As The Redskins Prepare To Visit The Saints, A Look Back at the Saints' Visit In DC

The Washington Redskins are set to take on the 2009 Super Bowl Champions New Orleans Saints in their first game of the regular 2012 NFL season.

On playing the Saints coach Shanahan says their quarterback, Drew Brees, has pin point accuracy.

“To have the success they had, you’ve got to have it all. You have to have a great scheme. You got to have excellent personnel and great quarterback play. Their quarterback is as good as it gets in the game and makes very few mistakes. He has pinpoint accuracy and knows the strength and weakness of defenses. He does a great job of putting them in the right place at the right time.”

Fans will look to see if the Redskins' QB will have the same.   The coaching staff has already seen improvement in their second-round QB draft choice, Robert Griffin, III.

"When you’ve got a guy who has played in an unconventional offense his whole life and comes to a little bit of a different one, everything’s new to him", said Skins' offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan. "The main thing with Robert is that he’s gotten better in every area as we’ve gone along. The saying we always says is, ‘You get better or you get worse,’ and Robert has continued to work at everything. I think he’s gotten better in all facets."
 
In 2009 the then Super Bowl Champs made a visit to Washington and brought some of their Louisiana flavor with them. 
 
 


Come Sunday, in prime time, Washington will need to bring their DC flavor with them - if they expect to defeat Brees and the Saints.

Said RG3 on returning to his home state to face Brees, "I'm looking forward to it."

Also...

Coach Shanahan critiques himself, and his team.

On how he has improved as a coach:
“I think I’ve grown and the more you get reps as a player, the more you get reps as a coach, the better you get. It’s pretty easy when everything’s going right to be a good coach. When things are going bad, what do you do? It’s tough at times. But I feel I have learned a lot from these past two years, how things are. You feel like you can do anything, how to fight through it and how to improve it. When you can figure those ways, you’ve really got to grind it out and really think how to help your players out. Each experience you get and each situation you get, you become better as a coach. I think my experience here and what I’ve been through has really helped me.”
On specific areas in which he has improved:
“All aspects – dealing with players, play calling, when to call things, what your players are capable of doing. When you know what you want to do to attack a defense, but maybe your guys can’t do it, so you’ve got to do something else… I mean, just finding different ways. I had three years as a coordinator before I came here and those three years were pretty simple. I don’t know about simple, but everything was clicking at Houston. We’ve been together for a while and we were staying pretty healthy. We really never had a hard time ever moving the ball. It’s more about, ‘Hey, we’ve got to do what it takes to win.’ Here, we’ve had some ups and downs. If everything was easy, I don’t know how good you’d be. When you go through hard stuff, it’s what you learn from it. You either get better or worse from a situation and you’re always trying to be better.”
On his vision for this season:
“It changes every year. That’s also what I’m learning the more years I’m a coordinator. Your vision – there’s no one set offense. Your offense is what your players can do and what they do best and that will change every year. Stuff changes because of your quarterback. Stuff changes because of your O-line. It will change because of your wideouts, your running backs. It’s always evolving. It will also change because your defense doesn’t catch up. You need to study tape too. You’ve got to know football. You’ve got to know defenses, study it, know where the weaknesses are and how you’re going to attack it and make sure however you want to attack it, your players are capable of doing it. I think we are in the right spot right now and we’re just looking forward to getting these guys out there.”
On continuity along the offensive line:
“I think it’s really important. I think football is not an individual sport at all. The O-line is as much of a team position as any position on a team. You have a good line when five guys know how to play together. Some places they have some good individuals, but if they don’t play together, a lot of issues happen. Our five guys have been banged up. They weren’t all out there during the preseason, but they are five guys that have played together at some time. I think those guys are all staying healthy and I think they can be a really good group working together."

---

Related
Bountygate! What Bountygate? Saints players cleared of suspensions. Click here.
Welcome home, Jim Haslett?
General Manager To Redskins Fans, "You're Gonna Love The Redskins!"  Click here.
Rewind:  Our Saints at the White House article. 

Comments