MONDAY, OCTOBER 11, 2010 Redskins 16, Packers 13 (OT) ARMSTRONG’SFIRST


Wide receiver Anthony Armstrong scored the first touchdown of his NFL career Sunday, leaping over Packers safety Charlie Peprah to haul in a 48-yard pass early in the fourth quarter.


NOTABLE


Safety Kareem Moore’s first-quarter fumble recovery gave him take- aways in three consecutive games. He is the first Redskin to accomplish that feat since Sean Taylor had interceptions inWeeks 5-7 of the 2007 season.


NEXTUP


The Redskins play the Indianapolis Colts in a nationally televised Sunday night game. The Colts beat the Kansas City Chiefs, 19-9, leaving the NFL with no unbeaten teams five weeks into the season.


KLMNO


EZ SU


D11


THOMAS BOSWELL Long after changes at the top, Redskins see improvement deeper down the roster boswell from D1 In Sunday’s 16-13 overtime win


over Green Bay, the Redskins saw perfect examples of both types of players—wide receiver Anthony Armstrong, the rookie who brings speed, excitement and smiling underdog swagger and safety LaRon Landry, the former high-draft-pick disappointment of ’09 who suddenly has begun to fulfill his enormous promise in a newsystem. The acrobatic Armstrong


caught a 48-yard scoring bomb fromMcNabb, a heave that traveled 55 yards in the air, that inflamed the crowd of 87,760, shifted the momentum of the game and cut the Redskins’ deficit to 13-10 in the fourth quarter. “Anthony really got things


going for us,” said a grateful McNabb. “He beat the safety deep. I put it out there high and far for him. And what a catch.” “When I jumped, I was


floating,” said Armstrong, grinning. “I wasWAY up over that safety.He was down atmy knees, man. “You’ve got to have some


swagger.” If Armstrong’s catch was an emotional turning point, it was Landry, who was beaten often on deep passes last year in the system of ex-coordinator Greg Blache, who inspired the defense all day with his violence and nose for the ball. You’d think that causing a


fumble and making 13 tackles might be enough for one day’s work. But it was Landry’s rolling reach-behind-himself interception in overtime—he picking off an Aaron Rodgers pass inches off the ground—that gave the Redskins the ball at the Green Bay 39-yard line in overtime. “Landry amazes me, to be


honest,” Shanahan said. “He’s fast, a hitter.He loves to play and he’s that way every snap.” After Landry’s pick, two short


McNabb passes and a crucial interference penalty drawnby Armstrong on legendary cornerback CharlesWoodson, set up the game-winning 33-yard field goal by Graham Gano. After Landry’s interception,


one Packer tried to strip the ball away from him. “Landry’s got the biggest arms you’ve ever seen on a guy his size. You’re going to try to strip the ball from him?” said linebacker Chris Wilson. “LaRon could have curled that guy.” “Landry just has incredible


speed and power,” said safety Reed Doughty. “There is no sense in having a heat-seeking missile if it isn’t aimed at the right targets.He’s just blowing people up.” No Redskins player disrespects Blache’s ’09 defensive scheme, especially since, in


TONI L. SANDYS/THE WASHINGTON POST


Anthony Armstrong dives to catch the ball after it bounces out of teammateKeiland Williams’s hands. Armstrong had a considerably bigger play, a 48-yard touchdown reception. Tiny rookie Brandon Banks


yardage stats, it’s still far ahead of this year’s crew. But everyone knows that certain players, especially Landry, already dominant linebacker Brian Orakpo, and versatile 275-pound linebacker Lorenzo Alexander have much more chance to show their talents. Armstrong and Landry get the


primary accolades this time. But they are symptomatic of wider change. Armstrong brings deep speed and vertical leaping to the receiving corps.His development is one reason that the Redskins could release undisciplined wide receiver Devin Thomas before this game. Thomas “has the talent, that’s for sure,” Shanahan said Sunday. “But he’s really going to have to commit himself —on and off the field—to being a pro.” However, there are other


young Redskins players who are emerging quickly under Shanahan and replacing players who thought their positions were secure under the previous regime.


returned one punt 30 yards and had a scintillating 62-yarder called back because of a penalty. “Both Armstrong and Banks were brought in because of speed,” Shanahan said. “You have to have it to make big plays. Both showed some spark today. . . .We were just a hair away [in the kick return game] from having a really big day.” Each week makes it clearer


that Shanahan andGeneral Manager Bruce Allen have even wider-ranging ideas about changing the Redskins’ makeup than most supposed. Second- year guardKory Lichtensteiger, drafted by Shanahan in Denver in ’08, has come along so quickly that 325-pound veteran Derrick Dockery was a “healthy scratch” for this game. That means: Job lost, newleft guard in town. At left tackle, rookie first-


round draft pick Trent Williams has made himself such an immediate fixture that all eyes will watch to see how his left knee feels onMonday. Williams


Washington’s offensive line holds its own despite changes


Even with injuries, switches, unit holds up in win over Packers


BY BARRY SVRLUGA When the season began, the


Washington Redskins rolled out TrentWilliams at left tackle, Der- rick Dockery at left guard, Artis Hicks at right guard and Jammal Brownat right tackle, onanoffen- sive line that had undergone a significant offseason overhaul in the hope of improving its perfor- mance. ButwhentheRedskins’ offense


took the field late Sunday after- noon—in an overtime game, the result in the balance — Williams and Brown were on the sideline, each with an injury. Dockery hadn’t even donned pads for the game, a healthy scratch. Hicks was liningupat tackle for the first time since June. And Kory Lich- tensteiger—signed as a center to back up starter Casey Rabach — dug in at left guard. “I think we’re getting pretty


usedtoplayingwithanycombina- tion of guys,” Lichtensteiger said. Even after the Redskins pulled


out a 16-13 overtime victory over the Green Bay Packers, the only constant for the offensive line is instability. The group is constant- ly in flux, and at times Sunday — facing a Green Bay defense that led the league in sacks and rang up fivemore against theRedskins — it looked completely over- whelmed. Only Lichtensteiger played every snap at the same position, and the other six line- men in uniformall played. But inthe end,whatever taped-


together combination the Red- skins threw out there held up enough to rack up 373 yards — andwin. “It doesn’t help, but it’s our job


to fight through that,” Lichten- steiger said of the personnel changes. “We get paid to work with any combination of guys we have to playwith.” It got to the point where the


skillpositionplayerswouldarrive in the huddle and look up, won- dering which faces they would see. “You don’t expect that,” tight


endChrisCooley said. “Obviously, you never hope for it. But it’s the NFL. I think every team has to come up with adjustments be- cause of injuries everyweek.”


TheRedskins facemore adjust-


ments in the days ahead. Wil- liams, the first-round pick who returned to the lineup after sit- ting out twoweekswith knee and toe injuries,was supposedtorees- tablishhimself as the anchor Sun- day.He had hismoments, flatten- ing one Packers defender on a 48-yard touchdown pass from Donovan McNabb to Anthony Armstrong that sparked a Red- skins’ comeback. But whenWashington ran one


final play in regulation with one second remaining — an ill-fated bomb from McNabb that was picked off by Green Bay corner- back Tramon Williams — Trent Williams said his “whole season flashedbeforeyou.”Ashepursued a tackle on the return,Williams’s knee buckled beneath him. “My knee’s still kind of weak


from last time I injured it, and it just kind of gave out onme,”Wil- liams said. “Itwasalotofpain,but Iwasmore scaredthananything.” As it turnedout,Williams reen-


tered the lineup forWashington’s first possession of overtime. He said he will likely have an MRI exam, but he did not tear his anterior cruciate ligament. Brown, though, was dealing


with his own issues. At the end of the firsthalf, twoplayers rolledup on his left leg. It stiffened at half- time. “I couldn’t put any pressure on it,” he said. Stephon Heyer stepped in to


play right tackle. That move isn’t strange for the Redskins. When the season began, Heyer would sub in every third series for Brown, who was coming off a hip injury, and Lichtensteiger would dothesameforDockery,who,as it turns out, was in the process of losing his job. But isn’t such a turnstile approach bad for the line’s cohesion? “That’s been the talk ever since


thebeginningof the season,when we started with the rotation: Is that the problem?” Rabach said. “It really isn’t,because everyweek in practice we’re rotating guys in and out of there.” Sunday, when Rabach got the


wind knocked out of him, backup Will Montgomery played center for a snap.When Hicks later lost his shoe,Montgomery stepped in at right guard. “Each play,” Montgomery said,


“I just see if everybody’s getting up.” By the Redskins’ second pos-


sessionof overtime, only five line- men were still standing. Neither


JOHN MCDONNELL/THE WASHINGTON POST


“We’re getting pretty used to playing with any combination of guys,”Kory Lichtensteiger (78) said of Washington’s constantly changing offensive line, which somehow is keeping DonovanMcNabb (5) safe.


Brown norWilliams—neither of whom suspects his injury is seri- ous — could go, so Heyer played left tackle, Hicks moved to right tackle, and Montgomery played right guard. Hicks’s last stint at tackle: Organized team activities in June. “I was messing with [Brown],


saying I’m a tackle by nature but I’m a guard by trade,” Hicks said. “WhentheytoldmeIhadtogoout to tackle, Iwas like, ‘Okay’.” As a Redskins offensive line-


man, who can be asked to do any job at any time, that is the only appropriate answer. svrlugab@washpost.com


left the game for a fewplays after tweaking a previous injury. At one level, it’s indisputable


that the Redskins were fortunate —that means l-u-c-k-y— to improve their record to 3-2 Sunday.As the final seconds of regulation time ticked off the clock, a 53-yard field goal attempt by the Packers’Mason Crosby hung high in the crisp autumn air at FedEx Field and seemed destined to end the game with a Green Bay celebration. Six Packers all had their arms over their heads signaling “good” as they prepared. But five Packers had better judgment than that and held their breath. The Green Bay minority had it correct as Crosby’s booming kick smacked off the left upright—more than halfway up the pole—and the Redskins were spared. Oh, how the Packers then


wished that they had kicked a simple 19-yard field goal early in the second quarter to build a 10-0 lead. Instead, they decided to gamble on fourth and goal


from the 1 because “they wanted to try to knock us out early,” said Alexander. And the player the Pack tried


to pick on was Alexander himself, a player so large he can play defensive line, but fast and agile enough to cover tight ends in pass coverage. “We were ready for them.


Whenever I had [Andrew Quarless] line up on me, it would be a pass.We practiced that coverage all week,” said Alexander. So, even though he was isolated in one-on-one coverage in the end zone, Alexander still had the joy of feeling Rodgers’s pass bounce off the back of his helmet incomplete. “Sure felt good when it hitme


in the head,” Alexander said. “That goal line stand [with


three Packer snaps from the 1- yard line] was the difference . . . the key to the game,” Shanahan said. So far this season, it’s been the Redskins’ foes who have made the blundering decisions. In the


season opener, the Cowboys tried for a senseless flat pass three seconds before intermission: the result was a fumble and a Redskins recovery for a touchdown return. That decided the game. Now, the Packers help the


Redskins, too. Or, at least inmy game notes, it says: “Go for it from the one? When you’re favored and can go up 10-0? Idiotic!” Right now, every Redskins


game except one has come down to the final play. They could be anything from 4-1 to 0-5. But they’re more than happy with 3-2 and 2-0 in the NFC East. When a newregime arrives, many factors are vital. But a fewkey plays going your way, a “doink” on a field goal that could have meant defeat, carry extra weight.A team trying to escape a 4-12 identity needs every handhold it can find as it climbs. “The best is yet to come,”


Landry said. For now, that’s the last word. boswellt@washpost.com


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64