Gästebuch » A collection of Redskins articles from around

the web"Redskins dipping in to AAF to reportedly bolster line depth with | NBC Sports WashingtonRedskins are looking to sign Andrew Ankrah of the Orlando Apollos in an attempt to improve its pass rush next season.Bruce Allen Believes New NFL Rule Change 'An Improvement' To Protect Integrity Of GameThe Redskins President beleives new technology will continue to improve calls on the field while commenting on the team's activity in free agency.Redskins to host draft night fan party at The Anthem - Washington TimesThe Washington Redskins are inviting fans to Redskins' Draft Night Presented by 7-Eleven on April 25 Terry McLaurin Jersey 2019 , the night of the first round of the NFL Draft, at The Anthem in the District.Josh Rosen reportedly expected to attend Cards' workoutsCardinals quarterback Josh Rosen has been the subject of trade rumors, but a report said he's expected to be at the team's offseason workouts starting Monday.Could Josh Rosen be 'a better' Kirk Cousins if paired with the Redskins? One analyst says so | NBC Sports WashingtonAndy Benoit believes Josh Rosen would fit in quite nicely with the Redskins and Jay Gruden's offense. So nicely, in fact, that he might be better than Gruden's last prolific QB.Failed Completions 2018 | Football OutsidersFootball Outsiders is the internet home for Innovative Statistics and Intelligent Analysis of the NFL and college football. Our writers, led by Aaron Schatz, also provide content to ESPN.com and write the annual book Football Outsiders Almanac.Jhurrell Pressley will serve suspension if signed by NFL teamPressley has drawn the attention of NFL teams, but if he makes a roster in September, he won't be able to play right away.Predicting the 2018 NFC East winner & losers: consolidating the position rankings Over the past two weeks, I’ve posted several articles about position groups, asking Hog’s Haven members to rank those position groups & head coaches in the NFC East.It was nice to see commenters (mostly) put away the tendency to root for the home team and try to be (somewhat) objective.Burgundy-colored glasses certainly had an effect, but it was more akin to a halo effect, where — when it was close -- the advantage went to the home team.Overall, though, commenters were pretty fair in their assessments.At a time of year when NFL blogs struggle to offer anything to readers, and when comments on most NFL-related articles number in the dozens and often don’t muster more than a single-digit total of comments, Hogs Haven members really came through on these ranking articles.We’ve seen between 1,000 and 3,000 votes on each of the various polls, and the 10 ranking articles had a total of 1,700 comments!Given that I merely posed the questions, and the comments sections supplied the answers, this is a wonderful example of reader-driven content.Now that the series is finished, to wrap it up and try to put a bow on it, I wanted to put the many rankings on a chart to consolidate them and see what they said about the expectations for the coming season among the Hog’s Haven members.Unfortunately, there’s nothing really straightforward about doing that.I would have liked to have used the raw poll results to establish the rankings by position, but that would have been unlikely to reflect the reality of the situation or the opinions of the readers accurately. Instead, I started with the idea that when you rank the teams from 1 - 4, there are 10 position points to give out (1+2+3+4=10).I decided that the basic idea should be to allocate the 10 points across each position ranking, allowing ties between teams wherever it seemed appropriate.The rule was that the 4 rankings had to add up to 10 points.For each position ranking, I looked first at the poll results, but then leavened them by taking into account the comments section to establish general rankings.Finally I added a dash of something — common sense,balance, judgement, normalization... I’m not sure what to call it.Basically, I just tried to make sure that the final rankings weren’t unreasonably skewed by the raw voting results.A few things were obvious when I looked at the results of the polls and the content of the comments sections.Firstly, it’s a Redskins website, so there’ll be a significant Redskins bias.Secondly, reading the comments section made it clear that the Eagles fans had showed up in bigger numbers than the Giants fans, and the Cowboys groupies almost hadn’t showed up at all.The other thing that I found from this exercise is that recency bias plays a role. Using the recent past to project the futureThe power of recency bias is intense in the business of sports prediction.For example, last year, in the wake of the Giants’ 11-5 season and the Eagles’ 7-9 finish, Hog’s Haven voters largely put the Giants at the top of the voting and the Eagles near the bottom.This year, following the 2017 Super Bowl win for Philly and the Giants’ 3-13 meltdown, things were turned around.The results of the voting, in light of all the factors that influenced them, were not surprising.When I consolidated the voting Ryan Kerrigan Jersey , the comments and some personal judgement, and blended it all together, here’s what I came up with:Unsurprisingly, the Eagles came out with the best average ranking following their Superbowl win.The Eagles were rated either a clear first place or tied for first in 9 of the 11 rankings.Further, they were ranked last in only a single position group — running back.The Eagles, when all the position group rankings were averaged, had the best ranking at 1.8, indicating that readers are expecting them to, once again, win the division title.The Redskins, with a composite score of 2.3, were ranked second by the readers.The real surprise is that they weren’t ranked 1st by Hog’s Haven readers, but — as I mentioned above — the Eagles fans showed up in force to read, vote in, and comment on the articles in this series.The Redskins were in the top rank for only two position groups (OL and CB) and in both cases Washington was in a tie with at least one division rival.The real benefit for the Redskins was that they weren’t ranked #4 in any position group by the readers.The ‘Skins were typically ranked 2nd or 3rd.The Giants & Cowboys were routinely found in the 4th position in the individual position rankings in the series of articles on Hogs Haven, with the Giants being ranked as the worst in a position group 5 times, and the Cowboys bringing up the rear 6 times.The Giants could only muster 2 first place finishes (ties for WR & S), while the Cowboys had two uncontested first place rankings (RB & ILB) and tied with the Eagles and ‘Skins for the best ranking at the OL position.In the end, the unscientific analysis indicates that voters/commenters see a huge talent gap, with the Eagles clearly having the best roster, the Redskins second, and the Cowboys last.As is often the case, fans seem to be projecting the results from last season onto the season ahead, with a bit of a Redskins positive bias to push them up the rankings, and some Cowboys negative bias to push them down.Once again, given that these rankings were derived by asking opinions from Hogs Haven members, it’s no surprise that the Redskins came out ahead of both the Cowboys and the Giants.What is perhaps surprising is how much respect was given to the Eagles, though the evidence suggests that their fans ‘traveled’ to Hogs Haven and heavily influenced the voting, and participated in the comments.Giants and Cowboys fans had the same opportunity, of course, but — and this is especially true of Dallas fans — they simply weren’t here voting and commenting.I suspect that the Eagles fans, with their team having won their first-ever Lombardi Trophy, are staying more ‘plugged in’ through the offseason in an attempt to continue the celebration, and with anticipation of another successful season coming up.The overall message for the Redskins faithful from this series may be that the readers seem to think that the ‘Skins have enough to get to the playoffs, but that it will be as a wildcard team, not as division champs.Instead, they see the Eagles — returning the head coach and most of the starters — as the clear favorites to win the NFC East again in 2018.I’ll remind you that, last year, the same exercise ranked our division rivals in this order:GiantsCowboysEagleswhich is the exact opposite of their actual finishing positions in the 2017 division contest.The team we all seemed to expect to be the weakest in the division — the Eagles — ended up winning the Lombardi Trophy.The team that was projected to do the best — the Giants — started the season 0-4 even before the injuries really started to bite, and they never recovered.Final thoughtsIn the parity-driven NFL, last season doesn’t matter. Outside of the Patriots, there are very few teams that have shown a year-on-year consistency that would allow you to confidently project them as a playoff team year after year.As always, the NFL is a league of great parity; the NFC East remains (in my opinion) a division without a single dominant team; every season begins with the knowledge that anything is possible.And that’s why last year doesn’t matter for NFL teams, and why you’re allowed to be optimistic about the Redskins’ playoff chances this season. 2018 should be another great season for the division.Personally, I expect it to be a great season for the Redskins as well. Here are the links to the 2018 “Ranking the NFC East” articles:Quarterbacks & Running BacksWide ReceiversTight EndsOffensive LineSafetiesCornerbacksLinebackersEdge RushersDefensive LineHead Coach