Washington senior V.P. of player personnel Doug Williams likes what he’s seen from rookie quarterback Dwayne Haskins. But it won’t be Williams who decides when and if Haskins will start. The decision apparently won’t be made by any one person.
"[A]t the end of the day, it’s going to be on [coach] Jay [Gruden], myself, probably [team president] Bruce [Allen] and the owner, after what [Haskins] does during the preseason and see where we are as a team to make that decision,” Williams recently told Steve Wyche of NFL Network.
Yes, the owner, Dan Snyder, will be involved in the decision. Which could make the decision less about winning now (which Gruden would likely prefer) and more about developing Haskins.
Former Washington quarterback Joe Theismann has cautioned against throwing Haskins into the fray given the difficulty of the team’s early-season schedule. The other view would be this: It’s sink or swim now, or it’s sink or swim later. At some point, every NFL quarterback has to show that he can succeed.
Besides, why not face teams with tougher defenses before all defenses have enough film to figure out a new quarterback’s tendencies, tells, strengths, and weaknesses? It’s arguably better to confront those teams before they can properly break Haskins down.
Bottom line -- if Haskins is a keeper, he’ll likely keep his wits about him while facing good teams as a rookie. If he can’t, then maybe he’s not the answer. If he’s not the answer, it’s better to know that soon then later.