Preseason Game #1 Notes

(Note: I wrote all this yesterday during a heavy drinking binge that lasted until 3 in the morning, forgetting I had to get up 7 and fly to stupid Florida for some shit for work, which I did, and got stuck traveling, so am just now trying to gain my bearings in the stupid fucking TPA airport before I hopefully get drunk again, but this time looking at the Gulf of Mexico and it's oil-stained pelicans and pretend Mexican rednecks. So when you read this and see "last night" realize that means Friday night. Or fuck it, just pretend it's still Saturday wherever you are. Go ahead and blaze up homie, you're off work tomorrow.)

The Redskins opened up preseason last night by kicking the Buffalo Bills ass all over FedEx Field, and before the game, with the pregame on the AM radio riding home on a Friday late afternoon with a 24 oz. Red Stripe between my legs, man, I was geeked the fuck up for football season. FOOTBALL MOTHERFUCKERS! Not baseball (the codeine cough syrup of professional sports) or pro basketball (the as-yet-unadmitted WWE style predetermined sports entertainment of professional sports... did you see Lebron turn heel by the way? man what an ass) or the world's football (which, the world cup is awesome as fuck, no doubt about that... makes me wish pro american football was far more regionalized and affordable so that thousands upon thousands of drunken delinquents would storm opposing cities, kinda like there were 32 Philadelphias, just twice as bad). This is Pro Motherfuckin' American Football, the truest of American past times, because people become concussed into dementia and crippled at their joints while making far more money than they should before they are old enough to know how to handle it, so you blow it all and end up a crippled and crazy burden on the rest of society. Americana to the core, bros. Embrace it.
Anyways, I am no fool and do not pretend that a preseason blowout that doesn't count against what is expected to be one of the absolute worst teams this year in the NFL is any sort of sign of impending greatness, but I did want to drop some quick opinions for you on assorted Redskins personnel.
MIKE SHANAHAN - You know, I am not exactly embracing the Shanahan era because I've never liked that dude. In fact, in most of my semi-libelous drunken internet writings over the years concerning the NFL, I've made it a habit of mentioning how if anyone in the NFL coaching hierarchy most likely molested children, it would be Shanahan. I do not change from that belief, though I won't be mentioning it every time anymore, because he is my head coach now. But seeing him pout-facing on the sideline with his mouth shaped like a bleached anus, it did not make me feel good. He actually bothered me upon first seeing as Redskins coach on the sideline more than Norv Turner, but not as much as Steve Spurrier. It should be noted that Norv Turner eventually bothered me more than anybody has ever bothered me as a head coach; and also should be noted that last night's blowout reminded me of the Ol' Ball Coach running it up on the 49ers in his first preseason game, even though Shanahan didn't purposely run it up on the Bills. I do not like this Mike Shanahan, and never will, but if he can establish some sort of actual franchise from Dan Snyder's personal plaything so that the rest of us who have loved the Redskins from our youth like Dan Snyder can enjoy it as well, then so be it. I will accept him.
TRENT WILLIAMS - You know what? This dude looks completely comfortable as an NFL starting tackle. Like he looked solid, not in his playing but just in his personal swagger. He's not cocky, yet he's confident, plus he's got more tattoos than a jailhouse gangsta, yet a sweet and simple crooked tooth smile that shows this is an ugly motherfucker who grew up big and now has millions and he's going to enjoy every Sunday afternoon starting assignment and every chartered jet and every groupie piece of pussy and every moment, and want it to go good to keep on going good like that. This is the first 1st round pick the Redskins have made since Sean Taylor that I've felt good about. Don't ask to me to go before Sean Taylor for another one because I'm not sure if I can remember that far back.
DONOVAN MCNABB - Whatever man. McNabb is McNabb, and what he brings that the Redskins have been lacking at QB for a decade is someone who asserts their authority over the offense. We will live and die by him, and very likely death will be the end result more often than not as the season wears on, but at least he accepts that on his back. Now maybe they can throw somebody under his wing for a year or two while they squeeze last drops of blood out of this retread rock of an NFL QB.
CHRIS COOLEY - The cynicism of being a Redskins fan has gotten so bad over the last decade that last season I was actually talking smack on Chris Cooley. That's ridiculous. Dude is the fucking man, and a solid ass dude to pull for on your football team. Other NFL fans should be so lucky to have a half-retarded goofball workhorse player with a penchant for saying and doing things like your boy from high school who has never started taking life seriously would do.
DEVIN THOMAS - Man, with Vinny Cerrato gone, there's no more trying to force us to believe that the Thomas, Malcolm Kelly, Fred Davis draft is going to pay off. Honestly, I would suspect Kelly to be gone by the end of preseason, and left to look for back-up work somewhere else where such damaged goods would be better than nothing. Thomas is still being given a shot to prove himself, including on kickoff returns, and seeing him flat out miss his first kickoff catch and the other dude have to fall on it to save a turnover, well yeah that's Devin Thomas. He seems like he has the skills but the grey matter just ain't too solid. Too many axons are disconnected.
MA'AKE KEMOEATU - Aka "Duke" which is what I shall call him. Anyone who knows me knows I have a huge football fetish for big happy-go-goofy Samoan dudes who play either defensive line or fullback, so a 350 lb. coconut-headed wildman eating up blockers in the middle happily is a much desired improvement over Albert Haynesworth's broody half-winded ass trying to do the same.
DE'ANGELO HALL - Classic De'Angelo, making a few stupid mistakes and snatching an INT to take down to like the 10 yard line, setting up a TD for the offense. I foresee a lot of this happening as new D-coordinator Jim Haslet was talking in a radio interview during the pregame talking about how the Redskins were highly rated in how few yards they allowed the past four years, but have consistently been low in snatching turnovers, basically saying he could give half a fuck about yards allowed, he wants motherfuckers taking the ball from the offense. I would expect this change in defensive philosophy will work well to get De'Angelo on Sportscenter Plays of the Day clips, and also drive Redskins fans who watch every play of every game furious at blown gambles on third and 8s that extend opposing drives. Oh well.
REX GROSSMAN - It makes me uncomfortable enough just having Sexy Rexy in a Redskins uniform, since I have solid e-bros who are diehard Bears fans and basically Rex screwed them over regularly with his inconsistency. Yet here are is Joe Theismann on TV commentary and Sonny Jurgensen on the radio pregame and others talking up how great Rex has played in camp, and how he really seems to have it all together, him having come with Kyle Shanahan and knowing this offense better than anybody else on the roster. I don't feel comfortable with this whatsoever. It's like we as fans are girls and this is some dude who dated like three of my friends and used to beat the fucking shit out of each and every one of them, but he shows up in my life, and he seems nice, and everyone's telling me, "Oh man, he's different. I'm not even sure how that old stuff even happened when you really look at who he is. You should love on him." I can't do it.
RYAN TORAIN - A lot was made about the Clinton Portis/Larry Johnson/Willie Parker three-headed veteran RB monster that the Skins were putting together, but Torain has fucking impressed in camp, and fucking double impressed last night in the game. Seems like Willie Parker may have gotten played out of a spot on the team. Plus, after like seven years of Redskins people trying to tell me how Ladell Betts was just as good as Clinton Portis and could be a starter on any other team in the NFL even though he never looked like it when he was in a game, it's nice to see that #46 on someone who actually breaks away and busts moves and makes your heart beat out of something other than frustration.
FRED DAVIS - Even though the Skins have a highly suspect wide receiving corps, Fred Davis shows signs he could be like a halfway black Jeremy Shockey (meaning half a Shockey, not half a black... if you saw his rhythmic TD celebration last night, ain't no doubt that dude is all black), meaning if somehow Shanahan can tweak his run first chop blocking west coast offense into incorporating a two tight end set regularly with both guys being able to go in motion to the slot, we could be onto something. Of course, last season against varsity players, Mr. Davis had a pretty good penchant for two things - fighting for an extra six yards, and fumbling.
ALBERT HAYNESWORTH - A non-issue, although Joe Theismann on the TV broadcast acted like holmes was going to be the greatest shit ever. I suspect Theismann is secretly inside Dan Snyder's pocket because he has always been overly hopeful the past ten years. Fuck Haynesworth. Sam Huff on the pregame radio show, when asked about Haynesworth, was straight up like, "They gave this dude $100 million; Jim Brown wasn't worth $100 million and that's the best player to ever have played this game. Cerrato brought this guy in and Cerrato was a dumbass fuckwad so this is just riding out the mistakes of the dumbass fuckwad, and whatever they can get out of this sack of shit is better than nothing I guess." That's not his exact words, but basically what he said. Speaking of which, there is no better radio broadcast team in the NFL than Sonny Jurgensen and Sam Huff and the other guy. (There used to be another the other guy but they switched it a couple years back, much to some people's chagrin, but really all you have to do as the other guy is a walking-on-eggshells play-by-play, and occasionally bait Sam Huff into saying something stupid and coaxing Sonny Jurgensen into talking about what should or shouldn't be done - although it seems in recent years Jurgensen is becoming more and more of a Snyder yes man himself. Man, Snyder's a fucking cancer.)
REED DOUGHTY - I would have absolutely nothing to say about our resident deaf whiteboy defensive back, except Joe Theismann actually said, "Reed Doughty on defense, to me, is like Rex Grossman on offense..." and the rest of it was a compliment of some sort, but it made me feel really bad for Reed Doughty. Luckily though, he's deaf, so he won't hear it.
DAN SNYDER - Holmes came in the booth at one point, and the thing he talked up was the new giant scoreboards in the stadium, which were started right after last season ended and just finished like last week. Sad thing is you know he saw the new Cowboys Stadium last year and this was the biggest splash he could make in one offseason's time. Believe me, if could've put the Redskins in a spaceship stadium to one-up Jerry Jones, he would've. Why don't you try getting the fuck out of the way and letting them try to win, you little-dicked fucker? (It really bothered me up there earlier where I sort of accidentally realized Snyder is a rich kid with the most awesome toy ever in the Washington Redskins and all the rest of us want to play with it too to enjoy it, but he's just like fucking it up to where it won't even be any good when the rest of us could afford to buy it secondhand at the nice Goodwill in town once he gets tired of it finally.)
LOGAN PAULSEN - I don't think he even played, but he's a white dude with a bushy ponytail and the number 82, which I can only assume means tight end not wide receiver. Props to him. The NFL needs more dudes like that.
KYLE SHANAHAN - The dude looks like he's 22 and manages a cell phone store. Like I think I tried to argue my way out of Verizon late charges one time with that dude for about 20 minutes outside of Richmond when my shit got cut off. I like Shanahan the younger. He lacks the anus mouth of his dad, and seems like a player-friendly type of cat who is serious business about football, like one of those dudes that goes on vacation and takes two terrabytes of game footage with him to organize and evaluate. If Shanahan the older can establish an actual football team for a few years, then get cancer or something, and Shanahan the younger take over, and we win 17 Super Bowls in 24 years, I could live with that.
LORENZO ALEXANDER - I was going to write about this guy this past week as Mr. Redskin, because after bouncing around a couple of NFL practice squads, he landed here under Joe Gibbs, and to stay on the team, got out of his natural defensive end position to learn offensive line, tight end, even fullback, plus starred on special teams. This continued, and he never cracked a starting spot outside of a game or two, then they switch to the 3-4 this year. That finds him having to suddenly learn outside linebacker, which he's doing, and might even knock Andre Carter out of the starting lineup. And dude is nothing but happy about it all, just happy to knock motherfuckers in the head and keep on cashing an NFL paycheck. That dude is awesome, and if someone was to just give me money to buy a Redskins jersey, #97 would by my first choice. At least this year. Watch them cut the dude now that I say all that.
BRANDON BANKS - An unknown wide receiver guy who was fucking tearing it up as a punt returner last night. Now it's only preseason, and more than any other part of the game, special teams in the preseason is a hodgepodge clusterfuck of dudes. Still though, it has boggled my mind why, the past ten years, the Redskins have not shot late round draft picks or brought in guys that are speedy but raw RB or WR or CB to let them return fucking kicks and try to learn or fight their way into a regular starting position. I mean it's common fucking sense, yet they never did it, instead putting some steam engined half-speed like Antwan Randle El back there, relentlessly, again trying their hardest to justify the contracts they've gave out. Just seeing a dude I barely heard of blaze around the corner for a TD return on a punt, man, it made my heart patter with the possibility that maybe, just maybe, somebody knows what the fuck they're doing with the Redskins this year.