Mike Shanahan is in Washington to cure the Redskins offense. But the team’s biggest names still have some issues to work through.
Speaking on ESPN 980’s “John Thompson Show” Wednesday Clinton Portis defended his relationship with Dan Snyder and said what a great teammate he is. Then he threw his quarterback under the bus, criticizing Jason Campbell’s leadership and handling of his captaincy.
If we printed all the the insulting things Portis said, this would be a very long blog post. So we point you to the Washington Post to check them all out. It’s fascinating stuff.
Campbell, informed of the comments, had enough. Portis’ attitude for a now mediocre player is galling from afar. It has to be infuriating for the players who actually show up to practice.
“How is he going to say I’m not a leader?” Campbell said in a phone interview. “I mean, that’s just not true. To me, that’s somebody who shows that they don’t know what a real leader is. A leader is not someone who leads by the wrong example. A leader is someone who is trying to do the right thing and trying to lead by example, and not just [being] about themselves.
“There’s a reason guys get selected as captains, and there’s a reason guys don’t get selected as captains. Obviously, he doesn’t have the respect of the locker room to be a captain. For someone to try to take a shot at me at the end of the season, after they haven’t even been around, only speaks about their character anyway,” Campbell said.
Good for Campbell. He’s too classy to do this during the season, and he’s already “squashed” the problem with Portis. His teammates, though, appreciated him firing back. They were quick to dump on Portis too.
Here’s what Portis and even the anti-Portis segment of the Redskins fanbase don’t seem to fully appreciate: There are 40 more valuable running backs in the NFL right now. He’s just a guy, he can’t break big plays, and a battered running back in decline doesn’t magically turn his career around.
We know Portis has a ton of guaranteed money due next year, but incidents like this make it clear the team would just be better off cutting their losses now.
Ask the Chargers if they are enjoying paying LaDainian Tomlinson over $6 million to average 3.3 yards per carry. And he really is a team leader and franchise icon.
Ask the Chiefs about trying to milk another year from Larry Johnson’s contract or the Seahawks what the last year of the Shaun Alexander era was like.
Mike Shanahan can build a better running game with no drama no name backs than dealing with Portis.
Mike Anderson is probably still in good shape, right?