Robert Griffin III needs to be aware of clock in his head, says Jay Gruden

Robert Griffin III felt the pressure — again — and he had, simultaneously, too little and too much time to react.

The quarterback was handed the ball at his own 44-yard line with 10:36 remaining in the third quarter of the Washington Redskins’ game against the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday. He had been sacked twice in his two previous plays from scrimmage — once a technicality when he scrambled for no gain, and the next, on third-and-9, a 10-yard loss at the hands of weakside linebacker Chad Greenway.

Taking the snap under center, Griffin faked a handoff to running back Alfred Morris, then looked to his right. He stared, waited, and stared some more, focusing on either tight end Niles Paul, who motioned into the backfield prior to the snap, or wide receiver Andre Roberts, split out to the right.

Meanwhile, Griffin’s right tackle, Tom Compton, was losing his individual battle with Vikings defensive end Brian Robison, and when Griffin started to feel Robison bearing down, he scrambled to his left, hoping either Roberts or Paul would free himself from his defender.

It never happened. Approximately 4.5 seconds after faking the handoff to Morris, Robison brought Griffin down from behind, costing the Redskins four yards on a drive that, five plays and one penalty later, would still result in a touchdown pass.

Those types of missed plays are nothing new for Griffin, who, in his two-plus seasons as a starting quarterback, has struggled with his decision-making. One of the better quarterbacks in the league at extending a play after it breaks down, Griffin has a penchant for holding onto the ball too long — a situation that, on Sunday, in his return after missing six weeks with a dislocated left ankle, was among his biggest problems.

“You’ve got to have a clock in your head as a quarterback, and sometimes, he gets locked in somewhere, and by the time he comes off to his secondary receiver, he feels the pocket closing in on him and he doesn’t have time to move,” coach Jay Gruden said Monday. “You know, we can help him. The line can help him a little bit. I can help him with the drops so that the quarterback can maybe get it out quicker or what have you. For the most part, he’s just got to continue to play and learn that and play with that feel in the pocket.”

Griffin completed 18 of 28 passes for 251 yards, a touchdown and an interception on Sunday in the Redskins’ 29-26 loss, and while he wouldn’t address how he felt about his return after the game — “Not good enough to win, that’s all that matters,” he said — Gruden said Monday he was encouraged by the quarterback’s play in his first game back.

Now comes the hard part. Griffin, who did not play well in the preseason in the new coach’s offense, must spent the Redskins’ next seven games fortifying his fundamentals in order to, by the start of his fourth season, take a step toward becoming one of the league’s better quarterbacks.

“I know everybody wants to sit here and ask me questions, because I’m the one sitting up here with the microphone in front of me, but at the end of the day, the only thing I attribute to me is the loss,” Griffin said. “Everything else is us, collectively, as a whole.”

Gruden turned back the clock and allowed glimpses of rookie-year Griffin to shine on Sunday with the zone-read option plays, the designed quarterback runs and the steady diet of play-action calls. Griffin has been able to thrive in such situations, but it’s the plays that require an assessment of the defense that have been problematic.

He has, at times, also handled those well — including on Sunday. On the Redskins’ fourth play from scrimmage, with Griffin at his own 46-yard line, he found Roberts for a 9-yard gain on third-and-4.

Roberts ran a 10-yard hitch out of the right slot, but Griffin, for a time, was focused on tight end Jordan Reed, who was running a crossing route over the middle. Noting Reed was not open, he turned to Roberts, who snagged the ball between Greenway and strongside linebacker Anthony Barr.

Griffin also displayed impeccable timing on a pair of deep balls to wide receiver DeSean Jackson, including a 49-yarder late in the first quarter. Jackson ran a flag route and pulled the ball in between two defensive backs — a throw that required Griffin to hang in the pocket long enough to get hit by defensive end Everson Griffen.

Two throws, however, sank Griffin’s chances of helping his team claim a victory. With 1:04 remaining in the first half — a situation where the quarterback merely needed to kill the clock to give the Redskins a 10-0 lead entering halftime — he barely stepped into a pass to Roberts on a 10-yard out route, leaving it far inside of his target and putting it into the waiting arms of waiting Vikings cornerback Captain Munnerlyn.

Then, with the Redskins at their own 43-yard line, trailing by three points with 1:09 to play and facing fourth-and-6, Griffin missed wide receiver Pierre Garçon on a crossing route, leaving the ball at Garçon’s feet after appearing to use only his arm to make the throw.

The Vikings, who entered the game second in the league with 25 sacks, hit Griffin nine times, dropping him on five occasions. Gruden said the quaterback’s left ankle held up well, even after Barr sacked him in the first quarter by lunging at his feet. Aside from the general soreness that comes from playing the position, and soreness in his chest as the result of a hit taken late in the fourth quarter, Griffin emerged fine.

His challenge, after the bye week and for the seven remaining games, will be to use Sunday’s loss as a baseline and continue to show improvement. Gruden, after reviewing the film, seems to think it’s a certainty.

“I think there’s some promise there,” Gruden said. “Overall, for his first game back in quite some time, I think he did some good things that really, ultimately, should have helped us win that football game.”