Washington Football Team: Ron Rivera and the art of confidence building

I need help with something and I am turning to the Riggo’s Rag readers for advice.

That may not be the wisest move. Usually, the advice I get is along the lines of “you’re an effing idiot.” Sometimes, I have to agree with that general opinion. But if you have a more thoughtful opinion about this particular aspect of the Washington Football Team’s 2020 season, I’d love to hear it.

(And that doesn’t mean I don’t want to hear creative new ways of calling me an effing idiot – those can be very thoughtful as well.)

The subject is building a team’s confidence. It is something that Ron Rivera appears to have done quite well this season with the Washington Football Team. Much has already been written about Rivera’s courageous battle against cancer.  He has been a remarkable living embodiment of resiliency and commitment. I have no doubt that part of this team’s toughness has been shaped by Rivera’s mere presence.

But I want to talk about coaching decisions. I was critical of some of Rivera’s in-game decisions earlier this year. At the same time, I think he made some very good calls that set up the Washington Football Team for both immediate and long-term success.

Let’s talk about the good moves first. Rivera made crucial offseason roster decisions that led directly to where the Washington Football Team is now. He jettisoned quality, disgruntled players like Trent Williams and Quinton Dunbar. His message was clear. If you don’t want to be here, we don’t need you.

He walked away from players like Derrius Guice and Cody Latimer who had off-field legal issues. I don’t think Rivera was making a moral declaration with these moves. I think he was imparting a message to his team about reliability. If we can’t trust you to make smart decisions off the field, then we can’t rely on you to be available to play when we need you. And then you’re of no use to us.

Maybe the most surprising move was saying good-bye to Adrian Peterson. Peterson was neither disgruntled nor was he unreliable. Despite his previous legal issues, no one considered AP anything other than a consummate professional. But he was also a dominant personality who was going to draw attention regardless of his on-field performance.

Part of the decision to release Peterson may have been tactical: Offensive coordinator Scott Turner prefers quicker, more versatile players. But part of it, I believe, had to do with team building. By cutting Peterson, Rivera was essentially saying to his younger players (which included Guice at the time) that this team is now yours.

Then there was the one enormous in-season decision. I realize some fans still think Rivera pulled the plug on Dwayne Haskins too soon. Their entirely understandable thinking is that Haskins is still very young and needed time to grow. Playing him for the entire season would accomplish one of two things. Either he would steadily improve and turn into a quality starter, or he wouldn’t, and the team would know it needed to look elsewhere. Either way, you would have accomplished something.

What this fails to take into account is that Rivera is not coaching one guy. I have argued that Haskins wasn’t benched because of his mistakes. He was benched because of his failure to make enough plays. But whatever the reason, I think it is clear that in 2020, Washington has stood a better chance of winning games with either Kyle Allen or Alex Smith running the show. Haskins may or may not turn into a success, but he is not very good right now.

If your team knows you are playing a quarterback for reasons other than trying to win the game at hand, you risk losing the team. Maybe there is a time and a place to do that. Rivera decided that this was not such a time or place. And the way his team has responded has been pretty clear proof that he was right.

But then there are some in-game decisions, and this is where I really need help. In Weeks 2 and 3, Rivera chose not to extend games by calling timeouts. In both games – against Arizona and Cleveland – the Washington Football Team was being outplayed, and their chances of winning were slim. But they were down by less than two scores; end-game situations in which most coaches would do whatever they could to keep fading chances afloat.

Perhaps more surprisingly than the two end-game decisions was the similar decision to not call timeouts at the end of the first half in the Cleveland game. The Washington Football Team seemingly had enough time to set up a late field goal but chose not to even try.

Those timeout decisions seem to say the exact opposite thing to your team. They seem to say that the coach doesn’t believe you can compete. Rivera even hinted that at the end of the Cardinals game that he was more concerned about the Washington Football Team’s health than about winning.

Then there was the decision to go for a two-point conversion at the end of the first Giants game. I think this was the single worst in-game decision Rivera has made this year. I understand there are some fans who think this was a bold move that announced to his team that he had confidence in them. To me, it said the exact opposite thing. It said he didn’t think they could win if they went to overtime.

I won’t rehash the entire argument. Suffice to say, NFL teams convert two-point tries at just under fifty percent, which means you are basically flipping a coin – only with the odds slightly against you. Washington had dominated play in the second half of the game and I believed at the time that they would have probably won had the game gone into overtime.

Still, coaches make calls based on instincts. They make them based on small details that they notice. They make them based on philosophy. You make your call and move on regardless of result. That’s what Rivera did. I think it was the wrong call, but it was his to make.

So here’s my big question. Washington played a great game after this loss, then played two very poor games, before going on their four-game win streak. How do these decisions – whether successful or not – figure into the newfound confidence the Washington Football Team seems to have?

Am I just totally wrong in my criticism of some of these decisions? Or is the entire issue of confidence overrated? Is the Washington Football Team playing better because players and coaches are simply performing better? Or do the examples set by Ron Rivera and Alex Smith simply outweigh all the smaller decisions along the way?

This has been a strange year and it still may end in triumph or in heartbreak. As fans, we often overreact to one game, or one play. Coaches, I think, take a longer view. Winning and losing may be life and death for the moment, but there is always another game to prepare for. As an outsider, I suspect there are countless decisions – big and small, noticed and unnoticed – that contribute to success and failure.

On the other hand, I may just be an effing idiot.