The Kevin Sheehan Show - Skins: New Stadium Site Not Guaranteed

Episode Date: January 8, 2019

Kevin and Thom discuss the Clemson title win over Alabama last night. A ton of Redskins talk on the show includes an appearance by Liz Clarke/Washington Post with an update on the Skins' stadium situation. Liz and Thom both think that a new site for a Skins' stadium may never be provided. Kevin and Thom also spend time on the four WildCard games and the upcoming Divisional Round playoff games. <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. You're listening to The Sports Fix. All right. Finally, he's back. God, you had some time off there. What were you doing? Well, I had some... You missed four shows. I did not miss four shows. Two shows. No, two. We all missed two shows. That's true. Because of the holidays. We did. But you missed two. I missed one. What? The Thursday after New Year's. Yeah, because I had some personal business to deal with. All right. I know you did. I hope everything went well with your...

Everything went okay. You know, don't toy with me. I'm not feeling too well. I know. I'm not feeling great either. I mean, I've been... My bedroom at night sounds like a black lung ward. I was in the car yesterday for seven hours.

After the show yesterday, I took my son back to Penn State, my youngest son back to Penn State, where he is a freshman. And it should be... Like I've made it in three hours, two hours, 50 minutes to State College when I'm really flying, no traffic late at night. And then sometimes it can take three and a half hours, depending on traffic. And yesterday there were a couple of issues coming back with traffic and just not moving for 15 minutes at a time. So I was in the car for seven hours. I did get to listen to the first quarter of the game last night with Sean McDonough doing the game on ESPN radio.

He is so good at everything he does. I just love that guy as a broadcaster. Yeah. I think he should still be doing the Monday night games, even without John Gruden. They could have put him with somebody, I mean, not bugger or wit. Actually, bugger's not terrible,

but they could have left him in the Monday night thing, but I don't even think he wanted to do Monday night football. I think he enjoys college sports. Probably does. Let me ask you, this is your youngest son. Yeah. Does not have a car.

You're not as a freshman. You can't have cars at Penn State. Okay, but he has a car. Yeah. I was just about to give you remarkable credit for having a freshman in college without a car. I was going to say, that requires tremendous discipline. You can't credit me for that. He's had one.

Actually, we have one where my son who's at Maryland and the one who's at Penn State sort of are now sharing it because one of them got sent back. But anyway, no. I guess, yes, he's had a car for a while, unfortunately, but you can't have one at Penn State. So that's good too, probably. You can walk everywhere up in State College. On my drive up there yesterday, I get a call from Steve Sands. Steve Sands Golf Channel, NBC Golf.

Steve's a really good friend of mine. We've had him on the show for years. He's such a great golf analyst. But, you know, those of you who know Steve or have heard Steve know that he's a huge redskins, huge D.C. fan. Massive Redskins fan, Caps, Nats, Terps, the whole thing. And he said, it took me a while to get to it because yesterday's show was officially the longest show in the history of the Kevin Sheehan Show podcast. Really? And I wasn't on it. And you weren't even on it. Holy Macra. To suck up all the

the air. But I don't even know how it got that way. We had a couple of guests. A couple of guests and then, you know, 15 minutes on the Ravens game. We'll do that. Is that how much time I spent on the Ravens game? really? I don't know if it was exactly that much. Anyway, he said it took me a while to get to it. Oh, boy. Oh, my partner is really not feeling well.

God. I'm doing my best, baby. What do you think about the no cough buttons in the studio? We've got to get some cough buttons up in this joint. Didn't I back far away that you couldn't hear it? No, we could hear it. The way you cough? Okay.

Black lung coughing over there. I know, I'm telling you. So anyway, Steve said it took me a while to get to it, but he goes, it was the best part of the show. Why didn't you put it closer to the front? So for those that missed it yesterday, we started talking, actually, it just occurred to me as to why we got to it. The Fox basketball coverage of the Big Ten uses the NBC NBA theme from the 1990s. Aaron, play that real quickly.

Yeah, this, Tommy, remember this? Oh, yeah. This is the Bulls of the 90s and NBC. So I said that, I mentioned that Fox is using this for the, you know, this. their Big Ten telecasts. You can't steal this stuff and use it. This is iconic music that is identifiable with the NBA on NBC in the 1990s. Anyway, that led to a conversation about some of my favorite, you know, CBS NFL sound, you know, and opening themes.

And Aaron pulled this up yesterday. Listen. The Washington Redskins offensive line is one of football's best, but today their reputation will be challenged by long. Lawrence Taylor and a fired up to your defense. The Giants are confidently riding the crest of a six-game winning streak. And with the right calls from Phil Sims, they hope to roll a seven today. You got to listen to what's coming up here, Tommy. Giants also face some stiff challenges today.

First, their defense must contain Washington's fleet receivers like Gary Clark. And their unharrowded pass blockers will have to contend with Dexter Manley, one of the best pass rushers in the NFL. Manly relishes the spotlight, and today it shines brightly in the season's biggest game. Joe Morris ran the Giants to victory in their first meeting, but today's rematch is at RFK City, where the skins are hard to beat,

and where tickets are impossible to find. Hold on. Oh, my God. Hold on. As sports presents the National Football League. Today it's the New York Giants against the Redskins of Washington, live from RFK Stadium, sold out for the 157 consecutive time. Those were the days.

So Sands calls me and he goes, I just kept listening to it. He said it, the hair stood up on the back of my neck listening to that. And it does. I mean, that's what it was here for three decades, 70s, 80s, and half of the 90s. You realize it's never going to be like that again. it never will. I mean, it's not just the Redskins. It's an NFL thing. What do you mean? There's only a handful of places where it gets like that anymore. That was, both of those teams were 11 and 2 going into that game. The two best records in the NFL,

and that's why some are all referred to it as the season's biggest game at RFK, mid-December, and that was the 86 Giants that won. They swept the Redskins, beat them three times, including in the NFC title game. And that day at RFK, I said that the Redskins got blown out. The final score was 24-14, but it was 24-7, and LT dominated the game. Absolutely dominated the game. I was thinking about LT yesterday, as it relates to this when Sands called. You know, Chicago, I had been raving about their defense all year in Kille-Mack.

Can you imagine LT in a big playoff game not having a sack? No. Or having Nick Foles go down the field? Absolutely not. On the final drive of the game. That's why when Belichick remember earlier in the year when he was asked about Kaleel Mack, he said, well, we're talking about Lawrence Taylor. Yeah.

We're talking about L.T. here. Absolutely. Caller Mac, please. That's very fair. You're absolutely right. There's no way that happens with Lawrence Taylor at his peak. He had three sacks in that game. In the season's biggest game, LT came into RFK and had three sacks.

And he's going against, like Pat Summerall said, the best offensive line in football. Right. So anyway, I love listening to some of that stuff. And that one, Aaron just pulled up randomly and it had it all. It had the tickets. The tickets are impossible to get. The sellout streak, the whole thing. All right, there you go.

We'll do some of that here in the offseason. I am actually, I've already done it. I've put together a list of the 25 most memorable Redskin games. It's a personal list. Of course. But I'm going to do that when the season ends here in a few weeks. I'm going to do that for 25 consecutive podcasts. Count them down 25 to 1.

And you'll be on two days a week and you can do two of them a week with me. But we were going to do this. You may recall, we were going to do this on the sports fix. And I put this list together like four years ago. And I've updated it, although there aren't many memorable games here in the last few years. No. But we just never got around to doing it. Pick one memorable game from the last few years.

From the last few years memorable? This is an easy one for me. What? The Eagle game because of the crowd? No. The giant game. It can be also memorable because it was so. Giants 2015?

No. God, I got to think. Like, we've had what, the giant game where Kirk throws the pick at the end? No, no. It's not a negative thing. It's a positive thing. But there haven't been many positives. You like that?

You like that? Do you like that? The Tampa game? The comeback? Yeah. That basically... It's not a top 25 most memorable game. But in the past three or four years, it may be the most memorable.

Yeah. In the past three or four, under the Jay Gruner regime, that's still the most memorable win because it probably saved his job. You know what? That is true. I don't know if it saved his job. We were talking about it. It was the Code Red game.

Yeah, that's what he called Code Red. Yeah. So I would say that Tampa comeback. And then how do you like me now is the Green Bay game? Oh, that's the Green Bay game. To McLuhan, right? Yeah. You like that as the Tampa come back.

You like that as the Tampa game. How do you like me now is to McLuhan walking off the field after the Green Bay Sunday night game? Yeah, I, yeah, it's, there haven't been a whole hell of a lot of memorable, you know, great football games, you know. I'll tell you what was a memorable game. The way they beat Seattle last year, do you remember that game at Seattle? Seattle with basically hardly anybody on the team at that point with all the injuries. And Seattle was decent.

And they went to Seattle and won against that team in that stadium where they had to go 85 yards there at the end to win it. That was sort of memorable. But they don't have a lot of memorable games in the last few years. Not positive ones at least. Not positive ones. Anyway. So we'll have a lot of that sound and we'll do the top 25 memorable games of all time. All right.

Did you watch a game last night? I watched some of it. I didn't stay up for the whole thing. I actually, I bailed pretty early when it was still a really competitive game, and I was kind of surprised when I woke up and found out what the score was. I mean, I think it was 1614 when I was watching the game. Alabama had a 1614 lead. Yeah.

And I was kind of stunned when I saw what happened. So what happened? Well, so I'm going to start with this, and then we'll talk about the game. The talk this morning, and I've been listening to a lot this morning, watched a lot this morning, and late last night, is just how, you know, Alabama was somehow fraudulent this year, and Clemson's actually the Alabama that we've been talking about, and Clemson's really the premier team. They've won, they're just as good as Bama because they've won two out of the last four. I'm not going to disagree with any of that, but I will say this, if those two teams played 10 times, same rosters, same coach, coaching staff, same field, same weather, 5-5. You would, this result, 44 to 16, would happen once for Clemson, it would happen once for Bama, and then the other eight games would be tight, hard-fought games. That's my feeling about this.

It's not like last year where Alabama completely shut Clemson down. Alabama was moving the football against Clemson's very deep. They had. I think they had the same amount of yards. They did. They had similar yardage. Yeah. Alabama made the mistakes. Alabama panicked in the third quarter. If you had already tuned out,

it's 31-16, opening drive of the third quarter. It's fourth and six, and they line up for a field goal, and they run the worst fake field goal play you've seen since swinging gate. Not just the play, but the play was against a fake field goal defense. Right, against a fake field goal defense. It was just, it was the one moment where I was like, wow, Bama's panicking down 31-16, kicked the field goal. Play the game. College football's different from the NFL. You get so many more possessions in college football games. These games last forever.

You know, a 20-point lead, in that case, if they had made a field goal, and the kicker was having issues, I understand that. But if they make the field goal, it's 3119. That's nothing in that particular game. Look, there were unbelievable performances. And I think everybody's feeling about Trevor Lawrence, and I'm talking about the experts who have said for several weeks running, this guy would be the number one pick in this upcoming draft if you were eligible for the draft.

It's not even close. Kuiper's been saying that for a while now. And Kuiper said again early this morning, I think on ESPN, that Trevor Lawrence right now would be graded out like in the Peyton Manning, Andrew Luck, John Elway, you know, area. So how is he going to stay in school for two more years? How what kind of pressure is that going to build up? You know, I was thinking about that. Here's where it would get really interesting.

What if he had a career-ending injury in his junior year? Where he, that would be, that could be the push to get players to have the right to enter the NFL whenever they want to enter the NFL, like you can in life in general. And right now, you need three fully. years out of high school before you can enter the NFL draft. But anyway, that's a conversation for another day, but you're right. How is he going to last? He's going to last based on the rules. They're not going to allow him to go to the NFL. But the conversation every week, it's going to be about that. It's going to be about how can they keep this guy in college football?

How come he's not playing in the NFL? You know what he said after the game? They asked him, how many more of these do you think you have in you? And he said three more, as if he's staying through his senior year. He is really good, and Alabama's really good. And that was the one thing that I wanted to get to before we get to some of the things that happened in the game is that I don't think by virtue of watching a 44 to 16 blowout last night that if they were to play this same game next week with this in mind, that I would think like Alabama didn't have a chance.

Alabama's really good. They're really well coached. It was a game that got. away from Alabama. Tua made a bad throw early, but they came back, they had the lead. You know, they couldn't stop Clemson's, you know, explosiveness. And we've known all year that this is, this has been Sabin's best offensive team, not his best defensive team.

Look, they really were in trouble against Georgia, too. You know, Georgia had a two-score lead against Bama in the SEC title game. But I just, I'm not going to rush to, well, Clemson was, they are the national champion. They were the better team last night, but I am not about to declare them much better than Alabama this year. I don't think they can. I don't. And I'm not about to claim that Clemson's now in for the label of what Bama's had, which is the most dominant premier program in the sport. It is one of the two or three or four.

You know, it's right there. And they got everybody coming back or a lot of people coming back, including their quarterback, including their running back. including their freshman wide receiver, Justin Ross, who was unbelievable last night. Some of those catches were ridiculous. The one-handed catch on the sideline was the best play of the game, but he had incredible catches. And some of those throws were a little bit off, but it was also because he was getting drilled as he threw it. I really thought that a bit of a turning point, and I'm not going to say that in last night's game, that Clemson would have lost the game.

But I really thought Bama panicked with that fake field goal. I thought they're They're moving the ball down the field. It's a good drive to open up the second half. It's only 31-16. Aaron knows this because he watches college football every week is nothing. A 15-point deficit in college football when you have explosive offensive players is nothing in college football. It can be a race and you can be up 15 within an hour of real time.

Right. And so I didn't think the game was over at halftime by any stretch. And as Bama was driving, you know, they got stopped on the third end. And Clemson made some really good plays. they were really well-coached. You know, Venables is one of the best defensive minds in the country and has been for a long time, going back to when he was at Georgia Tech and other places. But Clemson rolled, man.

I mean, they rolled. I just, I don't think this means that they're so much better than Alabama. I guess that's the only point I was going to make about that. The game itself, you know, there was no drama after Clemson got up 44 to 16. I'll tell you what, at 37 to 16, I still thought Bama could still make something happen here. If they can score and put the pressure on them, the final drive of the game was the most interesting because you've never really seen a Nick Sabin team down by this much. The biggest loss they've ever had is 15 points, and they lost last night by 28.

Clemson took over after an Alabama punt with 10 minutes to go inside their own one-yard line, and they ran the clock out on that drive. 14 plays, 94 yards, 10 minutes, 2 seconds. to run the clock out. Sabin's team actually threw in the towel over those final 10 minutes. You could see it because most of what Clemson was doing was running it right down their throat. And that to me was surprising because 10 minutes to go down 28, it's over. But when they were down 37 to 16 in the third quarter, I still didn't think the game was over. Because I've seen Bama score 35 points in 20 minutes. What was the line on the game when it kept off?

Alabama went off at five. I did not give out a smell test pick yesterday because I didn't like the game either way. And it's a good thing that I didn't give out anything because I would have leaned under in the game yesterday. So I'm glad I didn't. So what was the over? It went off at 57.5, somewhere around there. 57, 57 and a half. And the game looked like it was going to sail over the total.

As it turns out, especially because of that 10-minute drive to run the clock out at the end, it ended up being 60 points, only three over the total. So, you know, somehow you teased Clemson and the under or the over, you were in good shape in that game. The, it was interesting last night. The action was split. You know, I texted with somebody, and I'm going to tell you what he said to me last night right before kickoff. Because I was sitting there in the car driving back, and I was like, you know, if I'm going to get home and watch this and maybe listen to the first quarter, I might as well have something on it.

Yeah. And I didn't like the game at all. So I didn't like the side. They needed, offshore needed the under a little bit. And they needed, hold on what do you say? And they needed Clemson a little bit. So they got Clemson. So there's a little bit more action on Bama last night, a little bit,

and a little bit more action on the over. But I didn't play the game. I ended up sitting last night out. And college football's over. Tommy, this game, I haven't seen it yet. I don't think it's out yet. it is going to be a poorly rated television game. First of all, there was no juice for it going into it

because it's Clemson-Bama for the fourth time and people were sick of it, even though if you're a college football fan, this one you were looking forward to watching. I was looking forward to watching last night's game because I thought it was the best team that Davos had, and it was clearly the best team that Sabins had offensively. Anyway, so I was looking forward to seeing it,

but you combine the fact that there wasn't a ton of juice for this going into it with the, the blowout nature of the game that you basically everybody tuned out in the second half, it's going to be a bad TV rating, is my guess. It probably will be. I mean, the tickets, the ticket market really took a beating. A beating. You know, you almost have to project here moving forward that most of these games are going

to be played by teams in the South. You know, you might get a Big Ten team like in Ohio State in there. But, you know, it's going to come from the group over the next few years, Clemson. Bama, LSU, Ohio State. No Pac-12 team looks like they're going to be in a championship game anytime soon. So playing it in Santa Clara, and given that this was the fourth matchup, I can imagine that within those two fan bases, there is some fatigue. Oh, absolutely.

Right? Yes. Even though both teams were undefeated? Yeah, you got to take that into consideration. But I wonder what the bid is to host something like that. I think it's extraordinary. It's got to be. I mean, where was it last year, Dallas?

has had it twice. Santa Claris. But Dallas is not a bad trip. No, no. And I think if this game had been in Miami or if it had been in Dallas, it may have been. Or Atlanta. It would have been different. I think that's true. But to get onto a plane to watch this for a fourth time to go out to Northern California to watch it, there just wasn't a lot of juice. My prediction is that the TV rating is going to take a pounding from this. Both teams, I still personally think Georgia was in their category, talent-wise, coaching-wise, et cetera. And I had Trevor Madich on the show yesterday, and he thought Ohio State was in that category.

I don't feel that way. I thought Ohio State was just a tick below this group in part-timey, because I just didn't think Ohio State was very good defensively at any point this year. Oklahoma was really bad defensively. Georgia was the most complete team other than Bammas. in Clemson. Don't you agree with that, Aaron? I mean, I know Georgia got, you know,

whooped by Texas in the Sugar Bowl, but if that game had been for massive stakes, I don't know that you would have seen that result. I think Georgia, like Michigan, they were very disappointed and it was hard to get up for their next game after Michigan in the biggest game of the year got blown out by Ohio State,

and then Georgia in the SEC title game blew a two-score lead and lost the SEC title game. Georgia has the same level of athletes. both sides of the ball that Clemson and Bama have. I think watching them this year that if they had been in the tournament, if they had qualified, it's possible we could have seen them in the game last night. Well, if the tournament was bigger, maybe they would have. And this is something that's going to, you know.

Well, they said yesterday that it's not going to happen anytime soon. I know. I know that, but have you seen some of the deals that the conferences are cutting with the cities for their conference championship games? they have outs. The ACC cut a deal with Charlotte where they can get out of their deal in the event that there is an expanded playoff field for the NCAA playoffs, and they decide to forego an ACC title game. Remember what the number one reason for college reshuffling and conference expansion was?

Those championship games. Yes. Which are meaningless 85% of the time because of the playoff field being limited. to four. And before that, just two. And now, if you had an expanded playoff field to six or eight, you would have so many more of those conference championship games being meaningful games. They'd be playing games. And they're talking about doing away with some of them. That doesn't make any sense to me. You know this. I'm a pro-eight-team playoff guy. I don't like waiting, you know, in some cases, nearly a month or longer for the semifinal games. I agree.

And then you got to wait another week for the championship game. I think if you, the week after the championship Saturday in December, played an eight-team quarter-final Saturday, it would be one of the great days in all the sports. Listen, it's not just about college football fans. It's about engaging the fringe fan. And the fringe fan doesn't even though they're playing college football in January still at this point. There's a lot of time that goes off between this stuff. You're right.

It's too much time. and the bowl games are all NIT games. They're all exhibitions. If you're in a playoff, you're building up momentum. And imagine, and I've said this so many times,

it's my personal preference, and not everybody agrees, but if you had that weekend of the Army, the Army Navy game, is the Army Navy game the week after the championship games? I always forget. Yes.

Okay, so if you took that weekend, that one Saturday, where there is one college football game, and just a ton of college basketball, basketball on television. And now the NFL has tried to fill the void here in recent years by playing two games on that Saturday. But if that became quarterfinal college football playoff Saturday, with home field advantages, one through eight, you've got a game in the big house, and you've got a game in Tuscaloosa, and you've got a game in Death Valley, and you got all of these iconic venues,

too, because college football in so many ways is about the venues that these games are played in. And you started at, you know, the first game kicks off on the East Coast, you know, at 1130, and then you get a 3 o'clock, and then you get a 630 start, and then you get a 10 o'clock, you know, which is your last starter. However, it would play out over a day. That would be a phenomenal day in sports. You're not letting a month elapse between the conference championship games and the two semifinal games. I think it would be awesome.

And then you use the bowls just like you have for the two semifinal games. By the way, we just got the ratings in 14-6 overnight. That's the lowest since 2012 last year's was 16-7. Yeah, I mean, the blowout had a lot to do with it. Right. Now, the 14-6, what was it last year again? 16-7. And 16-7 for Bama, Georgia, which was a great game.

You know what, 14-6 compared to that is actually better than I would have thought. Because I would have thought, given the blowout nature of that, game that it would have done even worse compared to last year. Because last year was a spectacular game start to finish. All right. We're going to get to the Redskins next. Tommy's got a lot of thoughts on a lot of different things because we haven't been together in a while. Yeah, but you know, they float in and out of my head and I can't guarantee I'll be able to grab them all at any given moment. I'll try to remind you of everything. Window Nation is a big fan of this podcast. Harley, Aaron, Eric, they listen all the time.

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are installed. 86690 Nation or windownation.com. That's 86690 Nation or WindowNation.com. All right, while you were in different places in holiday vacationing and all of that and off, I was in here doing shows some of those days and talking about the Ruben Foster being cleared of those charges. I want you to weigh in on that. Jay Gruden was, it was reported on Friday by J.P. Finley that he has been told he's back for the 2019 season. Where do you want to start?

Well, let's start with Ruben Foster. I'm so sick of Ruben Fawkes. I spoke for you a little bit on one of the shows saying we both had multiple conversations here where we went out of our way to say that this had nothing to do with his innocence or guilt. Right, right. That was repeated. And it was a situation where the red, you know, it would be tough for any team to get involved with a guy who was, less than 48 hours out of jail on his second domestic violence charge in a year.

A charge, not conviction. I get that. But for this team, they were the last team to be able to do that. For any number of reasons, a lot of which were their own self-inflicted wounds, one of which was a couple of months ago, they fired a longtime team official because of his role in the NFL true-eating scandal, which the Redskins were front and center with questionable photo shoots,

pressure to have, you know, relationships with ticket holders, season ticket holders and corporate sponsors, and then you turn around and you take a chance on a guy who's accused of domestic violence. You couldn't be the team to do that. It was a damaging thing. It's one of the things that was the tipping point

for Brian Lafamina and his crew to create a, the Exodus to get them out of here because in part, I mean, they went to ticket, they went to Snyder and Allen and they said, look, we're already getting pushback on this. We're getting push back from people with a lot of money who spend money on this team who say this is a bad look and they don't want to be associated with it and they were basically ignored. We're going to have Liz Clark on the show in a little bit. It may have impacted them politically. Yeah. With respect to a new stadium. So it's just whether you think it's fair or not, whether you think it's right or not, that's the political reality of it.

It was not, again, it's an old saying, but the juice was not worth the squeezing in a situation like this. And, you know, people, I know you don't want to, you don't want to believe this. You want to think the football is football and the business is business. But we saw Jay Gruden and his post-game press conference basically said it's my job to put a project. on the field to get the people back in the stands, it's all connected. Look, I don't disagree with you. I'm going to digress here for a moment because I want to get back to your thoughts on Foster. I don't disagree with you that the football operation and the business operation aren't

connected in many ways. The only thing that I would say to you is that Brian Lafamina's, you know, plan to sell tickets and to get more people under the seats so that it's a better home environment. Brian Lofamina was never going to sell an additional ticket on his own. This team's dysfunction on the football field, all right? It's average to sub-average stretch of 20 years, 26 years now, is that's the difference between having people that care and having people that don't care. There's no doubt that a contributing factor has been the off-putting way in which they've conducted their business.

there is no doubt that that's made it worse. But what started all of this was not winning and having not won forever. I'll grant you that. But to get people to come back, they have to win. And they have to do more than win. I would grant you that, but that is first, second and third on the list. Of course it is. And Brian Laughamemeter wasn't going to help them win.

But they were six and three this year and nobody was showing up. I know. I know. It's true. And, you know, again, I've said this a million times. The opener to me was the biggest shocker of the year. Not the Eagle game, the opener against Indy. People don't feel good about being a Washington Redskins fan anymore.

Back to Foster just for a moment, because I did spend a lot of time on this, but I didn't do it with you. And I like having these conversations with you rather than with myself. I, you know, several people, and I know you probably got this on Twitter, too, the whole, oh, you guys are going to take it back now. No, it didn't take anything back because we never talked about innocence or guilt. We went out of our way to say that it wasn't about innocence or guilt. But the one thing that I said to you shortly after it happened, and I still feel this way, two things. One, the league should have never ever put any of its 32 teams in position to claim Ruben Foster off waivers.

I know the league thought no one's going to do this. Yeah. Okay? I get it. And I understand that the league was really upset because the Redskins went and F them again, you know, and made them look bad again. But they should have understood that, you know what, we got some organizations here that aren't very bright. And we should protect them from themselves. So that was the first. And I said this to you, you know, back at the end of November, what had happened. But the league is not very good on figuring out their domestic violence situation either. No, that's true. But it's precisely because they've had so many issues, you know, handling these domestic assault cases that they should have said, oh my God, we can't, he just got released. We must make sure that nobody claims him. I agree.

So I put some of it on the league. The second thing is, and I really do strongly believe this, and I said this to you at the time also, and I know I'm being repetitive for those of you that have heard this on a previous podcast in the last week or so. This is where the Redskins need desperate help. is where they really, Tommy, lack intelligence, you know, in every facet of their front office, from the actual PR people that could be directly responsible or directly, a direct contributor to handling these things in a different way, to clearly Dan and Bruce and everybody else. All they had to do, I'm not saying it would have made it go away, but if they had just owned it instead of shrunk and push Doug Williams out there,

And Doug, God bless him, because we know he didn't do it intentionally. He messed it up on the doc interview and then had to come out and apologize. It made Bruce look gutless and Dan, by extension, look gutless. And if they had just come out and said, look, we signed him for one reason and one reason only. He's a really good football player, and we think he can help us win. We're owning this. But let us just also say he'll never play for us if he's found guilty of these children. charges. He may not play for us if he's cleared from these charges because the league may have

something to say about this. But at this point in our current situation, we're not out to please anybody. We know we're going to take a PR hit. We respect those that are going to criticize us brutally for doing this. We know it's coming. We know it's coming. But we are in the mode of doing one thing and one thing only, and that is trying to create a winner. He's an exceptional player. We loved him coming out of the draft. That's why we claimed them. Beat us up. You're going to do it anyway. You do it regardless of what we do, and we understand that some of that is on us. But this is why we have signed the player. This is Bruce talking or Dan talking, not Doug Williams talking, and owning it so that at least intelligent people could say to themselves, okay, I don't

like that they did it. Think it's stupid that they did it. But at least they're owning it. And at least they saw what was coming. Like they were blindsided by the reaction. That's that's amazing. They did the exact opposite of what you said. I know. And it made Doug look bad and it and unnecessarily so. Sometimes when they when they F up big time, there could be they could minimize the damage with decent public relations, but they've never in that department ever. Well, because they don't value it. They don't. They don't. I don't know that it's that they're. don't value it. No, they don't, they don't value it. I don't think they're smart enough to find the right people, and if they have the right people, to listen to those people. Well, I think

they don't listen to people, but I don't think they value it. Do you agree, though, if they had just owned it, it would have been a slightly different reaction? It would have been better. Yeah. It would have been better. They would have been in control of the story instead of the story controlling them. All right, what do you think about Gruden coming back next year? I'm fine with it. I mean, I like slap happy, Jay. He's a nice guy to have around. That was my number one reason yesterday. I went through all of the reasons as to why he's back, and the number one reason, everybody likes Jay Jordan.

Yes, even when he supposedly gets mad like he did at me at the press conference. That was nothing. I know. He is a good guy. He treats people with respect. And when he walked off the podium after the last game, he wished everybody a happy New Year. How can you not like this guy?

Oh, God, you're such an easy sell. Well, I am. I am in an easy sell. Look, he's not. a good, he's not necessarily a good coach, he's not a bad coach. He's an average coach. He is an average coach. And their situation next year, unless you hated the guy you were going to hire to replace him, you would not burden a new coach with the burden that they're going to face next year here at Redskins Park.

I mean, you would not hire a new coach and say put your hands behind your back. here's your quarterback who we don't think is ever going to play again, and we're paying them $20 plus million a year. You know what, you can't bring a new coach into a situation like that. You've got to at least have a semblance of a clean slate for a new guy to start, or at least a way for him to dig his way out. There's no way to dig out of next season. They're just going to have to take it and like it.

So why not have Groot? It's the NFL. Anything can happen. But anything never happens to this particular franchise. This was actually, I don't think I've said this in recent podcasts, even though I've mentioned the fact that the NFL's designed for everybody to have a decent year once out of every four years. I'm afraid that this particular season, all the breaks in those first nine to ten games

were going their way. I mentioned yesterday they led the league through 10 games in opponents' missed field goals. They were getting every break possible, and yet they still couldn't make it pay off. So we may have to wait another four years for that kind of a season that you get the breaks to go your way. They like Jay. They don't blame Jay for the record. This is to me the biggest problem I have with all of it because there's this delusion about what Jay is with Bruce in particular. I think Bruce thinks he's going to be proven right.

If he just leaves Jay in there and keeps talking Dan into keeping Jay, that eventually he's going to be proven right that he picked the right guy. And the bottom line is if he coaches for another four years, he's going to have another 500 record. Yeah. You know, that's who he is. He lacks urgency. His teams lack discipline. You know, he's good at some things.

He's average at others and he's bad at various things. It's who he is. But to your point, were they going to do better than Jay Gruden in this particular offseason with all of the openings? With so many job openings? I mean, are they going to be? Green Bay just hired Matt LaFleur. I know. So, yeah, they weren't going to be the pick of the litter.

They're never going to be the pick of the litter. So the only way to do this eventually is to do it, and you miss this podcast, you were out, and I just said it's time to go back to the old. If Dan's going to, Dan's a bad owner, if he's going to continue to suck as an owner, he might as well do it his way. Because Bruce was his attempt, believe it or not, to be a better owner. Yeah, I know. You know, it really was.

But, you know, I would have, at this point, if you, if there, If there was breaking news before the Gruden News on Friday, the Redskins, Redskins, one, landed in Detroit and landed in Ann Arbor, Michigan. And they're trying to get Jim Harv ought to come here. I would be excited about that. Well, people would have been. Absolutely. Might as well go back to that way. Yeah.

But still no staff changes as of our recording this on Tuesday. You know what it'll happen? It'll happen Friday afternoon, like the Gruden news leaked out on Friday. They're definitely coming. And what did you make of the news that, you know, that Les Carpenter wrote about the other day? And I've suggested here recently that, you know, Bruce could be reassigned in the organization. I don't think that's going to happen. I mean, I think that was just, that could just be agents talking and wishful thinking,

since agents seem to hate him as much as fans and media does. I mean, he was voted the least trustworthy executive. in the NFL among NFL agents. So I think that's wishful thinking. I think Bruce does what Brutes wants to do. And I think he'll continue to do. He will as long as Dan allows him to. Well, I think that will continue.

Because he doesn't own the team. Right. I think that will continue. I don't think there's going to be any impact at all. I will be real curious because at some point, like at the Combine, he's spoken to the media. I don't know if he did last year or not. He didn't last year.

He did it. Last year? No. The last, Bruce, it's now been, other than the Dan Cilio stuff he does out in Southern California, his friend that hosts a radio show out there. And he'll have conversations occasionally with people outside the market.

I don't remember the last time Bruce spoke locally. It's probably been, he's probably spoken to somebody in the last year. He did the TOP interview before this season. That's true. But I'm talking about a sports. interview. So what I'm saying is and I'm just giving a challenge. That's

strategic on his part. A challenge to any member of the media, sports news or whatever. The next person in the media, at least in this town, that talks to Bruce Allen, better hold him accountable. Better ask the right questions.

And if it's TOP, news guys, he's not coming on with me. They better hold him accountable. We would hold them accountable, but I guarantee he's not coming on with me. me because over the last couple of years on radio, he wouldn't come on with, he wouldn't come on with, I think he came on with Cooley and I two years ago, two and a half years ago was the last time. And then he was much more comfortable going on another show on our station and some places like TOP.

And, you know, safe landings for him. There should be no safe landing for him in this town. I got a, I got a tweet yesterday from. Rob, who said, the exercise you went through yesterday, or today, he sent it to me yesterday, today on the podcast, talking about how the Redskins, even with Alex Smith, would have gone eight and eight, was the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard in my life. Total conjecture. Well, yeah. Of course. Just like it'd be conjecture to you say me when they would have won ten games.

I mean, of course it was conjecture. But I went through this thing yesterday. I said, you know, about Jay Gruden, Tommy. Part of it is that Bruce and Dan really think he's just been a victim of bad luck. Yeah. And that his record, you know, without all of the bad luck, Scott McClune is bad luck. Kirk Cousins was bad luck. You know, he would have been in 44, and 1 instead of 35, 44 and 1.

And this year was another one of those things. We were six and three. We were two games in front of everybody. And I just said, look, first of all, let's stop with the six and three. You're going to be six and four with Alex Smith. He threw two picks against the Texans. They were down 177. and in every game leading up to that point, they had shown no ability to come back against anybody.

Exactly. So they were going to be six and four had he been, had he not broken his leg that day. And Colt McCoy had come in off the bench and provided more offense than we had seen in a month for that team. And then I went game by game. Were they really going to go to Dallas and went on Thanksgiving with Alex Medea? Colt threw a couple of picks, but the defense was terrible. The defense had started to crumble at that point. And then I remember their last win.

The Tampa win. Oh, they gave up 500 yards to Tampa. I mean, they beat Tampa was because Tampa, Tampa's wounds were unbelievably self-inflicted. Yeah, the kicker missed two field goals and, you know, whatever. But look, I don't know. I don't think personally they would have won more than two more games. I don't. At six and three, I wasn't knocking them.

I was complimentary of the way they were playing because it was a smart, traditional way of winning, you know, not beating themselves, winning the turnover battle, winning the penalty battle, you know, running the ball, stopping the run. But they also, and I pointed this out yesterday, Tommy, they had six wins, they had five wins over very average teams, as it turned out. The Redskins lost, Tommy. They lost four games by 24 points this year. Only one team got beat up that often by that many, and that was the Cardinals. So they just were never a good It's okay to say that. It doesn't knock them for what they had accomplished to get to six and three.

I'm complimentary of that. But at six and three, I was not projecting 11 and 5. I was looking at a team that I thought was average. And I said it over and over again. It's 6 and 3. They deserve all the credit in the world for playing smart football and winning these tight games. It could have gone either way. But I don't see an 11-win team here.

I see a team that could make the playoffs because the division appears to be bad. And it did at that moment. Look, and I think they could have accidentally won their way into nine games. But that would be the team. And that would have been, as it turns out, that would have been probably a wild card. Yeah, that would have been the ceiling. But anyway, the point is, the big point was, what are they close to? You know, if Dan and Bruce are behind scenes saying, we're so close.

Jay talked about that in the post-game press conference. They're not close. Well, Jerry Brewer pointed this out. What they're close to is the last team in the playoffs. That's what they're close to. I had Jerry on while you were out. And I like Jerry. And he spoke to that.

And I said, you're burying the lead, though. And the lead is they don't have a quarterback. You know, in a league where you have to have a quarterback, they don't have one right now. They don't have an answer at the most important position on the field. And the truth is, and I know where Jerry was going. He was saying, look, they've got some really good young defensive linemen. And they do in Allen and ionitis and pain. And it's a good start because years ago, you know, this was actually a Shanahan and a Scott McLuhan influence thing about, you know,

Shanahan was the first guy to take, you know, since Chris Samuels. It had been 10 years since they had taken an offensive or defensive lineman in the first round. And he took Trent Williams in the first draft. and they started to draft interior players, and McLuhan made it, you know, an emphasis. We're taking Brandon Sheriff. He may be a guard, but this guy is the kind of toughness on the interior that you have to have. And here in the last two years, Alan in Payne in the first round. So they've got some of that, and they've got Brandon Sheriff, and they've got some talent in the interior.

They are still three to four starters away on defense and six starters away on a defense, and six starters away on offense. Yeah. They are. So I don't know what they're really close to. Are they close to having one of those magical NFL design seasons where they get all the breaks and in their particular case gets them to nine and seven and a six seed?

Okay. That's possible. But it's been more possible with the quarterbacks that they've had. And now next year, you may not have a legitimate NFL starting quarterback. Joe Flacco, baby. Flacco for Flacco. For Joe's sake, I hope he ends up in Jacksonville. That would be the spot for him.

My plan is to trade half the draft picks for Antonio Brown, dump every salary you need to to have enough money to sign Joe Flacco. I think Antonio Brown. Antonio Brown, Lavian Bell, Teddy Bridgewater, Jadavian Clowny. How's that? That would do it, baby. Jim Harbaugh, though. You got to, I mean, because you got to have better coaching here.

So, by the way, back to the coaching staff thing, I do anticipate changes by the end of the week. Real quickly, what did you make of the NFL playoffs the first weekend? Do you have any thoughts on those? Well, I've got some big thoughts about the Ravens game. I mean, you know, I find ironic that Baltimore of all towns who had to watch Buck Shoalter keep Zach Britton in the bullpen in an important playoff game against the Toronto Blue Jays when they needed them the most. Yeah. had to turn around and watch their football coach keep probably the best postseason quarterback of his era

save for Tom, who's not named Tom Brady? Wow, do you know what you just said? A lot of people will be like, who's he talking about? He's talking about Joe Flacklow. Yeah, on the bench. I'm talking about Nick Foles. On the bench in the fourth quarter.

I mean, in the second half, period, but particularly, I mean, I just don't understand that. Now, Mike Preston, who covers the team as a calm, this for the Baltimore son suggested that this was the owner's wishes, that he didn't, that Steve Bishotti did not want any changes. Wow, that's interesting because if that's true, that gives me a slightly different perspective on Bishadhi, because he should not be interfering with John Harbaugh in a postseason game, you know, and maybe, I suggested this, you know, towards the end of the season that I think John Harbaugh, if injected with truth serum,

would say our best chance to win a Super Bowl is to go back to Joe Flacco at quarterback. At the same time, they may not have been in the playoffs had Flacco started the whole season, especially when he was unhealthy. But let me continue on the Lamar Jackson, Joe Flacco thing. Lamar Jack, there was a lot of booing by Ravens fans. I know. Okay. They weren't booing Lamar Jackson.

they were booing the fact that Joe Flacco was on the bench. I agree with that. Those are two different things. Totally agree. And you've got some media who have an agenda who think that they were taking it out on Lamar Jackson and you've got some Ravens teammates who were spouting off about their fans booing. And one of them saying, one of them touting the Redskins line about how they'd rather play on the road because they don't get booed as much on the road.

I have a new rule. This should be enacted for the NFL, okay? If you get paid to be at a game, whether you're a player or whether you're a media, if you're paid to be there, you don't get to criticize the people who paid to be there. I know, I got it. Okay?

I know that was ridiculous. I mean, so, I mean, I think I had a big problem with that. I saw Bill O'Brien get totally out-coached in the Houston Col. Colts game. I think the Colts seemed like they could have won 35-0 if they wanted to. I was most surprised at how they dominated in that game. And I was surprised at Seattle, that Seattle didn't start running Russell Wilson until it was too late. Yeah, we're having him throw more. Back to the Baltimore situation, I completely agree with you. This was not a,

this was not an anti-Lamar Jackson sentiment in that stadium. I wasn't there, but that's my guess. That kid was incredible for them, you know, over a stretch that got them into the postseason. But there's also, remember what Tommy said, and a lot of you don't really want to acknowledge this, because he's not an elite quarterback, even though he got paid as an elite quarterback. And he's been really more times than not a very average quarterback and a frustrating quarterback for Ravens fans at times during regular season games. But Joe Flacco in the franchise's biggest games over the last 11, years, played his best football, including really carrying that team in many ways to its last Super Bowl. That was not a great Baltimore defense in 2012. That was a Joe Flacco carrying that team to two

road wins and then the Super Bowl win with outstanding clutch play, which he seemed to always provide in big moments, even in games that they lost, he played great in, in big games. But what I was going to say is, if you're a Ravens fan, you're like, this is Joe's moment. This is where he's always delivered for us. You want to lose a game with Joe Flacco on the bench? And we're down in a game. We haven't been behind by two scores during this Lamar Jackson,

you know, run-based, you know, quarterback run-based offense. And we can't come back. And I was shocked. I talked about it yesterday. I thought for sure Jackson would get one series in the third quarter, and then they would go to Flacco. He got the one series. he was out and then they got a turnover.

It was still 12 to nothing short field. I thought Flacco was coming in there. And you heard people say, well, look at the pass rush. You know, I mean, they didn't protect Jackson. They didn't. Well, they didn't protect Jackson was because the San Diego pass rush knew that the L.A. Oh, my God, I do it all the time. I do, too.

The Chargers knew that they didn't have to worry about Lamar Jackson throwing the ball. You think that defense is going to play the same way if Joe, Flacco is behind center? You think that defense's not going to have to make adjustments really quick if Joe Flacco comes in the game? Come on. I said this briefly yesterday. I read a little bit more about it late yesterday. Joe Flacco really did himself proud the way he handled this. He, you know, he apparently went to Jackson during the second half on the bench and said finish strong and was incredibly supportive of him. He was asked about why, you know,

did he think he was going to go in the game afterwards? And he said, no, we're not even going there. I thought Lamar did a great job of just hanging in there and giving us a chance at the end, which he did. Miraculously, he did. I thought Harbaugh handled it. You know what? I've said this, and it's not because I like the Ravens.

I wasn't rooting for them. I was rooting for Philip Rivers. But I've always respected that organization because they just have people, the organization that get it constantly. And now Ozzy is going to be moving on. And he has been one of the great personnel people, great general managers in the game for his tenure.

And they've become one of the really good franchises in the league. Hate to say it, I would have preferred over the last 11 years for the Ravens to have been a bad franchise and to have lost. But they aren't. They're a very good franchise, one to be. be, if you're a football fan to respect and appreciate. And the way they sort of went out here is, you know, it's taken the high road because they have often taken the high road where the

team that I've rooted for forever has taken the low road consistently here over the last, you know, two decades. Joe Flacco, 10 and 5 record and 15 postseason games. And a lot of those road games. 25 touchdown passes. A lot of those. And that was on the bench. A lot of those, a lot of those were road games. Joe Flacco, I think, has won more road games as a starting quarterback than any quarterback, other than I think it's Marino or Stawback or somebody like that. I looked this up last year, and it was second to somebody in terms of his road playoff records. So I love whenever I've had these conversations about Flacco, people say, you're out of your mind.

He stinks. No, he actually doesn't stink. He was a big-time clutch quarterback. And he's the franchise's all-time best quarterback since coming back to Baltimore. Absolutely. The Brown's coming to Baltimore and turning into the Ravens. Anyway, I'm looking forward to this weekend. Do you know, and I did not know this yesterday, Aaron, on the show yesterday,

that the NFL is now in the last 10 playoff games. The underdog is covered in 10 consecutive playoff games. I knew it was high. I didn't know it was all time. So you got the four, then you've got the Super Bowl, the two championship games, and three of the four last year in divisional on divisional weekend.

And this weekend, and I said this on Friday, that the public actually likes the underdogs a little bit. And so Vegas took a bit of a beating. Not a big beating, because there's a lot of split action too, but they're going to like the underdogs again this weekend. I mean, I can already tell you

that the chargers are going to be a public favorite. I'm rooting for him, though, but I may have the Patriots in the Smell Test. The Colts are, believe it or not, even with that low line, I think the public's going to play the Colts. I think the public's going to play the Cowboys. I think the public's going to play the Eagles. It's recent impressions. Eagles.

It's recent impressions. Yeah, because they're looking at the line on the Eagles. I actually thought it was going to be higher. But it's eight, and people are like, oh, here are the defending champions, big win. I think this could be the weekend of the favorites, but we'll have plenty of time to figure that out. If you listen to this podcast and you know others that would like to listen to the podcast, but they don't know how to do iTunes or Stitcher or Google Play or Spotify, just tell them to go to the Kevin Sheehan Show.com.

It's really easy. Website's easy. There's a big old blue button, hit play, and they can listen on the website. Also, if you haven't rated or if you haven't subscribed to it, it would really help us if you subscribe to the podcast. It doesn't cost anything. You don't have to give up any information. But on iTunes or Apple podcasts in particular, if you subscribe to it, it just gives us a better chance, quite honestly, a better chance to generate, you know, more ad revenue with the subscribing and the rating.

If you haven't rated it yet, if you rate it, that helps us as well. I'm asking even more these days, because I know that when football season ends, some of you are going to just tune in occasionally. So if you can subscribe and rate it, that would really, really help us. I can't understand why anyone would just tune in occasionally. I can't fathom why anyone would want to miss out on the golden nuggets that appear on this podcast. Come on. Look, you know this. I'm very, very appreciative and pleased with what we've been able to generate in terms of an audience through this podcast.

I had no idea what to expect, but it's been great. And so, you know, if it's a pain in the ass to subscribe and you'd like just listening without subscribing, that's fine too. But if it's not that difficult, and it shouldn't be if you subscribe, it'll just help us a little bit on the revenue side. All right, let's bring in Liz Clark from the Washington Post. Our good friend Liz, Liz and I would probably spend if Tommy weren't here at least 15 minutes talking about tennis. which we often do, but I don't think anybody would care about it on this particular podcast. So we'll pass on that for today. But you've been a part of some big stories here recently in the post.

And, you know, the story last week on the state of the Redskins got a lot of attention. And the one before that on the stadium, you know, got a lot of attention as well. I do, Tommy and I want to get to the stadium and get sort of a feel and an update from you on where you think that is. in a moment, but let's start with the team. You've covered this team in so many different ways for a long period of time. I think this is a new rock bottom. It doesn't mean we won't have another one two years from now. What do you think? I absolutely do. So I have covered the team eight years in two different stints spanning the full 19 years of Dan Snyder's ownership. So eight years covering his teams in the building, you know, every day of the season. And the other years,

sort of observing him as we all do in D.C. as a sports writer as someone who's interested. So, yeah, there's a lot of years and sort of hopeful moments and crushing disappointments that I've cycled through just as a resident of D.C. and a sports writer who's very interested. So, So the story that ran a week a week ago Sunday, it was an A1 story basically saying a once proud franchise, the Redskins are showing signs of foundational cracks. So that was the headline. And I thought it was a very apt headline. I favor restraint rather than screaming headlines that hype things up.

But I got a lot of grief on social media from kind of wise acres who go, I don't need to read this because that's been true for 10 years. tell me something new or there's something new here. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I understand what people were saying by that. It's clear they didn't read the story. So, yes, they've been showing signs of foundational cracks probably for many, many years.

But this moment is new to get to your question. This is different. This is new. And the way I would explain why and how is that my first years covering the team I was really kind of blown away by the benevolence of the fan base and the benevolence of the media market. In other words, every August, everything was forgiven about the previous season. You know, the fan base was back for more. The narrative was, well, Dan Snyder has matured.

He's not 34 anymore. He's 35. Now he's 36. He's learned not to meddle. He's going to be hands off. You know, everybody was like Groundhog Day, you know, new coach. new quarterback. Almost every year, there was a reason to believe.

What strikes me as new, what is new this season is that this fan base is done. They are not resetting. They are not giving the benefit of the doubt. They have seen enough. They've been burned enough financially, treated poorly enough, that it's just, they're not going to keep coming back. And I think if you look closely at the attendance numbers, it wasn't like a gradual progression down. It fell off a cliff from 2017 to 2018. And people are utterly remorseless. And the TV ratings show, they're tuning the Redskins out from their

own living rooms. They're not even bothering to tune in. I mean, they've just moved on instead of loving, despairing, the new normal is indifference, or, you know, I'd rather mow my lawn, or, gee, the nets are interesting. People have moved on, and that ought to scare Dan Snyder to his core. It ought to scare Bruce Allen. but he is impervious to, you know, I think self-reflection. Well, that's what happens when you're to Prince of Darkness, as I like to refer to Bruce. Here's my instincts tell me that the core group of Redskins fans

has been whittled down. I mean, the people who will believe them no matter what, who will stick with them no matter what, that group has gotten a lot smaller. And the real fear is, I don't think they're getting some of those fans back. I don't think they're getting some of the fans who have left back. I don't think it's cool to Roof for the Redskins for a whole group of young fans. And I think a lot of fans, I mean, they look at Dan Snyder, the owner,

and I think they've made a decision that, you know, we're not coming back. Yes, yeah. Yeah. You're much more economical with words than I love you. That took me so long to say. No, stop it. Exactly how I feel and what I know, just is it using my brain and having seen this play out year after year. This is a new normal.

He's lost people. He's much more economical with words because he just doesn't have the same vocabulary. There you go. You have, Liz. So there's that, too. So I generally, Liz, agree with everything you wrote and everything you said. And I've done so many of these podcasts here over the last, you know, month and a half, you know, saying the same thing that it's, you know, there's been apathy before.

You know, at the end of the Zorn season, that was the first hint that there could actually be indifference from some of the fan base. But we've never seen this percentage of the fan base be apathetic and indifferent towards the team. The thing that I always think about, though, is what? what would happen if, you know, first of all, it's a big if, because this team appears to be incapable of generating any forward momentum, but if they had, you know, if they accidentally drafted a transcendent player, and that transcendent player was a quarterback who, you know, made a huge difference, and now they were winning 10 or 11 games a year, how many of these people would come back in full force? And you both just indicated that you think people are gone

forever. I have considered that. I have, but I think the other alternative is that people still love football. They're still watching football, even though they're not watching the Redskins as much as they used to. They are watching football when it's on in the fall, and I think there would be this interesting dilemma, and it would be, I'm going to root for the coach, I'm going to root for the players, I just would hate like hell to see Dan Snyder ever hoist the Lombardi Trophy because it would be just painful for a lot of people to see that happen. So I don't really know if I, I'm not convinced that people wouldn't jump back in, I guess is what I'm saying.

I wasn't very economical there with words. No, no, no. So I totally hear that. And I certainly have spent a lot of time trying to think as an owner, you know, if this were my business, it's valued ostensibly at $3.1 billion. I get two-thirds of my revenue for doing nothing, sitting on my hands. that's what I get as my share of the national TV money, the lead generates. So I'm insulated basically from going bankrupt,

but there are flashing neon signs of my businesses in trouble. I've pissed away my greatest asset, which is a very loyal fan base, a very loyal customer base. So what do I do? What do I do? I think there are very slender threads that you can act on. so I don't mean to be totally nihilistic. I mean, I think there is something Dan can do and should be doing. So the biggest bump they could get, I am quite convinced,

is not only a new stadium, but a new stadium on the RFK site, which taps into the nostalgia of your old fans. It's going to resonate with young fans who don't think you're cool, but if it's a place you can Metro 2, set in a whole ecosystem of bars and fun things to do and restaurants, and you revitalize that part of D.C. And happen to have the stadium at the anchor and the building itself is exciting. And you know it's now automatic once you build a new stadium in the NFL. You're going to get hosting right to a Super Bowl.

That is the only way I think there is a genuine reset where, you win back the alienated fans and excite some new people about, well, I'm going to go check this out. You know, we're not necessarily talking about this stadium now, but the story you alluded to in the intro is about how politically fraught and difficult it's going to be for Dan Snyder to get development rights to the RFK site and how grievously he has misjudged. how you go about doing it. He has badly misplayed his hand, and I will put Bruce right in there because Bruce seems to be the person who has convinced Dan that this is easily done. And I say that with a smirk because Bruce, you know, told me and a whole group of reporters when asked about the cousin's contract, you know, oh, that's going to be easily done.

Right. You know, everything for Bruce is easily done, except until it gets all screwed up and then it's somebody's fault and somebody has to be fired. But so I think the stadium is the way, you know, we all saw the incredible magnetism of RG3 and what that one transcendent, charismatic, magnetic athlete, persona, person did for the team. And my first couple years covering training camp in my second iteration, 2014, you know, my ears hurt from the screams of RG3, RG3. It was a mania. So I do hold out that possibility of, you know, one transcendent player can just excite people beyond belief.

The real world issues associated with that for me is, you know, they don't really tend to draft that well. I think he might have been a once-in-a-generational player to land at the Redskins, RG3. And then, you know, quite frankly, I thought the Redskins' recent offseason, their moves in free agency, were so beyond atrocious. And I do not know why they got a pass. So it certainly, as it related to, what do you do at left tackle? How do you build depth that guard? What do you do at receiver?

You know, it was just a whiff, a whiff, a whiff. And then not to mention being forced to give away Kendall Fuller because you messed up the cousin's situation so badly. Yeah, I don't think he got a pass. It was a dreadful off season for them other than... No, it was, but I think it should have been hammered at every turn and hammered throughout the season. Well, the reason the secondary is struggling, what if you had, you know, another corner in there? Orlando Scandrick. I digress, yeah.

So say you do get this transcendent quarterback in the realistic short term. Who is he going to throw to? I mean, this was just a dismal year for offense, as you know. But so a long way of saying, I agree with you, Kevin. A new stadium, I'd put in there. It has to be at RFK. And a once-in-a-generational player, if you should be so lucky, those are your only two options.

Because I don't even think getting rid of Bruce at this point is going to win people back. It certainly would please a lot of disillusioned fans. I do agree with you that there is no more benevolence. I mean, there's no more of that really. It's a limited group now. I just, I guess I just think, you know, I'm like, okay, it's 2023 and they just drafted the transcendent quarterback and they've got a stadium downtown. People are football fans.

would jump back on board, even though they'd still hate Dan Snyder. Yeah. No, no, no, I agree. But they're not going to be at RFK if they ever are in until 2027. Exactly. So that's a long time to live with FedEx. And your best shot at making FedEx palatable for fans, you just fired after eight months, you know, because you were not patient enough to let this process of making the place

a destination play out. You know, so again, I went down another rabbit hole. But just the reality is you're going to have to be convincing people to come to FedEx now for another. That's true. How many years? Eight, seven, eight years? Long time? 2012, RG3.

The market forces in this town have changed dramatically. That's seven years ago. That's the beginning of the Nationals' playoff run. 2012. Where six years before the capitals win a Stanley Cup. So, I mean, a transcendent star comes now. The competition for fan dollars, corporate dollars, sponsorship dollars, is a lot different than it was in 2012. The RFK site is a disaster right now because not only, I mean, after Liz and the Post came out with that story,

you had the controversy about Jack Evans getting the stock deal on D.C. counsel that would benefit a company. Now, Jack Evans' political future is in doubt. He's the main leader of the push behind getting the stadium in the district. And here's the other thing. I think in order in this day and age, I think in order to get that stadium deal, whether it's in Maryland or the district or anywhere, you've got to have an owner as a face of the team that doesn't turn people off. I mean, Dan Snyder is radioactive.

What politician wants to connect themselves to anything at this point that Dan Snyder's involved in? It's that bad. I remember when Camden Yards got built in Maryland, Edward Bennett Williams was the owner of the Orioles. And he went up to the Maryland state legislature and gave a huge speech. that basically turned around the vote on the stadium. You need that kind of owner that politicians can align themselves with, and people want to run away from Dan Snyder now and rightfully so.

You just said so many smart things. Each topic you raised is a podcast. No, I'm serious. You know, starting with the point of 2012 is not 2019. Yeah. You know, you have a Stanley Cup in town. You know, you have a super, Superstars who don't wear shoulder pads in town.

You know, they play other sports. So that is different. The, you know, there are people who say, who cares if Lopamina is fired? Fans don't care about that. The stadium is so far away. Fans don't care about that. But smart fans, and I really think residents are quite smart fans, can connect the dots of the,

The viability, the healthy revenue streams of this team, they are connected to the team's competitiveness on the field. But to go back to your last point, the radioactivity of Dan Snyder, and we would throw Bruce Allen in there as well. You know, Dan does not like being a front-facing person. That is why he put so much trust in Bruce. Bruce fancies himself an excellent politician front-facing person, but he can't go anywhere without being booed at the moment. Everyone knows the team is worth $3.1 billion. It's in Forbes magazine. You ask a lot of a politician, whether it's Mayor Bowser or Governor Hogan or whomever, to take a podium in a public setting and put your arm around.

around Bruce or Dan and say proudly that you think, you know, giving development rights to this billionaire is the best use of this land as opposed to affordable housing, public space, green space, whatever, a safe way. You ask a lot, and then you seriously double down by making that even harder for the politicians by, you know, breaking your neck to sign Ruben Foster, you know, just months removed from the cheerleader scandal. And, you know, they just continue to do these tone-deaf really questionable moves, front office moves without any justification or rationale that, you know, they may, it's like they're thinking two minutes ahead. You've got to think, what is the image of the team?

What is the political image of the team? Am I helping politicians stand beside me and say, this is what we want to do with this hallowed, coveted piece of land, is give it to Dan Snyder. And Liz, you said that something that's very important that I constantly try to drum in the people who don't get it. It's all connected. The business and the football, it's all one.

It affects the competitive product on the field. And that's what's changed the most in the past 10 years. Perception becomes reality. And it winds up. Look, I've seen it in other sports. I saw it here in town. Dusty Baker got fired in large part because of the controversy involving Steven Strasbourg begging out of starting a playoff game because he wasn't feeling well.

The 12 hours that followed that decision. and then then they were reversed the decision, I know for a fact that that was the breaking point that got your baseball manager fired. So it's all connected, all of it. Liz, where are, so where are we on the stadium? Where are they on the stadium? What does your gut tell you on where it's going to be and by when?

Yeah. Well, they have only themselves to blame, meaning Dan and Bruce, for the situation they're in. So basically they're back to square one. There was every evidence, every reason to know that, you know, last March, April, May, you really needed to work very aggressively with Eleanor Holmes Norton and D.C. politicians to secure the RFK site, to get that in the hands

of D.C. That's the first step, and then D.C. in turn, makes it available to you to build your stadium. That you needed to do that while Republicans controlled Congress, while Zinke control the interior. The political hurdles you have to pass to get this federal land in the hands, not only of the city, but with the green light for multi-use development. At the moment, it has covenants that mean you can only use it for, you know, recreation. So you can't build hotels and bars on it now, even if it was the most popular owner in the league. There's a lot of legal things that actually take an act of Congress. So the most favorable climate for you was when Republicans were in charge of the key committees. And they sat on their hands. They sat not articulating their

vision, not working aggressively. They sat on their hands waiting for the three entities, Virginia, Maryland, and D.C. to come to them with various packages and offers. We're going to give you these tax breaks. We're going to do this for you. Here's how much we want you. Here's how much. And, you know, those weren't forthcoming. And, you know, it wasn't until November that they realized, oops, we need to, you know, speed this up. And, you know, that plan was. You know, you know, that plan, didn't work because there was no omnibus spending bill you passed that you could flip that in secretly and so now they have a a democratic house they're going to have to convince and I'm not saying there's one issue that is their biggest impediment but there are multiple issues there are some

people in Congress who will say never for a team with that name the name is the problem for me There are others that say no public land for an NFL owner who's going to use the same 10 games a year, no matter how many 24-7 for-profit businesses you propose building around it. And there are others who just say, my commitment is to public housing, or my commitment is to what the residents of Ward 6 want. And I'm pretty sure the residents of Ward 6, if a vote is taken, they're not going to be for this project. So, you know, and then there might be others who say,

gee, I don't know. I don't really trust your stewardship of this incredible asset because you've taken an NFL franchise, which basically any moron can make money at, given the number of guaranteed revenues. You've run that into the ground. You've offended women, many women, with the cheerleader treatment. you've shown your tone depth to issues of domestic violence.

I mean, the list is long. I'm being very tedious here. But you've got a big challenge to help D.C. get control of this land. And then once that happens, then it's a question for Mayor Bowser. Does she have the muscle to convince the city council and D.C. residents that what you want on that site is a stadium for Dan Snyder. The story that you wrote in early December, where you wrote about this provision, you know, getting this stadium provision into the Republican-controlled Congress spending bill. And it almost implied, and correct me if I'm wrong, that they were trying to get this slipped in. And now that I've heard you talk about it, it's because they sort of got caught behind the eight ball of waiting, you know, too long to get this done.

And like any moron couldn't have seen that there was a pretty good chance that the Dems were going to take back the house in 2018. But these would be the idiots that wouldn't see it coming. So did they just completely blow that opportunity? And then by the way, one follow-up to that is did this story that you and Mike DeBonis wrote? And I think that's who you wrote it with back in early December, if my memory serves me correctly. Did that make people aware that they were trying to slip this in and hurt their effort or not? It did make some people aware of this effort. The people who were aware of the effort were Republicans who were working alongside the Redskins.

So, yes, I found zero evidence of activity, urgency in the spring. When it was clear, this is when you wanted to do it over the summer, still nothing, still nothing. The first evidence I heard that they were trying to get this land was totally on the QT. Again, it has to be advanced by the D.C. government because it's not like they're going to make a congressional approval to give the land to Dan Snyder. So the congressional approval is we give federal land to the district. And as we know, Mayor Bowser last August went very publicly on record. What's missing at RFK is an NFL stadium for the Redskins. So, yeah, they did dither do nothing.

I think they pictured everything coming to them like it used to be back when NFL stadiums were perceived as drivers of economic development. I think there's enough evidence out there that that's not necessarily the king. certainly not in the way that an NBA or Major League Baseball team, you know, that's a venue that's in use so many, so many weekends, so many days a year is that economics are quite different. Right. So, yeah, so the story made not only some Democrats in Congress aware, like, whoa, they're trying what? It made some on the city council aware, like, whoa, there are mayors trying what? So, but I cannot say that that then worked against it because the reality was it was the shutdown that worked against it. I mean, that bill just died because of the impasse on the wall.

So there was no – and even when the wall loomed large and the impasse loomed large, all elements, all sort of tack-on elements. And by no means are the Redskins the first to use this. vehicle like, oh, let's slip in this pet project on the spending bill. It's sort of the way a lot of budget bills, budget bills get done and things get done. But it got,

that all got pared down to just the minimal spending. I mean, it never came forward. The fact that we had the shutdown and it didn't get, it wouldn't have gone anyway, doesn't take them off the hook for dilly-dallying around for a year and not having any vision on

this unless Liz, this wasn't really where they wanted it in the first place. Perhaps they thought they were going to get a deal in Virginia all along, and now it would appear that Maryland is the... By the way, do you believe now that Maryland is the frontrunner or not? No. No. You still think it's D.C.? Well, I guess the question is frontrother. Maybe I'm hearing something different than what you're asking. I'm quite clear that Snyder wants the RFK site. That is still his first choice. As an impartial person, I am quite clear that that is by far the team's best hope of resurrecting the business and excitement.

The Maryland land is also federal land. It also would require a congressional approval. So I think it's less fraught than the RFK site because there are some in Congress who say this is, there are some who feel it needs to honor Robert Kennedy Jr. that the site does. And they're not sure that this would do that. So, I mean, I honestly, I'm having trouble seeing them getting any stadiums. built. That sounds so apocalyptic, but I go back to some of the things Lubby intimated. Dan Snyder, Bruce Allen, have made themselves by their own hand either political unknowns or politically damaged or toxic, depending the language you want

to use. There is no record over 20 years of Dan Snyder's ownership that he has been a committed, involved corporate citizen. He has been a committed, you know, capitalist. But there are some owners, the Roonies in Pittsburgh come to mind that generationally have treated their teams while a for-profit business, also like a public trust, that it belongs to the people of Pittsburgh. And, you know, there's a big difference in an owner that. way. So I don't, I can't see them getting a stadium built, honestly. Well, what is, here's, here's the Maryland problem. I agree with Liz. I, I, I think, I think they've, they've got no place to go.

Hogan has two, the legislative session just started in Maryland. He has this one and next one to get this done, two years, because the last two years of, of a two-term governor are lame duck. So basically, if Hogan's going to be able to convince them to buy into using this federal land once they get the transfer done, if they get that done, and then financing the infrastructure to support the stadium, he's got two years to do it. After that, that window's closed. Well, let me, so you said something, and Tom just agreed with you. Well, what the hell does that mean? Does that mean that they've got to, they've got to stay in Landover and they've got to extend. the lease beyond 2027 and play in that stadium forever?

Or does it mean that he then has to use his own money, buy up the land on his own and build it where he wants to build it with every penny of it coming from his own pocket? So there's a decades-long misunderstanding about what exactly is the situation at Landover. And it took me a long time to unravel. And I finally got the 19-page documents that go back to Jack Kent Cook's purchase of that land. So there is no lease that expires in 2027.

What the legal document says is that, you know, we sell you this land. You're going to build an NFL stadium. You are required to play every home game at this NFL stadium until 2027, period. In other words, you can stay as long as you like. You own the land. But you have to commit to at least being there. You don't have to leave. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, yeah. Okay. So there's nothing precluding Dan from improving FedEx, from, as I believe the Patriots and maybe the Eagles did, building a ground-up new building on that same site, you know, adjacent to the old site. Right. I mean, both of these, I think, would doom the franchise.

I just think that, you know, that trip, that experience is so tainted. That's not going to excite any new fans. But that is his option. That's his cheapest option, and that will always be his option. It's his property. it's not good Liz thanks appreciate it

love the conversation as always I'll talk to you soon I always love talking to you Liz oh it's so mutual lovey and you too Kevin so sometime kept for a podcast with an audience of two let's talk about tennis

we'll do that I mean we do it on the phone together we might as well do it and record it the next time we do it you know what we can talk about what pickleball you know you know something about pickleball huh my wife has become

a pickleball master I got a couple of friends who are into that. That goes over it. That's a big game at leisure world from what I'm told. Thanks, Liz, so much. Thank you both. I appreciate it. Liz Clark, everybody. Real quickly, let me just thank our good friends at Ferrisch Chrysler Dodge Jeep in Fairfax. If you're thinking about something new, Ferrisse Chrysler Dodge Jeep still has a ton of vehicles on their lot. And right now, you're going to get a great deal. I said you've got to get out there by December 31st. talk to Ralph Perkins. They still have a lot of those vehicles on their lot. They're trying to get them off

their lot. Best rebates of the year, best deals of the year on the Jeep Cherokee, the Jeep Grand Cherokee, the Jeep Rangler, also the Ram Pickups. If you're looking for something used, their used car lot is overflowing. Go to Farish Cars.com right now. You'll see all of their live inventory, everything they've got on their lot with live pricing, and the best deals at ferrish cars.com. So it's always good to catch up Liz, and the stadium thing is interesting. Very interesting. The fact that both of you think that more, did you seem more likely than not, that he will not get somebody to help him, you know, with respect to giving him land in D.C., Maryland or Virginia? You really think that that's... I think he's become too radioactive.

I think you're wrong about that. I think he has more political ties than you even know. there are a lot of politicians he probably has relationships with or Bruce has relationships with somebody's going to give him an opportunity to build a stadium with land that's that's provided to him that's what I think I still think Maryland I still think Maryland is probably their best chance but that that window is does does not stay open for for more than two years I also would just say to you about your you know 2012 2012 or two totally different times I get it with respect to the competitive landscape with other teams, but if the Redskins ever started to do things right,

which I don't think will happen, and win, the fact that the Nats are good and the caps are good are not going to impact the potential fan base. Oh, I think for the new fans, absolutely. I think you're wrong. I think football still, football is still number one. Yes, it is. And if they have...

Here's what football is. Football is still number one, but right. Right now, it's the best house in a neighborhood with shrinking property values. Okay. I wanted to mention this. We did mention Matt Lafleur earlier, right? So it's Matt LaFleur, Sean McVehan, and Kyle Shanahan, all from Shanahan's, from Mike's staff. I think Mike's going to be with us on Friday to help preview the playoff games this weekend.

But, you know, think about the people that have been in the building. And you know what? They all would have remained in the building. if the owner hadn't picked Robert Griffin III over Mike Shanahan. If he had backed his owner and said, Backed his coach. Backed his coach. If he had backed his coach and said, Robert, do not come to me anymore.

I am now off limits to you, unless it's a personal thing. When it comes to your profession, he, Mike, is your coach and your boss. And whatever he says goes, period. if he had laid down the law in that way, it would have been beneficial to Griffin, beneficial to those in the building as coaches, and beneficial to the organization as a whole. And that's where, you know,

anytime you feel like, hmm, maybe it's starting to turn here for the positive, you always have to remember that he still owns the team and he's capable, even when he's trying to be a good owner, which he was, of destructive tendencies. Yes.

Maryland plays in Minnesota tonight. Huge game for the Terps, big game in the Big Ten. Minnesota is really good. Veteran team. They are 12 and 2, I think, Aaron. And do you know what the points spread is? I don't. Somebody asked me yesterday what I thought it would be.

I said, I think Minnesota is going to be about a five-point favorite, maybe a six-point favorite. Two. Really? Maryland is a smell test pick tonight. I'm not giving it out. I'm not doing college basketball smell tests. When you're a college, when you're an actual sharp, you actually don't give your picks away for free.

All right, that's not how it works with college hoops. Kidding, for the most part. Sort of. But anyway, I'm looking forward to seeing that game tonight because that would be a big win for Turgeon and Maryland on the road with Indiana coming in to College Park on Friday night in Wisconsin in College Park on Monday. Thanks to Liz, thanks to Aaron.

Tommy, welcome back. Tommy will be back on Thursday. We'll talk more about the NFL playoff games. And again, I think Mike Shannon. will be with me on Friday to help preview the four NFL playoff games as well.