It was an agonizing three quarters of football watching Robert Griffin III hobble around on a bad knee in the Washington Redskins' defeat at the hands of the Seattle Seahawks. The rookie quarterback quite possibly could be the Rookie of the Year in a few weeks, but he could whip up no heroics on Wild Card weekend and his injury led to the Redskins' demise.Griffin injured his knee earlier in the year, but continued to play while wearing a brace on his right knee. That right knee is the same knee in which he tore his ACL back in 2009 while at Baylor and the early inclinations are that he may have torn it again. It's devastating news and leaves 'Skins fans with a bitter taste in their mouth despite feeling so hopeful just 24 hours ago.
RGIII came out hot last night, leading Washington to two straight scores and opening up a 14-0 lead. However, it went south from there and it was plain to see Griffin's pain as he scrambled right, stepped awkwardly and fell to the sloppy turf late in the first quarter. He limped back to the huddle and remained in the game, but he was never the same.
Consider this: in the first quarter Griffin was 6-9 for 68 yards and two touchdowns, but the rest of the game he was just 4-11 for 16 yards and no touchdowns. Despite his obvious pain and lessened mobility, the Redskins continued to run plays such as read options and pass plays that required him to roll out in one direction. It was poor play-calling and it was part of the reason they 'Skins lost the ballgame.
Mike Shanahan said in the postgame that he might have been wrong to leave Griffin in for as long as he did, but let me assure Shanahan that he was 100% wrong. Here's why: while Griffin may have said he was good to go, his play said otherwise. The playoffs are win-or-go-home scenarios and there's not much time for error. After RGIII aggravated his knee in the first quarter the Redskins should have limited him to a pocket passer. A quick look at his stats tells the tale. He simply wasn't the same and it's not as though Washington had Joe Webb sitting on the sidelines. They had Kirk Cousins, a more than capable backup who had shown promise in his playing time earlier in the year.
Shanahan refused to make the switch and the offense sputtered, failing to score for the rest of the game. I understand that football is a man's game and there's something to be said for being a warrior for your team. RGIII was a warrior. He tried to continue on, but the reality is that he wasn't the best man for the job after the first quarter and it was visible. The reason people (including me) criticized Jay Cutler two years ago is because his pain was never visible. No one knew he was hurt; he just didn't play the second half. With Griffin we could see the limp, see the grimaces every time he ran and see the statistics plummet.
Shanahan made an error in judgement and it cost his team the game. However, blame is hardly what matters here as we all hope the 22 year old star gets good news about his knee and can heal quickly. It seems that we have seen far too many young stars go down with knee injuries in the past couple years. Derrick Rose, Ricky Rubio, Blake Griffin, John Wall, Adrian Peterson and perhaps Griffin all have been sidelined for long periods of time. Injuries are realities of the games we play, but this one hurts especially because it seemed obvious that it was only a matter of time before RGIII crumpled to the ground in pain.
In the fourth quarter when his knee gave out on him and he laid on the ground, it was as if the entire nation held their breath, hoping he would get back up. He finally did and he walked off on his own power, but there's a certain gloom over the sports world today. Hopefully this will serve as a lesson to coaches in all sports that when a player is injured he must be taken out. The game means a lot, but a career means more.
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