A month ago, the Washington Redskins needed to win out the rest of their season and receive a ton of help from the rest of the NFC in order to make the playoffs. And it needed to start in the short week between a Sunday's loss to Buffalo and a Thursday night game with Chicago. And then it needed to start after Sean Taylor's funeral. And then it needed to continue despite losing starting quarterback......

Well, so much for inspiration. The Washington Redskins pulled out all the stops to honor their teammate Sean Taylor yesterday. There were special patches, a moment of silence — the defense even took the field in a “missing man” formation (which history will remember as a 22-yard gain for the Bills). The inflamed passions failed to translate into quality gameplay, and Washington found themselves coming undone for many of the same reasons they’ve done so......

As the region continues to mourn the loss of Sean Taylor, some hopeful news has come to light in the search for his killer. Over the course of the week, officials have stated that they have "no reason" to believe that Taylor was anything more than the random victim of a botched burglary. However, in a story broken by the Miami Herald, a relative of Taylor's has announced that three men have now been detained......

Good morning, Washington. Given that A Charlie Brown Christmas was on TV last night, this story seems especially rough. Apparently some folks stole $1500 worth of Christmas trees from the Boy Scouts that were selling them. Remember kids: leave your clearly marked tree receipt out for Santa if you want your presents delivered promptly and with a minimum of additional paperwork. Latest On Taylor Murder Investigation, Funeral: The Post reports on the few details......

Yesterday, I found it difficult to write about Washington's loss over the weekend to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. It had nothing to do with the play on the field, which amounted to a carbon copy of the previous week's loss. Jason Campbell strove mightily to lead the team past their mistakes, only to be done in by mistakes of his own. A game changing moment came when the offense failed to obtain some badly needed......

After what was thought to be a succesful surgery, Redskins safety Sean Taylor died earlier this morning in Florida. His wounds -- a gunshot to his femoral artery, causing significant blood loss -- proved to be too much for his body to recover from. He was shot in what police are calling a home invasion on Monday. In a statement posted on the team's website, owner Dan Snyder said, "This is the worst imagineable tragedy.......

Good morning, Washington. It's news of the weird day today on DCist, as the Post tells the bizarre story of two 2nd-year engineering students from U-Va. who have been charged with the kidnapping of a man in Tysons Corner and demanding $500,000 in ransom. Both the two kidnappers and the victim are Chinese nationals who had been living with host families in Virginia while attending college. Police arrested Guanyu Lu and Baichuan Shu, both 19,......

It appears that tragedy has struck the Redskins. Emerging reports indicate that Washington Redskins Safety Sean Taylor has been shot in an apparent burglary attempt on his home, with one source claiming that Taylor is "fighting for his life". The Redskins have just released a statement confirming the shooting.Ashburn, VA - The Washington Redskins became aware of a situation this morning in which safety Sean Taylor was the victim of a shooting at his residence......

At first, it looked like a laugher in progress. It ended as a nailbiter. In a slogging game punctuated by missteps and flukes, the Washington Redskins escaped with a win at home against the Arizona Cardinals. How'd Washington pull out the win? On balance, they just reaped slightly larger benefits from the errors, but credit some missed kicks and the strangest two-point conversion call I've ever seen for the victory. By and large, scoring opportunities......

Earlier this week, Washington safety Pierson Prioleau spoke about his own season-ending knee injury as an ominous sign of setbacks to come. He seems prescient now. On Sunday afternoon, the Redskins took themselves out of contention early and often as the Philadelphia Eagles turned the match into a low-effort rout. Along the way, Washington gave up big plays, took the business end of a throttling fluke fumble, and, in the snakebitten way Prioleau described, suffered......

The best thing you can say about Washington's performance is that they managed to play well enough to almost not lose in heart-breaking fashion. That's pretty suspect grammatically, but it more or less defined the play of the Redskins Sunday afternoon. Once again, the defense looked meh, the offense played bleah, they strung some good plays into scoring drives and missed some golden opportunities on both sides of the ball. By the time Nick Novak......

Coach Joe Gibbs, despite having posted a career win-loss record that is just to die for, has never once won an opening week game on a Monday night. It makes you wonder why he’d willingly go through it again, especially after last night’s dispiriting loss to the Minnesota Vikings and their newly befuglified uniforms—squandering both a home game and a match against a very beatable team. In a game set against the backdrop of September......

Down in Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina, there remain plenty of reminders that the Carolina Panthers haven't quite taken over as the top team in the region. Even at a tremendous distance from DC, Redskins flags still wave from the houses on Virginia Dare Road and autographed photos of Skins luminaries such as Brian Mitchell and Art Monk are still prominently hung on the walls of local BBQ joints. Of course, the distance to......

Over the weekend, Washington, D.C. renewed its Taliban-like devotion to the Washington Redskins as nearly fifty-thousand fans headed out to FedEx Field this past Saturday to watch the home team participate in a “free” scrimmage against the Ravens. The reason for the Washington Times scare-quotes is because the event was mainly noteworthy for how Washington’s Public Frenemy Number One, Dan Snyder, used the occasion to test out his latest parking lot price-gouge strategies, proving once......

Redskins second-year safety Sean Taylor may have gotten off with a slap on the wrist for his last on-field incident – spitting in the face of Tampa running back Michael Pittman – but in Taylor’s off-field travails, things may have gotten a good deal worse for the troubled athlete. Last year, Taylor, believing himself to have identified the individuals responsible for the theft of a pair of all-terrain vehicles, took complete leave of his......

The Washington Redskins and the Tampa “Bay” Buccaneers are interesting opponents – so many contrasts, so many links. Like a meeting between the oldest and youngest NFL coaches. Like a playoff rematch between the last team to bounce Washington from the post-season. And Washingtonians still chafe over the fact that that young coach, Jon Gruden, won his Super Bowl with a quarterback most think should have been kept in DC. Earlier this season, when the......

For the Washington Redskins, the 2005 regular season was an unpredictable series of dizzy highs and swampy valleys as the team went from looking like a playoff shoo-in to an NFL also-ran. With only the thinnest post-season hopes remaining, however, the Skins made Tony Kornheiser look like a genius and rattled off December wins even as critical competitors – the Falcons, the Vikings, the Cowboys – hit the skids. It all culminated in yesterday afternoon’s......

The Washington Redskins doubled their Pro Bowlers from last year yesterday as wide receiver Santana Moss and tackle Chris Samuels were named to the NFC squad for this year's game. However, for the second straight year none of the players on the Redskins defense, which is currently ranked eighth in the NFL, will be making the trip. It seems that the defense's lack of sacks and turnovers from early in the year hurt them......

For three and a half quarters last night, the first meeting between the Redskins and the despised Dallas Cowboys played out according to the worst fears of hometown fans. The offense was cover-your-eyes awful. The Skins committed turnovers and penalties in the face of a swarming rush. Dallas’ defense stacked the line, keeping Clinton Portis in check and forcing the ball into the hands of Mark Brunell. And Mark Brunell obliged the home crowd......

Last year, the Washington Redskins were a football team only a neoconservative could love. A season opening touchdown run by Clinton Portis kicked off the campaign with a shocking, awesome touchdown run. But by midseason, the team had gotten bogged down. It was clear that the defensive unit was capable of winning the war, but week in and week out, it was just as evident that the offense was taking the field without a......

The Redskins are back in camp this week, preparing for a second season of The Passion of The Gibbs. New faces abound and new strategies are being hatched, but there are old questions lingering from last year’s campaign and a tumultuous offseason that are never far away. Cable sports channels and the internet have bred a new type of football fan—where a decade and a half ago, local diehards might give even the preseason game......

The headline of Nunyo Demasio's Friday article on Sean Taylor asserts that he is a man surrounded by “complexities,” as if he were somehow unique in that regard. He’s a nice guy, it seems – “good natured”, as unnamed interviewees put it – who nevertheless evinces something of a “recalcitrant side”, obstinate and given to “cavorting” with unsavory types. Wow. It’s almost as if human beings have some sort of “dual nature”. If only......

Quite a weekend for the local sports teams: >> Showing no ill effects from Marlon Byrd and Tomo Ohka's bizarre behavior on Saturday, the Nationals beat the Marlins 6-3 yesterday and put themselves atop the wacky NL East. While you're swelling with hometown pride keep in mind that the last place team in the division is only 1 1/2 games behind us. The scrappy Nats have won six of seven during their homestand and seven......

Late season improvement, a top caliber defense and the end of the Mark Brunell Experiment bred some hope among the faithful in the late weeks of the 2004 season, and a thorough dismantling of the playoff-bound Vikings the final week had some Redskins fans feeling renewed in their faith in Coach Gibbs. But two months into the offseason, some Redskin enthusiasts are wondering if Coach Gibbs’ best work is being undercut by another important personage:......

The Washington Redskins, in a hopeful sign of things to come, rang in the calendar year 2005 by playing their best, and perhaps most complete game of the season, running the Minnesota Vikings out of the stadium and nearly out of the playoffs. Riding a monstrous performance by the defense, who once again began the game missing key defensive starters and featuring players you’ve never even heard of, like Garnell Wilds, the Skins played......

Coach Joe Gibbs never had a whole lot of success playing out in San Francisco the first time he coached the Washington Redskins. Of course, back then, both the Redskins and the 49ers were frequently atop the NFC, and, along with Dallas, a fixture of the playoffs. At recently rechristened Monster Park last Saturday, fans were treated to two teams trying to get back to that level of play, and the only monster in......

DCist is happy to announce that Jason Linkins (aka The DCeiver) has agreed to take over our football coverage and bring his weekly "Passion of the Gibbs" column over to our bandwidth. I gotta tell you, DC…we was robbed! Defeat was snatched from the jaws of victory this weekend at “Snyders of Landover” (as my buddy Josef V. calls it) when the seemingly miraculous Clinton Portis touchdown was called back on an illegal motion penalty......

With the biggest sports story of the week already written, returning to another Sunday of the NFL regular season may seem a little anti-climactic. Perhaps more so when you consider the Redskins upcoming home game against the Green Bay Packers—both teams started out with big wins, fell into long losing streaks, got mired in the basement of their respective divisions, and only now are showing some signs of life. Both teams are enduring some......

As if things weren’t bad enough for the Redskins this season, rookie standout Sean Taylor was pulled over and charged with DUI early Wednesday morning. Virginia State Police Lt. Harry Newlin pulled Taylor over at 2:45 a.m., on the Beltway. Taylor was taken into custody after he failed a sobriety test at the scene and then refused a breathlizer. He was later released on a $5,000 personal recognizance bond and is due in a......

Grays Coming Soon? D.C. sports authorities have indicated that Major League Baseball wants a named picked for D.C.'s new baseball team as soon as possible. The AP, via WTOP, says that MLB officials want the name settled so marketing can begin. Speaking of Baseball, More Stadium Controversy: The District may have underestimated the costs required to renovate RFK Stadium and build a new permanent stadium on South Capitol Street. The Post reports that it may......