FanPost

Redskins at Broncos: The No Bull Review

Dustin Bradford

I love the feeling of watching my team be unstoppable. I hate the feeling of my team being incompetent. So as you can surmise, this was a love/hate game for me (much like my thoughts on the coach across the field during this game). I was a bit worried at half time and very worried after the 3rd Washington TD. That feeling thankfully didn't last long.

The biggest thing I felt after the game was relief that our defense executed at a high level for a whole game. Aside from one really nice drive by Shanny's guys our defense represented themselves extremely well when compared to what I've seen from them so far this year. There was a great pass rush, solid pass defense, and minimal damage done by the other team's running game overall.

Offense

Let's Talk About the Sherrif

Peyton Manning needs the bye week just as much as anyone on the team in my opinion. I thought he still looked inconsistent this game on his throws and am sure that is large part to his injured ankles. I'd say he looked about at 80% out there...good thing his 80% is better than most team's starters at 100%.

  • Early on Manning was holding the ball too long and it caused us some trouble...my bet is the plays were just well covered and he didn't want to throw to his outlet that quick...it appears to have gotten fixed after halftime.
  • His early TD to Wes Welker was a highway robbery of a play in the red zone. That was perfect execution against the right defense.
  • Manning also uncharacteristically was locking onto his receivers a few times this game...it cost us too. One of his INTs was just Cutlerish in its execution (the one he threw to a bracketed Welker).

Running Game Observations

I'm not going to say that I was impressed with our running game, but it again looked solid to me. In the offense we currently leverage you don't need a dominating run game to win, you just need it to be respected and our guys make sure teams need to respect the run.

  • Shout out to C.J. Anderson. The kid didn't get many shots, but he sure did look respectable on the field to me. I'm not wowed or anything, but the game didn't look too big for him at all.
  • Montee Ball also showed he belonged on the field..no fumbles, great power, and for the majority of his runs he was using good vision / decision making.
  • Knowshon Moreno's TD catch and run was gorgeous...he showed that quality of elusiveness that you look for in good RBs

Miscellaneous Notes

  • I love when our WR screen game is a rarity...because that Demaryius Thomas screen came out of no where...it was a great play call for the situation but it worked because we hadn't been using it and the Redskins weren't expecting it.
  • Orlando Franklin is my hero. That dude was so obviously not healthy and just Broncoing it up to keep Peyton safe.
  • DT really needs to be aggressive in his game. He got pushed around at the LOS by a smaller guy and had the ball taken away from him. A guy as big as DT shouldn't be letting anyone get away with that.

Defense

All is Right With the Front Seven

It is so good to see our line and backers get healthy. We were in RGIII's grill all game long. Sure they looked fairly poor against the run this game, but that has been Shanahan's strong point for a long time...he makes a lot of teams look poor against the run.

  • Did you guys play "Where's Von Miller?" this game? Because that cat was lining up all over the place. The other thing was it was mostly unpredictable as to when he was pass rushing because they dropped him back into a zone with RGIII containment responsibilities.
  • Derek Wolfe and Terrance Knighton both benefited big time in this game from Von being all over the place. There weren't enough double-teams to handle all the meat in the middle and slow down Von.
  • Danny Trevathan was on point as usual this game...he was all over the field and in on a ton of tackles.
  • Kevin Vickerson continues his rampage of moronic penalties this week. It was very good that the coaches benched him for awhile.

Secondary Thoughts

Our coverage unit looked pretty darn good all game long. It is funny how that works when you have a pass rush that gets there in less than 4 seconds on average. This game was the first in a long time that I thought our secondary looked like the strength I thought it would be in the off-season.

  • It was no secret that I didn't want to see Mike Adams start this year, but I was sure happy to see him when Duke Ihenacho got injured. Mike is really doing a solid job stepping in and not being a liability in coverage. Last year we had very little depth there.
  • Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie stole Kirk Cousin's lunch money on a slant route he saw coming from a mile off. That was the kind of thing I remember seeing with Champ back before teams stopped throwing Champ's direction.
  • Let's not leave my favorite CB out of the praise. Chris Harris got him some lunch money too this game...if you watched his locker-room interview he complained about not being able to get an INT when he was still able to run. That's just greedy son!
  • Breaking news: Rahim Moore can catch an INT that is throw directly to him!

Special Teams

  • I'm surprised to see Shanahan do what I'd do if I were in charge of a team playing against the Broncos: never kick the ball to Trindon Holliday.
  • What the heck was that challenge flag about? SMH...I have a great idea. John Fox is awesome at delegating...maybe he can delegate challenge flag decisions to the water boy...

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