The Immeasurable Failure of the Washington Football Team Under Dan Snyder

[Music] fight [Music] the year is 1999. young successful entrepreneur seizes the opportunity of a lifetime to fulfill his childhood dream and become majority owner of his hometown nfl team he's an actual fan who just wants to return to the glory of the franchise's past and is finally in the driver's seat to take it there himself he can see it so clearly two super bowls sammy ball joe gibbs a winning record respect from the rest of the nfl one small problem though he's viewing the rest of the world from the perspective of himself and his name is daniel snyder as owner of the washington football team whose non-racially offensive mascot is still pending snyder has spent his last 20 years building an irrefutable resume as one of if not the most arrogant and inept owner in the nfl and you know it would honestly be nice to be able to stop at arrogant and inept but streams of allegations have emerged about how horrendous the team has been in its treatment of female employees there's a history of him overcharging for an ever declining product and then of course the controversy surrounding their mascot for decades now that snyder refused to entertain until you know but at any rate the amount of mud that's been caked on this once revered franchise within just 20 years of ownership is absurd and today we're gonna march through it but talking about dan snyder to that extent is no doubt going to ruin my entire day so before we go down that road i'd like to tell you all about something i actually enjoy in today's sponsor over at hellofresh if you haven't heard of them before hellofresh is america's number one meal kit providing quality ingredients and recipes straight to your door on a personalized schedule they take care of all the little things for you food preferences exact quantities for your household and sustainable packaging that means less waste and less time in the kitchen as soon as i got my box i was very quick to jump on these black bean and poblano flautas mostly because of the inarguable fact that mexican food is just superior to all other foods the recipe was simple the ingredients were high quality and i was able to get dinner on the table in just 30 minutes so it's overall a formula that you just can't go wrong with if you're interested in checking out hellofresh and the variety of options they offer use my code ste80 to get a total of eighty dollars off including free shipping on your first box with purchase go to hellofresh.com to redeem that and for some more details once again that is code ste80 hellofresh.com so thank you again to hellofresh and with a gigantic sigh i guess we've got to talk about dan snyder 142 wins 193 losses one tie that's the overall record of washington since dan snyder purchased the franchise back in 1999. now i'm not going to sit here and say that dan snyder is the root of all problems when it comes to the team's struggles because i mean they're not exactly the luckiest team under the sun however what i do want to talk about are some of the core issues that have emerged time and time again as a result of his managerial style so here's the thing no owner is going to be perfect in which coaches and executives they trust with their football club but it's undoubtedly one of the most important aspects of ownership to get right if you're going to find any consistent success on an unrelated note washington is currently on its 10th head coach in snyder's 21st season at the helm draw from that what you will but one consistent theme among any coach's era for washington has been this incredible underlying instability and more often than not even a small difference of opinion between snyder and his coaches will end with them being kicked to the curb executives have talked extensively and anonymously of course about just how volatile and distrustful snyder can be with the direction of everything and how his daily behavior and incessant outbursts mimic what a child would think that a rich billionaire would act like it isn't necessarily that snyder doesn't want to win it's that he has no clue how to but doesn't believe anyone has answers that are better than his but how would i phrase this everyone has answers that are better than his like when he hand selected marty schottenheimer as head coach back in 2001 watched him rally the team in his first season from a zero and five start to winning eight of their last 11 and then firing him anyway due to personal conflicts and the lure of a successful collegiate coach to just start over with that's just one example of course but all in all a head coach has never lasted six full seasons with washington in the snyder era nor has one left with a winning record mind you there was a point in the recent past where the team had sean mcvay kyle shanahan and matt lefleur all on the same coaching staff so don't tell me they've just been unlucky rather there was never any synergy in the vision between owner and coach for any time at all in redskins park and that's almost always a death sentence for a franchise struggling to right the ship but when it comes to anything dan always gets the final say he seems to think of himself as a young jerry jones and league sources have even confirmed that he idolizes jones as a renegade who wants to call the shots on just about every aspect of football life for washington but for as much criticism as jones warrants for his grip on the cowboys snyder's impression of him is just pathetic dan snyder knows nothing about managing a football team but rather than placing competent executives alongside himself to better shoulder that task snyder has favored putting his friends in those positions with the best example of this being won vinnie serrato team president and de facto general manager of the team from 1999 to 2009 so what did he accomplish with snyder in a full decade well many know that washington became well known for their affinity for past their prime veterans throwing wads of cash at the likes of an aging deon sanders jeff george andre reed and jason taylor not to mention inking a seven year 100 million dollar deal with albert haynesworth that immediately fell flat there wasn't much if anything to show for on serato's resume before or after he spent a decade with washington but he did one thing properly that not many others could he got along with dan snyder and he was also more than happy to help him build his newly acquired franchise into a personal fantasy team that might have dominated the nfl if it was a decade earlier when there was no way serato's position could be justified any longer in 2009 bruce allen was named as his replacement and his tenure as team president managed to be even worse somehow a poster boy for the nfl's problem with nepotism allen is another figure who has been called out by team officials as authoritarian and just confidently wrong but nonetheless slowly absorbing more and more power over his decade as second in command while the franchise wilted away allen battled coaches blundered contracts alienated a fan base that was already out on mars after a decade under snyder all while insisting that everything was absolutely incredible how would you describe the culture surrounding this football team you know the culture is actually damn good i don't think that you need me to tell you this but he's lying in fact at the time these sacred words were uttered trent williams a situation that higher management was aware of from the start looking back at any point now in allen's decade of blunders it's hard to come up with any reason why such a polarizing and damaging figure was kept in a position of power for that long apart from one glaring excuse that is only ever applied to snyder and his goons no matter what happens the blame never falls on them at the top get a new head coach get a new quarterback kickstart a new era of washington football without addressing any of the fundamental flaws at the very core of the organization instead we can let those go unchecked for decades at a time and that's just the on-field product while snyder has final say on how he wants to build the team his incompetence in that regard has nothing on the irreversible damage he's done to washington and their entire fan base off the field in his 20 years as owner the team's 2020 off season was very busy and in the worst possible way but before we open up that really big can of worms let's briefly cover snyder's uncompromised journey to charge more and more for a product that gets substantially worse by the year when he first purchased the team in 1999 he inherited one of the most loyal and steadfast fan bases in all of football but quickly built a reputation for nickel and diming them at every corner just to slightly improve the team's margins how did he do that exactly well i might need you to kick back because it is a pretty impressive list exhibit a dan snyder was the very first owner to start charging fans to attend training camp exhibit b snyder once sold expired peanuts to fans that were still packaged in the branding of an airline that had gone out of business over a year earlier exhibit c following 911 he added a security charge to all tickets despite no apparent changes in stadium policy and as a bonus exhibit on the fifth anniversary of 911 he also sold 24 commemorative hats with an image of the redskins logo and pentagon on them but every cent of them as far as it was reported was just for profit those are just his greatest hits but he's also never been able to handle even an ounce of criticism against him either whether you want to judge that from the fact that he purchased the two most prominent sports radio networks in the dmv to better control his narratives or the fact that he also sued a sports writer who wrote an article titled the cranky redskins fan's guide to dan snyder that ripped into his extensive history of wrongs and while we're on the subject dan if you're watching this i've been advised to tell you that this video is just a big old prank please don't sue me but my begging here probably won't be enough just looking at the history because back in 2008 despite claiming there was a waitlist of over 20 000 people for season tickets dan sued his own seasoned pass holders right in the midst of a financial crisis for being unable to pay on their long-term agreements including one 72 year old woman who had been a season ticket holder since the 1960s sure dan snyder might not be able to win games but he can sure as hell win some lawsuits against the elderly i will never take that away from him of course i couldn't make a video about the washington football team without mentioning why they're now known as the washington football team despite being an inevitability that has only grown more and more certain over the years dan snyder was always the number one obstacle standing in the way of changing what was by far the most controversial name in sports the redskins and i mean regardless of what you personally grew up with or the traditions of the franchise that came before times change a spade is a spade and a slur is a slur and the fact that it took until july 2020 for it to be removed after being protested against for decades now is genuinely bizarre that can be credited of course to snyder himself who was quoted back in 2013 as saying we'll never change the name it's that simple never you can use caps well turns out never lasted just over seven years when sponsors finally caved to the public outrage and threatened the team to pull their support if a change was not made backed into a corner snyder naturally complied even going as far as to list sponsors first in a list of priorities that included the team's fans and community in their official release announcing the name would be changed thank you dan so i think that we can all agree this history over the past 20 years would be more than enough to declare snyder a plague on the franchise but unfortunately as many found out due to some excellent journalism from the washington post it still manages to get worse now i have to stress here that what was reported as of this video is publishing are allegations and they're currently being investigated by the nfl itself so i'm just going to go over the basic details here just to tread carefully in july 2020 the washington post released a bombshell article that originally involved 15 women a number that has increased to 40 in later weeks alleging inappropriate harassment during their employment with washington ranging from inappropriate comments to unwanted physical contact and other instances where clear boundaries were crossed snyder is not directly accused of inappropriate conduct in the piece and has gone as far as to label it a hit job but the vast amount of interviews given paint an environment of exploitation of female employees that was both known about and contributed to by top executives all of which mentioned by name in the article were immediately fired to make matters worse a follow-up was released detailing past exploitation of the team's cheerleaders back in 2008 with allegations of a video being made behind the scenes of beach photo shoots that were explicit in nature without the consent of any women involved with there even being other allegations that the video was made specifically for snyder and other top executives again snyder denies any knowledge of such a tape this is also not the first controversy that has involved washington's cheerleaders as a new york times report first brought to light a potential mistreatment on a trip to costa rica with exploitative behavior consistent with the reports released in 2020 i'll leave all of those articles in the description so you can come to your own conclusions but it is a lot reading those accounts of what has happened within washington's organization for the past 14 plus years of dan snyder's ownership at the least if proven those are the kind of things that have to be cut out at the very core even if he isn't directly implicated these allegations demonstrate an organization whose structure was built on indifference or at worst complete tolerance for abuse and harassment that cannot have a place in today's nfl especially when you take past controversies into consideration it's always fun to make jokes about failing as a football team but failing at general respect and decency in the workplace that kind of deficiency is only a result of what is tolerated up at the very top case closed so with everything out in the open what's next for the washington football team well anything and everything is a question mark including whether the nfl is going to force snyder to sell the franchise as a result of these ongoing investigations as well as whether or not ron rivera is finally the coach to turn the team's decades of falling backwards into any semblance of forward progress but if you ask me when it comes to the history of dan snyder's first two decades as owner the more things change the more they ultimately stay the same ron rivera is an incredible head coach and man and i personally hope he kicks cancer's ass but he's got an insane burden to shoulder and turning this entire franchise around on his own because i can tell you he's not going to get any help from up top and while i hope that is in the cards for rivera it's very hard to see a world in which this franchise is revered once again while this owner is still at the top a problem that isn't going to be solved unless done so by force so for the washington fans that are still left out there however many of you there might be my heart goes out to you and i want you to know that i do genuinely hope for some brighter days ahead because oh man do you deserve better than what is going on now but until that time comes hail to the football team [Music] you

Channel: Set the Edge

Views: 516,496

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Id: GMw34za952Q

Length: 16min 24sec (984 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 25 2020