Redskins naming RG3 a starter in February is a hollow gesture

On Wednesday, nearly seven months before the first week of the 2015 NFL season, Washington Redskins head coach Jay Gruden basically named Robert Griffin III his starting quarterback for said season.

This is it, folks. The first non-story story of the 2015 offseason.

The fact is, all this will do is help the Redskins dodge some of the buzz and quiet some of the inevitable and continual questions surrounding their quarterback situation. Good PR strategy, but the announcement itself means very little right now.

Griffin has an entire offseason ahead of him, including organized team activities, training camp and the preseason. It’s easy to call him the man right now, and it’ll be just as easy to explain at any given point that circumstances have changed.

I’m not saying Griffin shouldn’t start Week 1, but I am saying it’s too early to make whole-hearted decisions like these. It’s not just a Redskins thing. Unless you have a franchise quarterback in his prime, you just don’t know what’s going to happen between now and early September.

That’s especially the case with a team like the Redskins, who have benched Griffin twice in as many years and who haven’t ruled out drafting or signing a quarterback this offseason. So don’t believe for a second that this team has settled on RG3 for 15.

 

About Brad Gagnon

Brad Gagnon has been passionate about both sports and mass media since he was in diapers -- a passion that won't die until he's in them again. Based in Toronto, he's worked as a national NFL blog editor at theScore.com (covering Super Bowls XLIV, XLV and XLVI), a producer and writer at theScore Television Network and a host, reporter and play-by-play voice at Rogers TV. His work has also appeared at Deadspin, FoxSports.com, The Guardian, The Hockey News and elsewhere at Bloguin, but his day gig has him covering all things NFC East for Bleacher Report.

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