Should the Rams give RGIII a shot?

[Dan Poplawski]

Give me Capernik first

 

[Corbin]

Is this a serious question? No.

 

[RaminExile]

All in on Mannion for me. Roll with him, assess him, see if he can grow and develop in the pressure cauldron of being an MFL starter. Draft him a legitimate weapon of a WR and a tight end - something no Rams quarterback has had for a decade or so and see. Maybe he'll need more time, maybe it'll be a disaster and we'll ruin him for life. If so you go get your franchise QB next year when all the pieces are in place around him.

 

[jrry32]

All in on Mannion for me. Roll with him, assess him, see if he can grow and develop in the pressure cauldron of being an MFL starter. Draft him a legitimate weapon of a WR and a tight end - something no Rams quarterback has had for a decade or so and see. Maybe he'll need more time, maybe it'll be a disaster and we'll ruin him for life. If so you go get your franchise QB next year when all the pieces are in place around him.

Or you waste a year and then you realize next year that you don't have a shot at any QB that you grade as a potential franchise QB. Then you get to spend two years (maybe longer) in QB purgatory when your team should be contending because you stared a gift horse in the mouth.

 

[LesBaker]

If (and it's a BIG if) RG3 can become a player similar to Cam Newton/Russell Wilson, then yeah I would look at him. However, Fisher has never bought into a true running QB. He needs to become a better all-around QB and not rely so much on his feet to make plays. But the price has to be right, and I think it would cost too much because there are other teams just wanting to get their hands on him which will drive his market price up and be too much for us to afford.

Fisher had McNair, wasn't he a running QB..........?

Griffin will never be any good in the NFL and anyone signing him is going to regret it, he is all false hope and promise.

If he had any talent he wouldn't be playing safety on the scout team he'd be the starter.

 

[baconandbread]

I think we should give him a shot. He would be a low risk/high reward situation and Fisher has a history of being able to deal with problem players. We could easily drop Foles/Keenum and let him battle it out with Mannion. I don't think we have a realistic shot at Goff, so I'm hoping we take the best WR/QB available with the first two round picks or are able to trade our 2nd+ to get another 1st rounder if the players still available warrant that.

 

[jrry32]

Fisher had McNair, wasn't he a running QB..........?

Griffin will never be any good in the NFL and anyone signing him is going to regret it, he is all false hope and promise.

If he had any talent he wouldn't be playing safety on the scout team he'd be the starter.

I wouldn't make this assumption.

 

[Zombie Slayer]

If the Rams are going to sign a qb where the whole system had to be changed for a mobile qb, wouldn't Kaep be the better option? I mean he's been to a super bowl. I'd rather have defenses try to defend him, Gurley and Austin over RGIII. But I'm not high on any of the free agent QBs besides Cousins. I say they'll draft one high and have him, Keenum, Foles, and Mannion battle it out.

 

[MTRamsFan]

Fisher had McNair, wasn't he a running QB..........?

He was a passer first, runner second. McNair wa involved in a spread passing game for the most part. He threw for over 31,000 yards during his NFL career. Yeah he had over 3,800 yards rushing too, but in 13 seasons that averages to less than 300 yards per season. So by those stats McNair was more of a passer than a runner. Also, the QB read-option was not in affect back when McNair played. This is a huge part of RG3's attraction, and why Fisher will never bring in a QB that is more a runner than a passer. Now can RG3 become a passer and rely less on his feet? Not sure, but it could happen.

 

[fancents86]

Seems like some of you don't know about the Fisher/Young debacle in Tenn. it played out pretty much like RGknee in Wash, but worse. Why the hell would Fisher want that jackass on his team? Having RGKnee on our team is about as likely as grabbing Aaron Rodgers.

 

[bluecoconuts]

My first thought is hell no, my second is that it would be hilarious to get the bounty and RG3.

 

[thirteen28]

Keenum. Mannion. 1st Round draft pick. Maybe one camp arm.

No room for RGIII.

 

[HitStick]

I think RG3 would work well here. In Washington he got caught up in his own hype and then got a serving of humble pie. Here he wouldn't be the face of the franchise, and probably wouldn't ever even be the focal point of the offense. RG3 would be perfect in a offense with a strong run game (see his rookie year). With legit receivers he could blossom.

 

[jetplt67]

If there isn't a better option in FA, (I doubt there is) absolutely bring him in. He is far superior to anyone on the roster presently.

 

[LesBaker]

I wouldn't make this assumption.

It's an easy one to make. The best players play on Sunday unless something really truly out of this world happens. We can say that maybe his act got old or whatever, but then why would you want a guy who supposedly has the talent to be a starter but is 3rd string and playing safety on the scout team. If it isn't his talent that put him there then it was something REALLY bad and I'd want no part of it.

 

[Prime Time]

http://mmqb.si.com/mmqb/2016/01/12/robert-griffin-rg3-washington-tenure-ends-nfl

The Final Note on RG3
Silent this season after being demoted to the bench, Robert Griffin III left Washington a farewell message without saying a thing. It was a strange ending befitting the odd tenure for the ex-franchise QB in D.C.
by Robert Klemko

Mitchell Leff/Getty Images

LANDOVER, Md. — Washington’s third-string quarterback, Robert Griffin III, dapped each of the outstretched hands and smiling faces that greeted him on his way out of FedEx Field for the last time. A dreadlocked security guard in a green jacket whom Griffin had greeted a dozen times over the years pulled him close. “It’s been a blast,” Griffin told him. Said the guard: “Keep the faith. In my eyes, it’s still your team.” Griffin only smiled.

Of course, it’s not. Hasn’t been for some time. Shrewd observers might note the end of the RG3 era as the afternoon of Dec. 9, 2012, the day Griffin barreled into Ravens defensive lineman Haloti Ngata and hyper-extended his knee, a prelude to an agonizing evening at FedEx a month later when Griffin finished the job on his ACL in a playoff loss to Seattle.

The more literal fan may point to the beginning of this season, when Jay Gruden, benefiting from the buffering effect of a real, live general manager in Scot McCloughan (whom some in the organization credit with neutralizing an owner long smitten with Griffin), announced one-time backup Kirk Cousins as the starter.

But that’s ancient history now. Griffin will be released soon by the team that drafted him No. 2 overall in 2012 and enjoyed his breathtaking Rookie of the Year campaign that fall and winter. So at the conclusion of his second NFL playoff game on Sunday night—one a healthy Griffin watched in street clothes—he made a point of shaking the hands of each of the yellow-jacketed security guards who line the perimeter of the home bench, then he jogged off to the locker room and later declined comment on the way to his ride.

“It’s not the right time,” he said.

What could Griffin have said about his four years in the NFL, standing in the tunnel between the field and the players’ parking lot, that could possibly have summed up this journey with any adequacy? At his best Griffin wasn’t just successful; he was iconic. To watch him in 2012 was to witness the haphazard brilliance of 2004 Michael Vick channeled into a system that one dreamed could actually sustain life in the NFL for every high school quarterback who rushed for 1,000 yards and was promptly converted to wide receiver.

The read-option and its variants were freezing the likes of DeMarcus Ware and Jason Pierre-Paul in their tracks. Onlookers leapt at the notion that this could be the beginning of something, and Griffin was leading the revolution. Said Saints quarterback Drew Brees in September 2012: "It's only a matter of time before he takes this league by storm.”

Three years later Griffin spent a season on the bench, under guard from reporters during open locker-room sessions by a member of the team’s media relations staff who cut off scribes seeking only to exchange small talk with the one-time media darling. “No interviews,” he warned. Griffin was, for six months, the best-protected third-string quarterback in football.

The right time to make a statement, as it happens, came the day after Sunday. As teammates cleared out their lockers, Griffin packed his things into cardboard boxes, leaving behind a single note printed on paper featuring the team logo, hanging from the top shelf that for years housed his Incredible Hulk action figure. It was a poem often misattributed to Mother Teresa (the actual author was Kent M. Keith, a college student who penned a pamphlet on student council leadership in 1968).

He went quietly before Monday, but his actions spoke volumes. By all accounts, he worked his ass off. Griffin spent 30 to 40 minutes after typical practices in 2015 working on drops and throws with second-year equipment assistant Pat Coleman. Then he conditioned as he always had.

“He was a constant professional and didn’t become a distraction,” said sixth-year defensive lineman Chris Baker. “It’s gotta be hard for a guy of his stature to go from being the guy to a bench player, but he handled it with class.”

Griffin continued to do the little things he always did: slapping hands with every player during pregame stretches, conducting a pregame routine that included a brief moment of reflection at the midfield logo. Of course, quarterback meetings with Cousins and QB coach Matt Cavanaugh were awkward, says backup Colt McCoy, “but it’s the NFL, so you’ve got to get over that.

“When that all went down at the beginning of the season, naming Kirk the starter, it was pretty unexpected,” McCoy continues. “And Robert didn’t say things he probably could’ve said. I think there’s a lot of luck involved in this business. A lot of things have to fall in the right place at the right time, and it just didn’t for him.”

It’s fair to wonder today what Griffin’s early career might have looked like in a different place, where he might not have been asked to start on Day 1 for a football team that finished 5-11 the year before. It’s been well-documented that the outgoing Mike Shanahan regime was encouraged by his near-maniacal work ethic but put off by Griffin’s approach to film study; might he have absorbed a different mindset as a backup that first year? Griffin never did learn to slide at the appropriate moment; might he have avoided injury with more time to acclimate to the speed of the pro game?

“You always will wonder what Robert would have been if he could have sat and learned,” says Nick Sundberg, Washington’s longtime long snapper. “You look at Aaron Rodgers, sitting behind Brett Favre. You get time for the body to develop, time to get used to the speed. Do I think things would’ve been a little different if he had time to sit? You have to.”

Instead, success and celebrity came fast and frantic, and both Griffin and the organization led by team owner Dan Snyder made some decisions that appear unwise now. After his rush back to the field after the Ngata hit, and the subsequent re-injury, there was that cryptic Spring 2013 text to ESPN’s Trey Wingo that hinted at discontent within the organization: “i know where my responsibility is within the dilemma that led to me having surgery to repair my knee and all parties involved know their responsibilities as well.”

And then Griffin was ‘All In for Week 1,’ a sprint-to-the-finish recovery from knee surgery paired with an Adidas marketing campaign that rubbed more than a few teammates the wrong way, and might have compromised the recovery process, too. And then there was Griffin’s logo, unveiled after the injury-riddled 2013 season—a 3-13 finish—during which Griffin quietly campaigned for reporters to share his sleek new personal stamp with their social media followers.

A year later, Griffin’s marketing team had moved on. Cousins, curiously drafted three rounds after Griffin in 2012, was named the starter and finished the 2015 season as the player of the month in the NFC.

But before that, when Cousins was laboring through a rough patch of the schedule and Washington was losing to teams that would make the playoffs, Griffin was quietly defending Cousins, and winning the hearts of those who shared one final night with him in Landover. After one loss, Griffin was walking to his car when a fan started screaming “F--- Kirk!” According to local photographer Dexter Powell, who was nearby, Griffin walked over to the fan and said, “No, no, no. It’s about the team. Not the individual.” Powell was one of the people Griffin embraced on Sunday night.

“I think sometimes you have to fall to realize you have more work to do in here,” Powell said, pointing to his chest.

Cousins’ season ended with a 29-for-46, one-touchdown performance in a 35-18 loss, which shone light on Washington’s glaring defensive deficiencies but offered a glimpse into an optimistic future. The press box in Washington, half empty in Week 7 when the team stood at 2-5, had a line out the door Sunday evening for halftime offerings of Ben’s Chili Bowl.

And even after the blowout, there was some pep in McCloughan's step as he walked away from FedEx. In just one year he had moved on from the injury-prone enigma known as RG3, who only a year ago made one last impassioned plea in a team meeting after regaining his starting job for the last time: "I'm going to give this 100%," Griffin said, according to several players in the room. "I just need you to have my back."

He would start five of the final nine games, throwing four touchdowns and six interceptions.

Then, after a season of near-silence, Griffin left behind only that poem.

Give the best you have, and it will never be enough. Give your best anyway.

Was it passive-aggressive? Probably. Clichéd? Sure. Diffusive of blame? You could make the argument. But it was undoubtedly Robert.

He remains affable, quirky and smart. Says Sundberg: “Robert's the type of guy that you can introduce him to your mom once and he remembers her name.”

But was he particularly close with anybody?

Says wide receiver Rashad Ross: “I’m not sure that he was.”

In the end, teammates took little notice of the hanging note as they passed around souvenir footballs for autographs to commemorate the 2015 season. Meanwhile, Griffin’s message went viral online, engendering a panoply of positive and negative reactions among fans.

Diva.

Underappreciated.

RGME.

Aware.

Clown.

Hero.

Shown a picture of the poem, Sundberg's eyes got big.

“Whew,” he said. “Interesting.”

That it was—all four years of it.

 

[jrry32]

It's an easy one to make. The best players play on Sunday unless something really truly out of this world happens. We can say that maybe his act got old or whatever, but then why would you want a guy who supposedly has the talent to be a starter but is 3rd string and playing safety on the scout team. If it isn't his talent that put him there then it was something REALLY bad and I'd want no part of it.

This is not always true.(in the case of Washington, Kirk Cousins is better for that team and system than RGIII, though)

It was something really bad. And I hope he learned from it. But talent isn't the issue. It's the other things. This is the same guy that had a 100+ QB Rating and 20 TDs to 5 Ints as a rookie. It was in a dumbed down offense but he still had to make the throws. RGIII's problem isn't talent. It's his personality/character. If he's been humbled by his experience and learned from it, he still has an opportunity to develop into a quality QB. He's only 25 years old. How old was Kurt Warner when the Rams gave him a chance? How old was Rich Gannon when the Raiders gave him a chance?

If RGIII wants to be great and is willing to put the work in, it's still attainable.

 

[shaunpinney]

This is not always true.(in the case of Washington, Kirk Cousins is better for that team and system than RGIII, though)

It was something really bad. And I hope he learned from it. But talent isn't the issue. It's the other things. This is the same guy that had a 100+ QB Rating and 20 TDs to 5 Ints as a rookie. It was in a dumbed down offense but he still had to make the throws. RGIII's problem isn't talent. It's his personality/character. If he's been humbled by his experience and learned from it, he still has an opportunity to develop into a quality QB. He's only 25 years old. How old was Kurt Warner when the Rams gave him a chance? How old was Rich Gannon when the Raiders gave him a chance?

If RGIII wants to be great and is willing to put the work in, it's still attainable.

Fisher and the Rams are good at dealing with young player with 'character problems'. I still think that RGIII has the potential to be a exciting starter in the NFL, you don't need a complicated offense to be a SB champion, you just need to do the basics well. like you said, he's still young, being benched when you're the face of the franchise, and a player that cost so much in draft equity, must have been humbling.

if I was a school boy and I was pick an NFL team and my 3 QB choices are Keenum, Foles or RGIII - it's RGIII overtime and I'll find it difficult to believe anyone who choses one of the other 2...

 

[shaunpinney]

@jrry32 in your opinion, how would you compare RGIII to the QBs in the class of 2016?

 

[jrry32]

@jrry32 in your opinion, how would you compare RGIII to the QBs in the class of 2016?

I couldn't. I don't know where RGIII is at mentally...which is the thing that has held him back in the NFL.