The Takeaways, Week 9: Redskins at Bills
November 5, 2019
by Steve Thomas
This column is essentially my space to rant about whatever I want for a few paragraphs, so it’s usually pretty easy to write, and oooh, boy, do I have some ranting to do this week. The Redskins dropped their 8th game of the season to the Buffalo Bills by a score of 24 – 9. It somehow never felt like Washington was never really in it despite a relatively small point differential for most of the game. There are almost no words to describe how bad of a professional football team the 2019 Washington Redskins are this year, but I’ll give it a shot. What are the “around the water cooler” topics for this game? Read on to find out in this week’s edition of The Takeaways.
Dwayne Haskins was just okay in his starting debut
The Redskins’ new rookie quarterback neither wowed anyone nor made any game-killing mistakes. He didn’t do anything special and didn’t lead his team to a touchdown, but also didn’t throw any interception or hurt his team via mistakes. Haskins was 15 for 22 for 144 yards with no interceptions and no touchdowns on the day, which is mediocre at best by anyone’s standards. To say that he was merely “okay” is about as descriptive as I can get on this one, because it seems like the most apropos term to use. Early on in this contest, Haskins looked a bit nervous and his passes did not come out of his hand very well – they lacked precision and velocity. He appeared to get more comfortable as the game went on, although he held the ball too long at times, which caused at least a couple of the Bills’ 4 sacks, and missed a read or two. Haskins had trouble at times when the Bills disguised blitzes and coverages. Basically, he neither helped nor hurt his team. It was an adequate debut, and he has plenty of room for growth, although unless the team finds Haskins some offensive talent to play with, it might not matter. The Redskins are essentially playing without a pass catching tight end, the slot receiver has been an absolute zero all year, and the oft-injured pass catching running back has been out for two weeks and counting. If anyone can name a team with fewer weapons than the Redskins, I’m all ears. That certainly makes Haskins’ job exponentially more difficult.
Adrian Peterson is still a stud
For two quarters, AP looked like he was 26 years old again. It was a thing of beauty, absolutely amazing to watch. He was hitting holes and making people miss like the AP of old. Clearly, the offensive game plan was to make things as easy as possible on Haskins by relying heavily on the future hall of famer. Solid plan, except that the Redskins refused to deviate from said plan when the Bills started keying on Peterson in the second half. Peterson had 10 carries for 101 yards at halftime, and 8 carries for 7 yards in the second half. Washington needed to do something else once it became evident that the run game was no longer functional, and that something was probably more of a short passing game. That obviously didn’t happen, but it should have. Chalk this one up to “failure to adjust”.
Once again, the defensive front 7 got owned
The Redskins defensive front 7 is by far the biggest disappointment on the team. This group was owned, again, this time by the Bills. Devin Singletary was unstoppable on Sunday, with Singletary gaining major yardage on seemingly every touch. The Redskins failed to put significant pressure on Josh Allen, and what little pressure they did get didn’t matter because the defensive front 7 routinely let Allen scramble and escape. Allen is not a good quarterback, but the Redskins allowed Buffalo to use him in a way that fits his skills – heavy, effective run game and mostly short passes. Allen did try to go deep a couple of times, with predictable results. The point is, though, that the Redskins defensive line and linebacker group has consistently produced subpar results as compared to the sky-high expectations that they came with heading into the season. Montez Sweat has proven to probably be more versatile than some initially gave him credit for, but has shown very little of the elite athleticism that his combine results would have suggested. Ryan Kerrigan is a mere shell of his former self, Jonathan Bostic is just a guy, and rookie Cole Holcomb, who has shown promise this season, disappointed today. The defensive line – Jonathan Allen, Daron Payne, and Matt Ioannidis – has lost entirely too many one-on-one battles and have allowed too many running backs to get into the second level. They have gotten good pressure on opposing quarterbacks this year, but failed to do it Sunday against a vulnerable Bills team. They aren’t playing up to their talent level.
Once again, the secondary failed when it counted
Guys, Josh Norman isn’t the only one in this secondary who struggled at times on Sunday. You aren’t being honest with yourself if you think he’s the only problem on this unit. Quinton Dunbar had a bad game, showing poor coverage on multiple plays. Surprisingly, despite appearing to be at fault in Buffalo’s third and 18 conversion, second year player Troy Apke was otherwise at least adequate at safety in relief of Montae Nicholson and Deshazor Everett. Fabian Moreau didn’t have any obvious busts against Buffalo, but he’s disappointed on the season overall. The bottom line is that the Bills were allowed to convert multiple third and long plays, including third and 18, and that’s unacceptable. This unit has been just as disappointing as the front 7 in some ways, sadly.
Even Tress Way had a bad day
Team MVP and NFL Super-Punter Tress Way had his first bad game in quite a while, with multiple poor and/or medicore punts that didn’t help his team. The wind appeared to be a factor, for sure, but the bottom line is that Way surprisingly didn’t get it done against the Bills. I’m sure it was just a one-time thing, as Way is too good to have too many efforts like the one he put forth on Sunday. He’ll no doubt bounce back, but his #1 ranking might be in jeopardy as a result.
That’s it for this week. I’ll be back with another edition of The Takeaways when the Redskins lose to battle the Jets at Jack Kent Cooke Stadium in Raljon in week 11 after the bye week.