QB provides a glimpse of offense’s potential
ASHBURN – The joy was muted by the results. Rex Grossman impressed his teammates, translating his knowledge of the offense into success. He provided a glimpse, perhaps, of what this offense could accomplish.
Yet it only carried the Redskins so far. They still lost 33-30 to Dallas, despite Grossman’s four-touchdown day.
“All that matters is winning,” Redskins center Casey Rabach said. “We need to get over that hump and win these games and then we’ll be happy.”
Santana Moss said, “You ain’t nothing until you win. You can sit here and hip, hip hooray about scoring 30 points. That’s nothing. Unless you get that W, we can’t talk and feel good about it.”
But there was an addendum to Moss’ comments.
“You had a sense of where this offense can go,” he said.
Moss also said he felt the same way a few weeks ago with now backup quarterback Donovan McNabb. But players also acknowledged that Grossman’s experience in the offense, albeit for only one prior season, was evident. He finished with four touchdown passes and a 93.4 rating.
“I was pleased to see how he saw reads and seen things before it happened,” Moss said. “We had a rhythm, that’s telling you a lot right there. When you have that rhythm, you can almost sense that he knows what’s going on. He has a feel for it; he knows the plays, so just go with the flow and he’ll get the ball to you.
“He played lights out.”
Grossman excelled, for the most part, at hitting receivers in stride, allowing them to run after the catch and gain more yards. Coach Mike Shanahan is a stickler for footwork and Grossman’s had to please him — his feet were usually in good position to make an accurate throw. On his five-yard touchdown pass to Chris Cooley in the fourth quarter, Grossman slid to his left, but kept a wide base and he threw right to Cooley, delivering a strike.
He had his flaws. Grossman made a poor decision on his first interception, flinging a pass into the flat as he was falling. His arm strength isn’t terrific. But it’s hard to argue with his first outing.
Rabach said he would talk with Grossman about the offense throughout the season.
“It was amazing how thorough he was in this offense. It definitely showed [Sunday],” he said. “Rex is real fast, he likes to push the tempo and he likes to get to the line and get going. He doesn’t like to waste time, so that was a little different. We went on a lot of quick counts and caught the defense off-guard. All in all [the tempo] seemed to be upbeat, lively.”
Tight end Chris Cooley agreed.
“He got to the ball when they were moving around on defense and they couldn’t make adjustments,” Cooley said.
But, perhaps because of the loss, Mike Shanahan was not going to gloat over his decision to bench McNabb and start Grossman.
“You better do what you believe is right,” Shanahan said. “I get a chance to evaluate these guys every day. You’re looking at film 12 hours a day, so you have a gut feeling when a guy is going to play good.”
