Rod Gardner released

Speculation

I am a little late on this because I just found out now, but thank you UNCfever for pointing this out.

I've thought that there is something fishy about this whole situation and now even more so. Talent is not the issue at all here. He has the talent. Size and speed are all that you can ask for, and his hands, although 50/50, aren't stone. I don't have any kind of inside track other than this board, but speculation has to lead us to the fact that there is more to this subject than we are receiving. Drug problems came to mind but I think that he would have been caught by the NFL drug tests (however no one knows). Disruption came to mind and thats what I have begun to believe. Maybe I am missing something, but you don't just deactivate a player for no reason, and you would have already deactivated a player already at this point in the season. Why do you go to this drastic of a move this late in the season if he is not causing some form of distraction. I'll tell you that its not because Casey Cramer is going to be a focal point in our offense, and if he is, I'll give up my playoff hopes. I don't buy the fact that Rod hasn't learned the offense either. He has learned the offense in Washington several times with all of the coaching changes (correct me if I'm wrong), and by the way, Henning's offense is not very thick. There is something more to this.

 

The Skins cut him for a reason. He's make a few spectacular catches and then completely disappear for weeks. He did the same here (with fewer catches obviously). That's all he did his whole career. We didnt have room for a guy with that particular talent.

 

If it were most any other team other than the Skins, I would agree. But the fact that he did stay with them for 4 years, with their revolving door is a little amazing.

I realize he wasn't the main focus at WR for them, but still not bad numbers either.

Year-Tean-Games-Rec-Yards-AVG-TD

2001 WAS 16 46 741 16.1 85 4
2002 WAS 16 71 1006 14.2 43 8
2003 WAS 16 59 600 10.2 35 5
2004 WAS 16 51 650 12.7 51 5

 

We seem to have plenty of room for Keary Colbert don't we? I'm a fan of Keary Colbert on our team and all, don't get me wrong, but using your logic, we would have dropped Keary a long time ago in this season, and he starts...Rod barely even got playing time.

 

He hasn't looked good, at all. No big loss.

 

Uh, actually, those numbers aren't much to look at. One pretty good year. But 600 yards isn't that good at all.

He was inconsistent their as well. Besides not having great speed, I've heard he wasn't always where he was supposed to be. He can make some plays, but when you aren't where you are supposed to be, you are inconsistent.

Sounds like he has some Wilkins in him. Another dum-dum.

 

Their's also this thing called practice. You may have heard of it.

 

He couldn't learn the offense, he'll be of no use to them

 

IMO Gardner maybe had WR skills but he didn't have good blocking skills. Remember the holding penalties in the beginning of the season? He had trouble blocking anyone out. Keary can at least lay a lick now and then.


They just signed an extreme blocker from the practice squad. Can you picture this???

Brad, Casey, & DeShaun in the backfield.

 

You are right to a point about the stats, but I doubt many WR's outside of the number 1 on each team would have much more. I know there are some teams that pass a lot more that would, but for the most part no.

The other funny thing about those numbers, they are better than any of our WR's other than Smith this year.