It Can't Be; It Could Be; It Is!
Washington is in the NFC Championship game. Whoda Thunk?
By Donnie Johnston
COLUMNIST
Can’t wait till Sunday.
Finally, something to look forward to in what is typically the blahest month of the year. The Redskins/Commanders are in the NFC championship game.
Five months ago in a column in another literary world, I wrote, in a very sarcastic manner, I might add, how now that the team had a new name, a new owner, a new coach and a new quarterback, nothing short of a Super Bowl championship should be expected.
Guess what! The Redskins/Commanders are just two games away from that goal. Whoda thunk it?
My hat is off to Washington’s ownership, its coaching staff and its players. A 12-5 regular season was beyond most expectations. Everything from there on out is a bonus for the city and the fans.
The Skins (they’re still that to me, and I’m one-eighth Indian, so I don’t want to hear it) have a better than even chance to win it all. They are that good, in great part because of rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels and the fact that they don’t make stupid mistakes and beat themselves. They are sound both offensively and defensively.
Yes, I picked Washington over Tampa and also over the Detroit Lions, a team they dismantled. My friends, who thought I was crazy, will verify my claim. One more win and we’re Super Bowl bound.
The Skins beat the Eagles, who they meet in Philly Sunday, the last time the two teams met, breaking a Philadelphia winning streak at the time. That is past history and, of course, means nothing now. In the playoffs, all things are new.
But if Washington can play as penalty and turnover free as they have been, they will win. Put it in the books! Then on to the Super Bowl!
Seems impossible, Washington in the same sentence as the Super Bowl. The team has been so bad for so long.
And Washington without a quarterback controversy. That’s amazing in itself.
There is no love lost between Washington and Philadelphia, either among the players or the fans. Sunday’s game should be a knock-down drag-out affair, both on and off the field.
When the Skins beat the Eagles in December, a friend had a neighbor whose father, a Philly fan, got so worked up that he died of a heart attack the next day.
And about 40 years ago I had a friend who got so excited over a call during a Redskin game that he had a heart attack and died right there in his easy chair. Americans take their football seriously.
There was talk about how excited the folks in Washington were on Monday. The presidential inauguration? Naw! That’s kid stuff. Everyone was excited because the Commanders beat the top team in the NFC and are headed to the championship game.
Go Washington! I’m picking the Redskins/Commanders by seven
The most excited man in DC on Monday was Donald Trump. He couldn’t believe the inauguration was taking place on King Day. Someone finally told his majesty that it was Martin Luther King Day and that it was an inauguration ceremony and not a coronation.
But then Trump said during his campaign that if he was elected, we wouldn’t have to vote anymore. Maybe he knows something we don’t.
They moved the inauguration indoors Monday because of the cold, which I thought was kind of wimpy. I was outside in the sunshine when the ceremony was taking place and it was not bad.
But the cold can be dangerous and today may be the coldest day of the winter in these parts.
During the cold spell a couple of weeks ago, I had an elderly friend who walked outside late at night to take a smoke and fell on the ice. He laid there all night and was reportedly near froze to death when someone found him the next morning. He is recovering but lost the tip of one finger to frostbite.
You’ve got to be careful.
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The Washington Redskins was founded in 1932 and was originally known as the Boston Braves, for their landlords, the baseball team called the Boston Braves. In 1933 the name was changed to the synonymous Boston Redskins when the team left Braves Field for Fenway Park, the home of the Boston Red Sox. Some accounts state that the name "Redskins" was chosen to honor William "Lone Star" Dietz, who began coaching in 1933, because his mother was Sioux. There were four Native Americans on the original Redskins team of 1933. In 1937 the team moved and joining Capitol Hill as the second football team of Washington, D.C., became the Washington Redskins.