Jay Gruden: “Kirk Cousins will be the starter for 2015”

After saying for months that Robert Griffin III was his quarterback, Washington coach Jay Gruden reversed course today, saying that Cousins is the starter — and will remain the starter, meaning Griffin has no chance to unseat him.
“Kirk Cousins will be the starter for 2015, moving forward,” Gruden said. “It’s Kirk’s team.”
Of course, Gruden has changed his mind about his starting quarterback several times during his year and a half as Washington’s coach, so no one should be surprised if either Griffin or Colt McCoy ends up starting at some point. Gruden insisted that he thinks he has three good quarterbacks.
“Robert’s done some great things, no question. We have total faith in all three of them,” Gruden said. “We just feel like Kirk has earned the right to be the starting quarterback in 2015.”
Amid talk that owner Dan Snyder was pushing for the team to keep Griffin while the football people wanted to move on, Gruden said that starting Cousins is his call, but Snyder has always supported his calls.
“Mr. Snyder has been nothing but supportive of this football team,” Gruden said. “All Mr. Snyder wants to do is win.”
Gruden said the team does not plan to release Griffin, has he has not decided whether Griffin will be the second-string quarterback, or whether McCoy will be second and Griffin third. All he’ll say for sure is that Cousins is the starter, and will remain the starter.

Source: PFT.com
Author: Michael David Smith
AP Photo: Tom Gannam, WTOP.com

McCoy, Cousins continue to out-play RG3

If Washington’s quarterback depth chart were determined by on-field performance, Robert Griffin III would be firmly entrenched at third string.
Although coach Jay Gruden insisted after Thursday’s preseason game against the Lions that Griffin will remain the starter, that game showed once again what we’ve seen throughout Gruden’s tenure as Washington’s coach: Colt McCoy and Kirk Cousins are simply playing better football than Griffin.
So far this preseason, McCoy has a 131.6 passer rating and has led Washington’s offense on three touchdown drives. Cousins has a 118.3 passer rating and has also led Washington’s offense on three touchdown drives. Griffin has a 54.6 passer rating, and Washington has yet to score a touchdown with Griffin on the field.
You can argue that the preseason is too small a sample size to draw any conclusions, and that Griffin is playing against better defensive players than Cousins and McCoy are. But Griffin’s sub-par performance goes beyond just this year’s preseason. Last year Griffin started seven games, Cousins started five and McCoy started four. Washington wasn’t a particularly good team no matter who was starting, but according to ESPN’s QBR system, which combines both statistics and film study into one number on a 0-100 scale, Griffin was easily the worst of the three. McCoy had a 46.9 QBR, Cousins had a 46.5 QBR and Griffin had a 33.5 QBR. The Football Outsiders DVOA system, which uses play-by-play data to assess quarterbacks, similarly had Griffin as by far the worst of Washington’s three quarterbacks.
Given all that, it’s surprising that Gruden is so adamant that Griffin will continue to start. Perhaps Gruden is still intrigued by the great promise Griffin showed in his rookie season. Perhaps Dan Snyder has told Gruden to give Griffin a chance. Perhaps Gruden just doesn’t think McCoy and Cousins are legitimate NFL starters.
But at some point, on-field results have to matter. And Griffin simply isn’t getting results.

Source: PFT.com
Author: Michael David Smith
AP Photo: Tom Gannam, WTOP.com

RG3 is the starter now, but Jay Gruden may not stick with him long

Washington coach Jay Gruden has said Robert Griffin III is the team’s starter “right now.” But it’s hard to believe that Griffin will remain the team’s starter for the duration of the 2015 season.
Gruden showed last year that he’s willing to make a change at the quarterback position if he doesn’t see the results he’s looking for. And Gruden made many public comments indicating that Griffin doesn’t play the quarterback position the way Gruden wants.
There’s also the simple fact that both Colt McCoy and Kirk Cousins were better than Griffin last year, the first year in Gruden’s offense for all three of them. Griffin takes so many sacks (33, more than McCoy and Cousins combined) and fumbles so often (nine times, again more than McCoy and Cousins combined) that he negates the advantage that his running ability provides. It’s great for a quarterback to be able to make plays with his feet, but not great for him to trust his feet to bail him out of so many situations that he doesn’t get rid of the ball when he’s under pressure and ends up taking sacks or fumbling.
And Griffin simply isn’t the same runner anymore that he was as a rookie. Griffin went from 120 carries for 815 yards and seven touchdowns in 2012 to 86 carries for 489 yards and no touchdowns in 2013 to 38 carries for 176 yards and one touchdown in 2014. Post-knee surgery, Griffin is a different runner.
Even Griffin’s longest run of the season in 2014 was hardly something to celebrate: On a 23-yard scramble against the Giants, Griffin did a great job of breaking into the clear and picking up a first down. But instead of stepping out of bounds as soon as he passed the stick, Griffin cut back inside to pick up extra yardage. That resulted in a tackle that had Griffin going down hard on his knees. Griffin needs to learn that to protect himself better than that.
If Griffin can’t protect himself better than that, the question of whether he’ll remain the starter will become moot because he’ll get hurt. But even if Griffin stays healthy, the simple fact is Gruden has never seemed to think much of Griffin as a quarterback, and unless Griffin can improve dramatically, it’s probably just a matter of time before Gruden benches him for McCoy or Cousins.


Source: PFT
Author: Michael David Smith
AP Photo: Tom Gannam