in terms of percentage is because the Redskins have just reported before this year, they've just reported every game as a sellout. They've never given you the real numbers. Everybody that's a Redskin fan that has watched every game knows that there have been half-filled stadiums here in recent years. Now, there's never been a half-filled stadium for a home opener like there was in September of this year. And it's been a a long time since, you know, you've seen a stadium taken over to that effect. It was the biggest crowd of the year, by all accounts. And it's because the Eagle fans came. It was terrible. But, you know, another incredible moment from this year and memorable moment to go with the home opener, the Eagles game, is being down at home 40 to nothing early in the third quarter to

the Giants. That is when I think this season, the Giants. The Giants, the Giants, game, Scott, when they're down 40 to nothing, that's when everybody knew that the Eagle game, if the Eagles were in contention, it would be what it was going to be. Because we've seen it before with Cowboy fans, not to that degree, but we've seen half the stadiums, 55, 60 percent of the stadium, cowboy fans before. It's not, yeah, yeah. It's, I, I wasn't suggesting it was new. I know, like the idea of a, the idea of a role. is, is, you can, I suppose you can turn a blind eye, but that was such a jarring, loud and very nationally consumed sort of, like, and you can point out the Pittsburgh Monday Night game years ago,

which, which I remember being like, whoa, because it was, the Redskins were actually pretty good, and all you saw were terrible towels. Right. So sure. There have been moments, I know. I wasn't acting like this was some epiphany I had. I think it was just a, I've had enough of watching this without saying what I think. Right.

And without just sharing my disgust with the whole, with the entirety of what it's become. And, you know, I don't know if Daniel Snyder in that group is, is even capable of a come to Jesus moment. I don't know. But if this, if this season wasn't it, then it is truly a hopeless endeavor. And I'm sure you've shared, you know, anecdotal. your stories of the people you live there in Montgomery County. And that's why I'm from. And I don't have a friend other than my man Sanko who took his kids that are Eagles fans.

I don't have a friend who would have gone Sunday if you paid him. Like you couldn't get paid actors to take Redskins tickets. And I juxtaposed that with my grandpa, who back in the 80s, we were able to get him one season ticket. I don't even remember the story behind how he got it. And it was in the back row of all. RFK. And my grandpa would go by himself, my Sundays to be eight rescue games a year, and sit by himself, because he was so psyched to be able to go. And I think about that. My elderly grandfather,

bless his heart, Lorenzo, the guy that I told the story about on Thanksgiving Day, and the Cowboys try to kill him. Like, I think about that guy. And now I think about people in D.C. that just don't care, truly do not care, because of how this organization has gone. And that is astonishing. to me. There is no doubt that it's this new rock bottom of even more people, but you and I both know that our friends, you know, most of them, started to check out years ago. I mean, five years ago, you couldn't give away a ticket to some of these games, you know, to people who said, look, even if they were good, it's too inconvenient, the stadium, the experience, and you hit on some of those in your thing on SportsCenter the other night. It's just, it's a new rock bottom. I'll tell you what

is unique about this one. I don't know that I've ever seen, you know, we talk about apathy and indifference and there's no doubt it's at an all time high. And it's much worse than anger. I mean, that that's an emotion that no company that sells a consumer product ever wants their customers to feel. And it's at an all time high. With that said, there's, also never been a louder movement from a social media standpoint with respect to one person in the organization than this hashtag fire Bruce Allen thing. It is, that's astonishing. Go to their Twitter page and just look at the responses to every benign tweet that they send out. Well, now they can't even, now they can't tweet at all because anything they say, they

could tweet out, we're giving out money to anybody that doesn't say fire Bruce Allen. It's unbelievable. We'll give any... Every person that doesn't tweet Fire Bruce Allen will give you $20. It'll be $5.000. But I'm asking you, do you think that they will... And this isn't going to lead to the next question and will it make any difference.

I just want to know, do you think that they will give this irate and apparently much larger than they thought, group of people that want that guy on? Will they give them that? Will they fire Bruce Allen? I have thought for the... the better part of maybe a month and a half, two months, that yes, that they would either fire him or reassign him. Jerry Brewer was on the show with me yesterday, and he said he thinks he'll be reassigned,

but not far enough away to where he won't still have significant influence. And that's a problem. You know, the fan base wants him gone. They don't even want him, you know, hired back as a 1099 employee to consult on stadium matters. They want him gone. And, you know, what you said is 100% true. And I've made this point multiple times over the last month is that it's not going to really solve the problem much. You know, it just gives you a chance of maybe getting lucky with a flukeish hire that turns out better than that one.

I mean, it can't get any worse either. We say that all the time at rock bottom. And then three years later, there's a new rock bottom. But it's the owner. It's the fact that he doesn't believe it. It's him. He doesn't think that there are as many problems as the fans do. And somehow the erosion that you've mentioned, and I've talked about repeatedly ad nauseum, has almost escaped him.

I don't know how that happens other than to say that maybe when you get to a certain level, the caring for all of your, you know, the caring for this business or the attention paid to it just isn't as close. I don't I cannot I cannot process that I don't I don't pretend to know the man

I I do believe that or I don't believe that you could become a successful in business by being completely oblivious to obvious things I don't believe that I do believe that you can get to a place where you're so insulated with people that tell you

it's fine that you miss things but this this had to have been this new rock bottom, this do low, this had to have been something that resonated with him. And I suppose to the degree that I wanted to be one who contributed to helping him realize that, that's why I chose to say when I sit on the show. I'm not suggesting he and the Redskine brass sit down and watch my show, but I would imagine by now, just like the article in the post, I imagine they're aware

it's been sad. Yeah, I mean, I said on the podcast yesterday, I mean, your rant, Sally's column, Jerry's column, all of the people, everybody that's been, I don't think they care. I think people probably relate to them what's been said sometimes, more times than not, they don't know about it. But when they do find out about it, they don't care. They think you're wrong. They think Sally's wrong. They think people like me locally are wrong, dead wrong, that we don't have. the whole story.

And all you can want to... Then they deserve what they get. Yeah, you can... They deserve what they get. When they get empty stadiums, they get taken over by division rivals, and you get nationally pants like that, then you deserve what you get.

And you can continue to put tarps over seats that used to be filled, and you can try to fill tickets on the radio and on TV locally that nobody wants to buy, and you can keep backing like everybody else is wrong. We're not wrong. We're your consumers, and we're right. And so, continue down this path at your own peril.

Yeah, exactly. The NFL playoffs start this weekend. Did you ask me this question, which I actually just asked Joe Banner a few minutes ago, about the three AFC teams at the top and the three AFC teams at the bottom? Did you ask me that or not? Did I steal that from you? It was not me. Okay. So if you had to choose from the top three seeds in the AFC or the bottom, three seeds. The top three are Kansas City, New England, and Houston. The bottom three are Baltimore, the Chargers, and Indy. Which of those two groups will the AFC champion emerge from?

That's really interesting. I would assume the top three, just because I think, I made this comment on my show at some point about the Chiefs. The Chiefs have lost four games. They haven't looked bad in any of them. There hadn't been a game where they looked out of it, and it's because of that offense in Mahomes. I think they're going to be a tough thought. I think the AFC champion comes from the top third, but I understand the question because in luck and in the totality of Baltimore and in Rivers and the totality of the charges, I think you have real live possibilities of them springing upsets.

I just wonder who's best equipped to go into Kansas City and win a game. Is it, you know, Rivers, who's done it already once? Baltimore who almost did it. It took a miracle from Holmes. What's your, I'll take the top three, but is your answer to the bottom drinks? I think so. I think so. In part because I think it'll just take either the Chargers, the Chargers or the Ravens winning. The problem with that is I actually think Houston could go to the Super Bowl also. I really do. Really? I do. I think that outliner there's just so bad that at some point it's just going to cost them.

You can't keep having Watson running around and pulling rabbits out of hats. No, you can't. But I think they will move the ball and score against Indy on Saturday. And then I think they could easily go to Foxborough and win. So then you're, you know, you're two wins away, two games that I think they can win to be in the AFC title game. But the Baltimore thing, you know this. You know I'm a Rivers fan first, and I'm rooting for him more than anything else. in this postseason. I just think that the Ravens are just fascinating to watch, and I think that

there's something about that team all the time in the postseason that they'll have a chance, and the way they play now is so unique, not on defense, but on offense. What will be interesting is to see if they can come from behind, if they get behind, because that's their, there's no chance that Lamar Jackson could throw them back from down. two scores in the second half. Agreed. Agreed. And that's why I have, I've wondered if that exact scenario you just mentioned comes to be, do they just pull, you know, pull the poncho off of Super Joe and see if he's got a,

you know, cape on, you know, and throw flaco in there. I wonder if that would happen because they've been ball control and lean on the defense. But to your point, you know, you're down 17-3 early third quarter. that's a tough, that's a tough comeback script if you're really not trying to throw the ball at all. But I wonder, the thing I really have wondered about is did Baltimore do themselves almost a disservice by how they played against the charges a couple weeks ago? You know, did they show their hand enough that the charges can go back and look at it and figure out where there's a weakness? Or is it just that Baltimore's defense is just so nasty that the charges really aren't able to figure it out? That's the biggest curiosity to me.

I think it's a lot of the latter. I mean, you know, they couldn't run it. They couldn't throw it. They couldn't catch it and make any plays, you know. But you know how these things go. It's like all of a sudden you get one big play and it loosens things up. And when Baltimore is in that front running position defensively, they are really difficult. I think really difficult.

I also think an interesting question, and I had this conversation with Joe Banner when he was on earlier in the show, is if you injected truth serum into John Harbaugh, would he tell you that they've got a better chance to win the Super Bowl if he starts Flacco right from the beginning than Jackson? I mean, he can't do it, but I wonder whether or not, you know, winning a Super Bowl at this point if they'd, if he thinks they'd have a better chance with Flacco. That's an interesting question. One of many. Like, I really believe. this playoffs is the most interesting we've had in years because I think that the, I don't know what the chiefs are in the playoffs. I really, I wonder about the Rams and, I mean, the Bears rather, for the same reason, I wonder about the Ravens, like offensively, even though they're more creative, like is Trubisky a guy that makes a mistake. And the Patriots to me are the biggest and most interesting question, because when they've

been bad this year, they've been worse than I ever remember. Like, that lost at Tennessee where they just were totally outclass. times where Brady just doesn't look close to what he's been, missing wide open guys. And yet they always figure out some way to take what they've got and make it enough. You know, so I don't know. This is a legitimately fascinating playoff picture. And it starts with a really interesting first round. Yeah, it really is.

You know, there's not, as I've looked at the four games for this weekend, I don't really think there's like a major, you know, smell test anti-public side. It's like all of the games, people are making the case for, you know, each team in all four games. You know, you can pretty much do that. Yeah, I'm writing something for the show that's about along the lines of what I was talking about, the big picture of the playoffs in totality and then this weekend. And to me, the best thing you can have in sports from an interest standpoint is when no result would be a

shock. That's what I think we have this weekend. I think you can talk yourself into any result for any of the four games where you kind of shrug and go, well, you're not that one. I mean, Philly winning in Chicago would be the biggest surprise in my opinion. But then you just go, well, you know, Foles last year in the Super Bowl, you know, and the playoffs. I mean, he did some stuff and you go, yeah, that's true. I agree with you on that. And I think a lot of NFL fans think that, you know, Phillies in and now they're the most dangerous team. That would be the most surprising result for me too this weekend is if Philly goes to Soldier Field and beats that team that I've watched this year that I think is as good as any other than Baltimore defensively in the league.

And they've got weapons offensively. I think they're every bit as good as Baltimore defensively. I mean, every bit is good. Yeah, I think you might be right on that. And then the only surprise in the postseason in general for me would be if New Orleans lost at home. It wouldn't be a shocker, shocker. But it would be the...

It depends on who it is. it would depend on who it is, but you're right. To me, them, like, breeze in that building is just a different animal entirely. And so that's the one thing that feels like the, you know, the strongest candidate. But we've also seen them look much more beatable down the stretch in the last month than we did.

It stretches during the middle of the season. So, I don't know. I mean, I'm always excited about the playoffs. Yeah, me too. This year is a... All right. Have a great weekend. I'll talk to you. See you. I'm sure we will.

Have a good one. If you're listening to the podcast and you know others that want to listen to the podcast, but they tell you that they don't know how to do a podcast, just tell them to go to the Kevin Sheehan Show.com. I get that all the time. I'll get people that'll say, hey, I heard that, you know, you're doing this podcast, and I'll say, have you listened? And if they say no, they'll tell me that it's because they don't do podcasts.

That's the answer. don't know how to do a podcast. You don't have to know how to do a podcast. It's really easy to use your phone and use Apple podcasts or iTunes, as all of you know, to listen to a podcast. But most people know how to find a website on the internet. So just tell them to go to the Kevin Sheehan Show.com and they can listen very easily whenever they want to listen. And also, and I've asked this of all of you before. If you haven't subscribed, it doesn't cost anything. You don't have to give any information, but if you're listening on a platform, Apple Podcasts, iTunes, Stitcher, tune in, Google Play, Spotify, and they give you a chance to subscribe to the podcast, do that. It just

helps us, and it'll definitely help us even more during the off season when football's not going on. So if you don't mind doing that, it really is. a big help. It's not going to take up any phone space. It's just you getting the podcast as a subscriber when it's done each day. It doesn't force you to listen if you don't want to listen. It just, it makes it easier and it makes it better for us. Also, rate it if they give you a chance to review it or rate it. That helps as well. Aaron just pointed something out to me right after Scott. We recorded Scott on the podcast, and that is the breaking news of the day. that the domestic violence charge against Ruben Foster has been dropped.

Here's the story on ESPN. The state attorney's office in Florida has dropped the misdemeanor domestic violence charge against Redskins linebacker Ruben Foster. That according to Hillsborough County Court Records. The charge stemmed from the November 24th incident between Foster and his former girlfriend the night before his former team, the 49ers, played the Buccaneers in Tampa. He had been scheduled for arraignment on Thursday today. He was released in late November by the 49ers.

And of course, the Redskins claimed him on waivers just two days after that, and they took heavy criticism, a ton of criticism for doing it. I don't need to spend a lot of time on this, because I've said this from the beginning, from the day that they signed him, It doesn't matter if he's guilty or innocent. It was not smart for the Redskins on that particular day with very little due diligence other than perhaps one or two players that they talked to on their own roster that had played

with Ruben Foster at Alabama. It was not, in my view, this is my opinion, was not very smart of them to sign Rubin Foster on that particular day in that particular moment. It wasn't. And I said on that day, it doesn't matter, guilt or innocence. And in fact, left open the possibility, the real possibility that he would be found innocent of these charges or these charges would be dropped. And therefore, he would be potentially eligible to play.

It doesn't mean that the league still can't suspend him. for now a third arrest in, I think it's a year in three months, you know, in 15 months total, the second domestic violence incident. But anyway, he now has the opportunity potentially down the road if the league doesn't suspend him to play football. We know that now because his legal situation as it relates to this previous incident is now done. Here's what I would recommend to the team. Do not do what you've done before in these situations. Do not raise your arms in a V and do not strut as if you were right and everyone else was wrong.

Most reasonable people assumed that there was a possibility that he was innocent. We still didn't think a lot of reasonable people that it made sense for the Redskins to be the team that signed him, 72 hours after his third arrest and second domestic violence arrest in less than a year. I hope for that young man that he figures it out and gets it together, and for the Redskins, it would be incredible if he were cleared and never got into trouble again and became a great player for them. It would. It would be great for them. Doesn't mean that when they did it, it made sense to some. It didn't to me. We were going to do coaching blunders today, but man, the show's run long with two long interviews.

I can do some of those tomorrow. I have them. I've got the list of them. Tomorrow, I think Cooley will be on with us tomorrow. So tune in for that. But thanks to Joe Banner, really enjoyed the conversation with him. Scott as well. We do Scott every Thursday, as most of you know.

Aaron did a great job producing. Did I have anything else? The only thing I was going to say, actually, I did have something else. You know what we didn't get into? since it happened at all, is John Wall down for the year with surgery. This is true. I mean, I know that it's not a big deal to most of you. It's an interesting deal to me because unlike last year where I said, you know, look,

they're playing great without them. They're playing team ball without them. Hashtag everybody eats. But there's no chance of them doing anything if they were to get to the playoffs without him. I actually feel a little bit differently this year. think the team will play better. They won last night. They won their second straight game. I mean, they beat Atlanta at home. Alex Lenn had a great game against him. What did her do last night? I didn't see what Hurt her did. I did. I did see Alex Lennett at 24 and 11. He had a great game against

him when they hammered him in Atlanta a few weeks ago. But I am more interested. None of you are. That's fine. In watching this team with Satteransky as the, you know, 35 minute plus a night point guard. and to see them play differently and with more people involved and with more movement and with more of a chance, I think, right now than the way John Wall was playing to be successful. Look, the Eastern Conference, you know, there's still only, what, two games out of the last playoff spot, three. There are three games out.

They could still make a run to 500 and be in the postseason. Nobody cares. That was a total waste of everyone's time. I apologize for that. Anyway, have a great day and talk to you tomorrow.