I’m not the only one who took the Redskins conditioning test today.
Mike Golic, the 47-year-old former NFL defensive tackle who’s now an ESPN commentator, took the test on ESPN’s NFL Live. Golic completed the two 300-yard shuttle runs in exactly the allotted time of 70 seconds for the first run and 73 seconds for the second.
ESPN may have given Golic a bit of a break: He actually looked like he took a head start on the first run, and it was inconclusive whether he crossed the finish line in time. But Golic did pass according to the stopwatch being held by his radio co-host Mike Greenberg, and afterward he said he was unimpressed with Albert Haynesworth’s inability to pass the same test.
“Albert Haynesworth should have made this test -- he should have made this test,” Golic said. “You have to come in and they have to see if you’re in shape, and he wasn’t able to do it. That’s a big problem.”
I’m not sure how big a problem it really is for a defensive tackle to be too slow to complete two 300-yard shuttle runs, but when people like Golic (and me) are passing the test that Haynesworth can’t, that gives Redskins coach Mike Shanahan ammunition in his public battle with his $100 million defensive tackle.