In the midst of conflicting reports about Robert Griffin III’s popularity in the Redskins locker room, wide receiver DeSean Jackson spoke up at a team meeting last week to support his quarterback.
In his weekly press conference Wednesday morning, Griffin said he appreciated Jackson’s gesture, but moreso his overall message: win, and the reports go away.
“What [Jackson] said was just addressing the group, addressing a few out of the group. Who those guys are, we don’t really care,” Griffin said. “The thing that he stressed, and that we’re stressing, is that we’re focused on winning, focused on Tampa Bay. We need everybody focused on doing their job to the best of their ability. Look the man in the mirror and say, ’What can I do to help this team win?’ That will help us not only win games, but it’ll help us change the culture around here.”
Griffin declined to go into details about the ways in which the Redskins’ culture could change, but said the team’s shared focus remains on Sunday’s game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Much has been made about whether Griffin is “liked” in the locker room, but Wednesday, he was asked a related question: does being liked even matter to the third-year quarterback?
“You like everybody you work with?” Griffin replied while a smile. “It’s really not even about that. I think for us as a team, what we are focusing on and what D-Jac did stress, and what Ryan Clark has stressed and other guys, other leaders have stressed — [Jason Hatcher], [Stephen] Bowen, [Barry] Cofield — is that we can’t let anybody try to tear us apart from the outside in. It’s been pushed and pushed and pushed and everybody thinks it’s coming from the inside-out, but we’re strong in that locker room. And we feel like we can’t let any of these reports or anything divide us.”
That said, Jackson’s support did matter.
“That’s what teammates do. That’s what a family is,” Griffin said. “I think we’re getting closer as a family on this team.”
• Tom Schad can be reached at tschad@washingtontimes.com.
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