The Redskins Like Safeties

With the 6th pick of the NFL Draft, the Washington Redskins select LaRon Landry, S, LSU. Mike Tanier of Football Outsiders tells you all about it.

I have a neighbor with an in-ground pool, a giant plasma television, and a minivan big enough to be used as a mobile command base by the military. The dude's always in five-digit debt, skips his water bill for months at a time, and eats ramen noodles for a month after he files his 1040 form. The dude is also a Redskins fan, which is perfect, because he runs his life the way they run their team.

The Redskins love to acquire luxury items, and they don't mind buying them on credit, spending next year's draft picks to get this year's T.J. Duckett. Times may be changing, though. They were relatively responsible fiscally this offseason. What's more, there are rumors that Cerrato will be shown the door; apparently, their was a three-nanosecond pause between "Jump" and "How high, Mr. Snyder, Sir!"

After all the disappointing seasons, the Redskins may not be as far from contention as you might think. We're still fine-tuning the projections for Football Prospectus 2007, but we think the Redskins will bounce back this season. Why? Their defense was average on first and second downs last year, but lousy on third downs. All it takes is a few tweaks to turn a bad third down defense around, as the Chargers proved a few years ago.

Landry is one of those tweaks. He's a natural free safety, so he'll share centerfield with Sean Taylor for a year or two. With Taylor and Landry deep, the Redskins will be able to counter Terry Glenn and Terrell Owens when they face Dallas, and Eli Manning could have a 30 interception season. Landry is ready to play right away, and he's a major upgrade over Adam Archuleta, the glorified linebacker the Redskins found at the bottom of their shopping bag after last year's spending splurge.

And now, the Redskins can go home.