(12-09-2022, 05:26 PM)rfc17 Wrote:

(12-09-2022, 04:50 PM)MarleyJag Wrote: Yes by and large he was better. I'd take that 90s team or even the inconsistent Del Rio teams over anything we've experienced lately. Yeah, 17 was fun but a fluke.

I would do anything to go back to the Del Rio years.  Those were physical teams that could dominate the line of scrimmage.  And we had a 3-4 year stretch where we had a great defense.  Unfortunately we just didnt have a QB good enough to put us over the top first with Leftwich and then Garrard.  And then all those poor drafts just really started to pile up by then end of his tenure.  I'm sure Del Rio deserves some of the blame for that but hard to know how much influence he had.

With Pederson and Lawrence it's very possible this team is on the verge of, at the minimum, having a nice little stretch like that. What really did that era in was James Harris going for broke with Derrick Harvey and Quentin Groves in one draft class and the drafting of Leftwich. 

That era was so desperate to make it's own mark, to leave it's thumbprint on the franchise and city that they really didn't give most of the holdovers a chance. Brunell had one more good year left in the tank. He proved that with Joe Gibbs in Washington by leading them into a play off appearance.

Not only that, but, they completely snubbed David Garrard's development and he was more than capable of being a solid QB, if not, better than Leftwich had he been given a fair shake for the starting job in 2003, 2004. Worst case scenario? You're looking at Eli Manning, Philip Rivers or Ben Roethlisberger in that draft class after a bad year. 

Passing on Terrell Suggs, with a defensive minded coach at the time, pretty mind blowing really.

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