Since being fired from the Denver Broncos, football coach Mike Shanahan has been desperate to prove that he truly is "The Mastermind" and that he can win Super Bowl championships without numerous Hall of Famers on his team. Apparently, that desperation reached "the breaking point" this past weekend when his decision to leave hobbled NFL rookie sensation RGIII in the playoff game resulted in RGII's heart-wrenching fall while trying to recover a snap and the tearing of his LCL. Now, with the star quarterback potentially lost for all of next season, the backlash has begun.
While much of the commentary has been delivered by sportswriters - and disheartened Redskins fans - political writer Maureen Dowd delivered a scathing indictment of Shanahan's dangerous hubris. Dowd and others are calling out Shanahan for not making the obvious call earlier in the game to pull Griffin who was clearly struggling and not able to play to anything close to his potential. Clearly, this particularly troubling injury has gotten under everyone's skin for two reasons - RGIII is simply so electrifying to watch and this injury resulted from such negligent stupidity. Would Mike Shanahan really risk the health of his franchise player (who he sold the team farm to get) just to win a playoff game? In a sense, yes.
Obviously, Mike Shanahan did not play RGIII in the game or leave him in when he knew he was injured with the intention of ruining the young star's career. However, coach Shanahan was clearly so blinded by his desire to win that he lacked the good sense to pull the kid. Even former Shanny prodigy Jay Cutler had the sense to pull himself from a playoff game last year when he couldn't plant his back leg - and that didn't even require surgery. But Shanahan let a 22-year-old amped up rookie playing in the biggest game of his life make the decision to head back on the field without doctors so much as talking to him. And that is a serious deficit of leadership. That is not a masterful mind.
With the injury to RGIII and the implosion of Washington's gridiron hopes, The Mastermind is no more ... if he ever was one.
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