Campbell Coming Along Nicely
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by J Cunningham
In many ways, Washington Redskins quarterback Jason Campbell is still an unknown commodity, a young singal-caller walking around the nation's capital with a large question mark over his head.
Not totally unlike the ones you'd see when a guard hears a noise in the PlayStation game Metal Gear Solid.
That's not say Campbell isn't talented -- he did lead an Auburn team that went undefeated and got snubbed out of a shot at a national title by the ultra-genius BCS and was the No. 25 overall pick in the 2005 NFL Draft -- but he's so unproven. Monday night's NFC East road game against the Philadelphia Eagles was just his ninth career start, and to call the Redskins offense of being explosive might be grounds for making one Rosie O'Donnell's replacement on The View.
Since apparently, you have to be insane to have that job.
Two seasons ago, Joe Gibbs found the playoffs thanks to a solid -- if not aging and immobile -- Mark Brunell, but last year it was clear Brunell's days had passed. Getting Campbell in for the first six games of 2006 was not only a smart move, it was the only move. A first-round pick, Campbell was eating a lot of salary, and if he was to be the Redskins' quarterback of the future, he needed as much experience as he could get, as soon as possible.
That experience is already paying dividends, as Monday's 20-12 win over the Eagles showed.
Campbell isn't a fantasy player's dream -- I don't see 300-yard, 4-touchdown games in his immediate future -- but he does what Gibbs asks him to: hand the ball to backs Clinton Portis and Ladell Betts and make smart decisions on passing plays. Campbell's mobile enough to escape the pocket when it collapses (which Brunell couldn't in later years), but he's not a running quarterback. He's got a canon of an arm, yet one of his favorite targets is tight end Chris Cooley.
Who caught that TD before the end of the first half Monday night? Cooley.
Like most young singal-callers, Campbell is still prone to mistakes -- that interception in the first half to James Williams was a late throw after Campbell stared down his intended receiver -- but he gets better every time the Redskins play. And the offensive line has done a wonderful job protecting him, even with injuries (the biggest being Jon Jansen, who's out for the year with a broken and dislocated ankle). The two-headed beast, Portis-Betts, gives a solid rushing attack that gives Campbell more leeway in the passing game, a reality that will only prove itself more as the weeks go by and he gets more experience.
The defense has helped, back to playing to its potential -- just 25 points in the first two games, one offensive touchdown allowed -- and held Donovan McNabb and the Iggles to nothing but field goals whenever they sniffed the red zone. And how about that 2007 first-round pick Laron Landry, laying that big hit on 4th and 6 to save the game?
But Monday's game was Campbell's coming-out party. He's young, talented, smart and as long as the team keeps playing him the way it does -- not giving him more than he can handle, slightly increasing his workload week after week, this guy's going to wind up being a nice starter in the NFL, maybe even a Pro Bowler.
I'm not sure if he'll be another Doug Williams -- a similar-style QB Gibbs won the Super Bowl with -- or if he'll wind up being a legend, but Campbell is, in many ways, the quarterback the Redskins have needed ever since Mark Rypien left:
A winning one.
