OPINION:
I hope Jay Gruden and the Washington Redskins give Colt McCoy a fair hand this time.
I hope they deal honestly with the only quarterback on the roster who decided he wanted to be here.
I hope they aren’t playing politics with the quarterback who still arguably delivered the biggest win this franchise has had in five years.
The last time, they weren’t quite honest with McCoy when the time came to change starting quarterbacks. But this time, if the Kirk Cousins era is truly coming to an end in Washington, they need to look no further for a replacement — at least for next season — than number 12.
Coach Jay Gruden talked up McCoy this week in his autopsy of his team’s 7-9 season. When asked how comfortable he would be with the 31-year-old McCoy as the starting quarterback, Gruden answered, “How comfortable? Colt McCoy has done an excellent job here. I’ve always been comfortable with Colt.”
He’s telling the truth there. Gruden likes McCoy very much, which disturbs many Redskins fans who believe McCoy is nothing but an adequate backup, remembering his injury-filled journeyman career before he signed with Washington as a free agent in 2014. Gruden, though, sincerely believes McCoy can run his offense well, and the coach knows how respected McCoy’s leadership is in the Redskins locker room.
AUDIO: Redskins quarterback Colt McCoy with Thom Loverro
But when it came to showing that faith in 2015, Gruden balked — and while he has always been comfortable with McCoy, he may not have been quite fair with him.
The year 2015 started with Gruden, after declaring at the end of the 2014 season that there would be a competition for the starting quarterback job, changing his tune in the now-famous hostage video at the NFL combine — when he backtracked and said Robert Griffin III would go into the season as the starter.
As it turned out, Gruden all along was secretly conducting his own quarterback competition, and he gave Cousins the job after a preseason game against the Baltimore Ravens.
McCoy, who completed 41 of 57 passes for 416 yards, four touchdowns and zero interceptions that preseason, felt he wasn’t quite dealt with fairly. When I asked him in a 2015 interview if he knew the starting job was even open for competition, McCoy said, “I’ll just say that I didn’t know. … That’s a hard question to answer without just being straight forward and blunt. Did I know that it was a competition like that? No. No.”
He was disappointed in the way it was handled and the outcome.
“I didn’t even know that it was going to happen, how it was all going to work,” McCoy told me then. “I felt like I had played well in the preseason. I felt like I had grown a lot since playing last year. Unfortunately, I got hurt last year, but I knew I wanted to be back here this year. I felt comfortable in the system. I felt comfortable with the guys in the locker room. I proved that I could win last year.”
In 2014, in place of an injured Griffin, McCoy led the Redskins to perhaps their biggest victory since 2012 when he started on Monday night against the Dallas Cowboys and led them to a 20-17 upset win at JerryWorld. He completed 25 of 30 passes for 299 yards and ran for one touchdown.
But the front office pressured Gruden to play Griffin the following week against Minnesota. Griffin was benched after his dismal performance in the loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. The next week, McCoy started against the Indianapolis Colts, completing 31 of 47 passes for 392 yards, three touchdowns and zero interceptions. He struggled the following week against the Rams, completing 20 of 32 passes for 199 yards and two interceptions, and his season was over the next week against the New York Giants when he suffered a pinched nerve.
It was the last time McCoy started an NFL regular-season game.
Despite the questions about how the secret competition was handled, McCoy has had nothing but praise for Gruden and team president Bruce Allen — and when he had a chance to leave as a free agent in 2016, he instead signed a three-year, $9 million contract with a $1.8 million signing bonus. “I feel confident with the group of guys on our team and the people who are calling the shots above us the front office,” McCoy told me in a July conversation on my Cigars & Curveballs podcast.
He might be the only quarterback on the roster who believes that. But his faith may finally pay off.
Gruden’s language in his season-ending press conference indicates the Redskins understand there’s a real possibility that Cousins isn’t coming back. In evaluating Cousins, Gruden was blunt: “When you’re 7-9, it’s hard to say, ’Wow, this guy really was outstanding.’”
But when he was asked about going with McCoy if the team can’t get a deal done with Cousins, Gruden didn’t sound any alarms. Far from it.
“I have total faith that if he was given an opportunity, he would be ready to produce,” he said. “We’re still trying to work things out with the other quarterback in Kirk and hopefully things will work out, but I know Colt is ready to play.”
If Cousins has played his last game as a Redskin, Gruden sounds like a man with an ace in the hole.
McCoy? He’s just looking for a fair deal.
• Thom Loverro hosts his weekly podcast “Cigars & Curveballs” Wednesdays available on iTunes, Google Play and the reVolver podcast network.
• Thom Loverro can be reached at tloverro@washingtontimes.com.
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