A hiatus

This is just to let you that I will be away for a few weeks so you probably won't be hearing from me until mid June or so. With my luck, the lockout will somehow be resolved and free agency will hit while I'm away. If that happens I would refer you to the list of great Redskins sites on the right hand side of this page and I will have my comments when I return.

Finding a Redskins starting quarterback for 2011

We will never know whether the Redskins went into the draft intending to skip the quarterback position, or if they had a guy they wanted but missed out on him. I rather suspect the latter, but it's a non-issue now. Either way, that ommission has given us all to talk about during an indeterminately long offseason that lack even free agent news to this point. The fact is, none of us know anything about how the Redskins will handle the quarterback situation once the lockout lifts. And the nature of the internet is that the Redskins will end up being mentioned in rumors regarding absolutely everyone that could be available. For a very thorough accounting of potentially available quarterbacks I recommend this Rotoworld post; but let's start with a much less exhaustive list and discuss a few of the names that have come up as possible 2011 Redskins quarterbacks: Vince Young, Rex Grossman, John Beck, Matt Hasselbeck, and Kyle Orton. Then I will tack Bruce Gradkowski on to the end even though he hasn't been talked about much.

A post-draft look at the Redskins front seven

After adding four draft picks to the front seven, it seems unlikely that it will be addressed further in free agency. This group has been intriguing since the front seven’s struggles were such a major part of the Redskins defensive problems last year, and yet very late in the season (too late to do any good) some of the bench depth gave indications that they could play much more effectively than the starters we’d been seeing much of the year. So with that in mind let’s take a look at how the new arrivals may be integrated in with the holdovers and talk a little depth chart.

Taking stock of all of the Redskins draft picks

Now that all the picks are in (all 12 of them…) I wanted to take this opportunity to run through them all at once and get a feel for what we got. For no particular reason, we’ll go one position at a time rather than the order they were drafted.

Each pick will have a brief description of what the guy may bring to the table (with the obvious disclaimer that we won't really know if they were a good pick for at least two years). Click the links in each name for more detailed info on each player. For Kerrigan, Jenkins, and Hankerson it will take you to my earlier posts on them; for the others it will take you to one of the various scouting reports floating around the internet.

Redskins 3rd round pick Leonard Hankerson

So far, WR Leonard Hankerson is the draft pick I'm the most excited about. This guy sounds like my kind of receiver.  Let's look at the my favored draft websites to see the particular characteristics that make me think he can contribute.

From NFL Draft Breakdown:

“...nice long arms that he uses to create separation against press coverage... great leaping ability... A hard worker, Hankerson has worked diligently to improve his game and has gotten better every single year. NFL teams will love his make-up as he is a high character and mature player"

NFL Draft Countdown:


          • Displays outstanding body control and ball skills
          • Polished route runner who knows how to get open
          • Understands how to use frame to his advantage
          • Tough and isn't afraid to work across the middle

Redskins 2nd round pick Jarvis Jenkins

Click here for my initial reaction to 1st round pick Ryan Kerrigan. And now to look second round pick Jarvis Jenkins...

Some of the highlights from his NFL Draft Countdown profile:

• Very athletic with good speed, quickness, and agility
• Real stout at the point of attack and stuffs the run
• Strong, physical, powerful and a terrific bull rusher
• Is able to penetrate and make plays in the backfield

After a few hours of considerable internet confusion over whether he would play nose or end (he played 4-3 DT in college), Shanahan finally referred to him as an end in an interview so that's what I'm going to call him until we hear differently. The Redskins apparently told him he would play some tackle as well, and given the array of unconventional formations Haslett like to use guys tend to turn up in all sorts of places, and I suspect Jenkins will not be an exception. Nonetheless, lets file under "end" for now.

A first look at Ryan Kerrigan

I make no pretense of being a draftnik, so I'm not going to try to convince you that I've spent the last few months down in my bunker breaking down film on college players and have a detailed opinion on the Redskins new first round pick Ryan Kerrigan. I do, however, have an internet connection and therefore have easy access to the opinions of folks who do make use of such bunkers, so let's take a look at some of the highlights of the various online scouting reports and find examples to illustrate why I have somewhat mixed (thought mostly positive) feelings about this pick.