ANALYSIS/OPINION:
Before the season started, Washington Redskins linebacker and self-declared elite pass-rusher Brian Orakpo laid out the task before the team, coming off a 3-13 season under Mike Shanahan and starting a new era under Jay Gruden.
“We have to have a sense of identity,” Orakpo said. “That’s the No. 1 thing. Once we do that, I think we’ll be just fine. Just build and create that identity and who we’re going to be known as. Not a team just out there playing. We need to be out there being consistent, balling out, making plays, flying around the ball on both sides of the ball.”
A sense of identity. The Redskins talk about it like it is some holy grail, as if they will one day stand in front of a mirror and see a champion.
“We’re still working together, finding out our identity for what we are,” Gruden told reporters following their 27-17 loss Monday night to the defending Super Bowl champion (their identity) Seattle Seahawks at FedEx Field.
“I don’t know what anybody’s identity is defined as,” Gruden said. “We’re just trying to get our guys out there, really for the identity to be, just go out and play their butts off every day and compete every snap, and I think our guys have started to do that, defensively especially.”
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Well, consider that mission accomplished, according to Orakpo, who told reporters that the defense put forth a “phenomenal effort” in the game against the Seahawks. “We almost had it. We almost did it, but fell short.
“Obviously, we are 1-4 and we are disappointed,” he said. “But these are the defending Super Bowl champions, and we went toe-to-toe with these guys. And that is something to hang our heads high on, getting ready for Arizona.”
Those toes must be pretty wide apart. Seattle rolled up 403 yards of offense. Quarterback Russell Wilson ran for a career-high 122 yards. They won by just 10 points because three Percy Harvin touchdowns were called back because of Seattle penalties.
Toe-to-toe must have been the theme of Gruden’s comments to his team following the loss. They were the same words he used postgame patting his team on the back.
“We wanted to come out and really go toe-to-toe and play our butts off,” he said. “I think we did that. As far as [Seattle] not being at their best, part of that was because we were playing pretty darn good. Had nothing to do with them, and everything to do with us, I’d like to think.”
Gruden can stop his search for the holy grail. The Redskins found their identity — it’s been there all along.
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The Redskins look in the mirror and see a prince.
Everyone else sees a frog.
Delusion.
Listening to Gruden, it is almost as if Jim Zorn never left.
Here’s Zorn talking about a 31-17 loss to the Atlanta Falcons in 2009: “The thing that I was impressed with, if there is anything that is impressive … remember, I’m qualifying, we lost, I get that. But the thing that was impressive was the fight that the Redskins football team has. They came out and battled.”
Washington doesn’t have to find an identity — it has to change it.
That won’t happen until this team stops embracing delusion.
All we heard this off season was that last year’s 3-13 was because of the control of the evil Shanahan father-son duo. The word “identity” surfaced during the summer in a Washington Post interview with Robert Griffin III (who used to be SuperBob but is clearly mortal).
Griffin fixated on identity — mostly his own.
“We need to find our identity, and Jay is going to let us decide,” Griffin said. “So, that’s up to me, it’s up to Trent Williams, Brian Orakpo, Jason Hatcher, Ryan Kerrigan — all these guys around here. That’s what we have to decide, and I think that’s why everyone else is a lot more free around here, because we feel great things are coming.”
Griffin went on to tell The Post that he had “rediscovered” his own identity.
“As a quarterback, my identity is I am the leader of this team, I am the guy that everybody looks to when things are going bad,” he said. “… I am the guy that delivers. I am the guy that everyone on the team offense, defense, special teams — when it’s crunch time, they’re not looking at Trent Williams, they’re not looking at Alfred Morris. They’re looking at Robert Griffin III and that is an identity and position I accept.
“You have to believe in yourself. If you don’t believe, nobody else will, and that’s what I do for the guys around me, for my family. I give them that belief that at the end of the day, things are going to work out, and I don’t think their belief is misplaced, even with us being 3-13 last year. We will be a better football team this year. That is my identity.”
If you want to find Griffin’s identity now, you have to look on the Redskins bench. He’s the guy taking notes.
All this talk about identity is simply misdirection from facing the truth. Until this team looks in a mirror and sees a frog, the identity of the Washington Redskins will remain the dysfunction of delusion.
• Thom Loverro is co-host of “The Sports Fix,” noon to 2 p.m. daily on ESPN 980 radio and espn980.com.
• Thom Loverro can be reached at tloverro@washingtontimes.com.
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