Robert Griffin III on the Redskins' offense and McNabb

Don Banks of Sports Illustrated recently spoke with Robert Griffin III, and like most people who do so, came away very impressed with the 22-year-old quarterback. You should certainly read the whole piece, but there were a couple of quotes from Griffin that I found particularly interesting.

First, on what he's learned about Kyle Shanahan's offense:

"It's pretty tough to gauge how much of it I know already," he said. "By no means did I know what they wanted to do with me specifically within that offense after our session. But I know the offense has a lot of formations, a lot of motion, and they're going to try to disguise things. You can get a base feeling on an offense, but you can't say within three hours I'm familiar with their offense.

"It's an offense that asks the quarterback to specifically stay within the system. I think a lot of good systems do that. If you're going to one-hitch throw here, you do a one-hitch throw here. But once everything breaks down, and you go through all three or four of your reads, that's where you can be creative. I think whenever you can work within the system out, rather than outside the system in, it's better for you. That's what I tried to do at Baylor."

With Griffin's strong arm, accuracy, and athleticism, it's hard not to get excited every time he discusses the Redskins' offense. Griffin also commented on Donovan McNabb's recent critical comments of Mike Shanahan and the Redskins:

"All respect to Donovan McNabb, he had a great career," said Griffin, when I asked him if he understood McNabb's point. "He was one of my dad's [favorite] quarterbacks when he was a Philly fan. He's not a Philly fan any more, because I'm about to get drafted. But what [McNabb] said probably did come from a place of just bad taste. He had a bad taste in his mouth from his experience with Coach Shanahan, and I understand that. He never said anything bad about me, he was just trying to warn me, trying to say, 'Don't let egos get in the way.'

"But that's part of the job at quarterback, to be able to manage different types of egos and different types of people. So I'm looking forward to going up there and managing whatever it is that needs to be managed. All respect to Donovan, but it just didn't work out for him in Washington, and that's why he thought it didn't work out."

It's hard to think of a more perfect response to McNabb than that. Well done, RGIII. (Or is it RG3? This really needs to be settled.)

Also: You should read the outstanding article of Griffin's legacy by ESPN's Tom Friend. Fantastic insight.