Redskins release Devin Thomas

The Devin Thomas era in Washington has ended. According to Redskins Insider's Rick Maese, the Redskins released Thomas yesterday, making room on the roster for Keiland Williams.

In the end, Thomas was right. For weeks, he admitted in interviews that he was worried that his roster spot was in jeopardy. He survived four games under Mike Shanahan, only contributing as the team's kick returner. In parts of three seasons in Washington after being drafted in the second round in 2008, Thomas caught a grand total of 40 passes for 445 yards and three touchdowns. He also had a rushing TD in 2008.

Obviously there was something about Thomas that the Redskins coaching staff didn't like, or else he would have gotten a chance. Thomas, who's only 23, will likely move on to another team with wide receiver issues, though not many teams have as thin of a wide receiver corps as the Redskins.

It would be nice to have some more answers on why Thomas was released, but two things probably contributed: 1) somehow he got in Shanahan's doghouse and couldn't get out of it, and 2) maybe he just wasn't that good to begin with. After all, he was drafted by Vinny Cerrato.

Jason Reid also shared a story about Thomas during the preseason:

An incident during a meeting in the preseason probably did not help Thomas improve his standing with the Shanahans.

As Thomas slept in the meeting, rookie wideout-punt returner Brandon Banks used his cell phone to take a picture of Thomas. Banks then transmitted the picture via Twitter. After team officials informed Shanahan of what occurred, Banks quickly deleted the picture from his Twitter account.

If Thomas was talented enough, him falling asleep in one meeting probably wouldn't have been a big deal. But that unprofessionalism, combined with his apparent talent deficiency, was enough for Shanahan to show him the door after just four games.

Here are some other links/reactions on Thomas's departure:

• "Redskins release Devin Thomas after four games; Keiland Williams promoted" [Mike Jones, @TBDSkins]
• "Thomas cut, Williams promoted" [John Keim, Redskins Confidential]
• "D.C. Is Where Wide Receivers Go to Die" [Jamie Mottram, Mr. Irrelevant]
• "Devin Thomas era in D.C. is over" [Matt Mosley, NFC East Blog]
• "Devin Thomas Cut by Redskins" [J.J. Cooper, FanHouse]

Joey Galloway vs. the league

If you're a Redskins fan, you've likely heard a lot of discussion about Joey Galloway. Most of the talk hasn't been very positive and has been along the lines of, "Joey Galloway shouldn't be on an NFL roster"; "Why is Galloway starting?"; "Why don't the Redskins start Devin Thomas instead?" etc. Those seem like fair points/questions, especially since through three games, Galloway has just three receptions for 88 yards (all coming in the Houston game).

Now, obviously the Redskins' two best receivers are Santana Moss and Chris Cooley. Fred Davis, the No. 2 tight end behind Cooley, is probably the third-best receiver. Galloway isn't necessarily the fourth-best option, and he may not even be in the top five.

Anyway, I decided to take a look at how Galloway stacks up against other No. 2 wide receivers in the NFL (ranked by receiving yardage). Granted, not only have just three games been played, but several teams have solid receiving options at tight end and running back, meaning they all don't need to have great No. 2 options at wide receiver. Still, I figured it was worth a look.

Teams' No. 2 receiving leaders (WR)

1) Indianapolis Colts: Reggie Wayne: 18 catches, 260 yards
2) Houston Texans: Kevin Walter: 16, 207
3) Dallas Cowboys: Roy E. Williams: 12, 191
4) Denver Broncos: Jabar Gaffney: 17, 189
5) New York Giants: Steve Smith: 18, 181
6) San Diego Chargers: Legedu Naanee: 10, 177
7) St. Louis Rams: Danny Amendola: 16, 162
8) Cincinnati Bengals: Jordan Shipley: 13, 161
9) New Orleans Saints: Marques Colston: 14, 154
10) Arizona Cardinals: Larry Fitzgerald: 12, 152
11) Pittsburgh Steelers: Hines Ward: 10, 151
12) Miami Dolphins: Davone Bess: 13, 149
13) Philadelphia Eagles: Jeremy Maclin: 11, 147
14) Oakland Raiders: Darrius Heyward-Bey: 10, 140
15) Jacksonville Jaguars: Mike Thomas: 12, 139
16) New England Patriots: Randy Moss: 9, 139
17) Buffalo Bills: Steve Johnson: 9, 137
18) Green Bay Packers: Donald Driver: 18, 129
19) Tennessee Titans: Justin Gage: 7, 113
20) Chicago Bears: Devin Hester: 6, 110
21) Seattle Seahawks: Deion Branch: 12, 102
22) Washington Redskins: Joey Galloway: 3, 88
23) Baltimore Ravens: Derrick Mason: 7, 82
24) San Francisco 49ers: Michael Crabtree: 6, 81
25) Kansas City Chiefs: Dexter McCluster: 5, 78
26) Atlanta Falcons: Harry Douglas: 6, 71
27) Carolina Panthers: Brandon LaFell: 3, 66
28) New York Jets: Jerricho Cotchery: 8, 64
29) Tampa Bay Buccaneers: Michael Spurlock: 3, 59
30) Minnesota Vikings: Greg Lewis: 5, 56
31) Cleveland Browns: Mohamed Massaquoi: 3, 55
32) Detroit Lions: Bryant Johnson: 2, 28

Some of the names on the list are No. 1s (Wayne, Moss, Colston, Fitzgerald) who are routinely doubled by opposing defenses and may not be on the list as the season progresses.

If not for a 62-yard bomb from Donovan McNabb in the Houston game, Galloway would be near the bottom with Bryant Johnson. Also, Galloway's three catches are tied with LaFell, Spurlock, and Massaquoi for second fewest.

I'm not sure why Galloway has started all three games. Maybe he's a nice guy who knows all of the plays, plays hard, and runs his routes correctly at all times. But he's not much of a threat, and when he's on the field, he makes it easier for opposing defenses to focus more on Moss and Cooley. Unless something is seriously wrong with Devin Thomas, like he's completely forgotten how to play wide receiver or catch the ball, he seems like a much better option at this point than Galloway. So does Anthony Armstrong.

Quick hitters: Orioles, Wizards win; Devin Thomas is strange

-- Melvin Mora knocked in three runs, and Mark Hendrickson allowed one run on six hits in five and one-third innings in his Orioles' debut as the O's beat the Tampa Bay Rays 5-4. The bullpen struggled a bit again, with Jim Johnson allowing two runs and George Sherrill giving up a solo home run to Dioner Navarro in the ninth, but Sherrill was still able to record three outs for his second save. Evan Longoria hit two homers and had three runs batted in.

-- In a rather meaningless game against the Toronto Raptors, the Wizards and Caron Butler managed to make the contest a little more exciting than it probably should have been. With time ticking away and the scored tied at 98 apiece, Butler went to work:



What a great play; Butler completely lost Shawn Marion with that move. But I feel like I've seen that before somewhere. Oh yeah, right here. The Wizards are now 19-61 and have two more games left to get to 20 wins (if they want to).

-- The Washington Redskins' rookie receiving trio of Devin Thomas, Malcolm Kelly, and Fred Davis didn't exactly have a great first season in 2008-2009. In fact, all three receivers combined caught 21 passes for 165 yards and no touchdowns. Thomas did manage to rush three times for 53 yards and a touchdown -- hooray!

According to Dan Steinberg of the D.C. Sports Bog, Devin "Showtime" Thomas now has his own blog. His first blog entry, entitled "Party Mix On My Shoulder," included this gem:

I’ve always had people doubting me. Do I play with a chip on my shoulder?

I’ve got a party mix of chips on my shoulder.

I wear number 11 on my jersey because I was 11 years old when I first knew that football was my thing, but also because 11th was where I thought I was going to go in the draft to Buffalo. There were very strong indications through the Bills and the media that I would go No. 11 to Buffalo and I had a real good feeling that was where I was going to go.

It didn’t happen and I stayed around into the 2nd round. Now I do what I’ve got to do to prove that I could have and should have been a 1st rounder.

Mr. Irrelevant wrote about Thomas's odd take on the phrase "chip on my shoulder" yesterday. I'm glad that Thomas is so confident -- "But I don’t need to look at my number for motivation. When it says Thomas on my jersey, that means it’s Showtime, time to do what I have to do." -- but hopefully he finds enough motivation to play much better next season. I'm not going to write him off just yet, but it would be nice to see some of that "Showtime" on the field.

-- Tim Kurkjian wrote a glowing article on the rapid progress made by Orioles' center fielder Adam Jones. My favorite part has to be this passage:

A lot of young players today aren't interested in doing that. Many of them are so spectacularly talented they don't feel the need to learn. Not Jones.

"[Former Mariners outfielder] Jay Buhner came up to me my first spring and said, 'Shut up and listen,' then he walked out of the room," Jones said. "John [Shelby] had nine years in the big leagues. Crow [hitting coach Terry Crowley] has been in baseball for like 50 years. They had finished good careers before I was even born. Why not listen? I'm a sponge for these coaches."

That Jay Buhner -- always one to dish out wisdom to young baseball players.

Through four games, Jones is doing very well. He's 6-14 with three doubles, one triple, six runs, and three runs batted in out of the second slot in the lineup.

Week in review: Lessons in crab dribbles and Morgan State basketball

Right now, the Steelers are up 21-10 over the Chargers. Earlier today, the sixth-seeded Eagles took down the top-seeded Giants, and yesterday the Ravens and Cardinals both won playoff games on the road against higher-seeded teams. Lots of people probably picked the Eagles and maybe even the Ravens, but just about no one figured the Cardinals would beat the Panthers on the road -- very shocking indeed.

But besides football, it's still been an odd week.

Sunday, 1/4:

-- Last week, LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers came to Washington to face the Wizards. I was in attendance and had a great time as the Wizards actually won, 80-77. If it wasn't surprising enough that basically the worst team in the East took down the best one, LeBron was actually called for traveling on a crucial play with less than a minute left in the fourth quarter. Here's a recap of the game, with that questionable play around the 2:00 mark.

First of all, the call was obvious. That's a travel in a real game, a pickup game, or even just when you're in the gym by yourself. Still, it's impossible for James to admit it. Instead, it's a "bad call" because he took a "crab dribble." Caron Butler would have none of that: "A crab dribble is when you, uh, travel." (For more coverage, check out this hilarious posting on the D.C. Sports Bog. This one too.)

Second, the faces of the three guys next to us in red shirts after the Cavs lost were priceless. Not only did they look like they'd never been to a basketball game before, but they cheered like crazy even when LeBron made a simple layup. Thank you, basketball gods, for that small gift.

Tuesday, 1/6:

-- The Orioles reached a deal with pitcher Koji Uehara. Uehara will become the first Japanese player to play for the Orioles. Roch Kubatko, who wrote the blog posting I linked to, adds:

John Stockstill, the Orioles' director of international scouting, has seen Uehara pitch in person about six times and really likes him. But the true test always comes on U.S. soil.

Uehara won two games in the 2006 World Baseball Classic and has found a tremendous amount of success in international competition, which leaves team officials encouraged.

If he turns out to be consistent at all, Uehara will be able to provide some relief for Jeremy Guthrie, who is the only reliable starting pitcher the Orioles currently have. We'll see how he performs.

By the way, I'm getting tired of Orioles' fans whining about the team not trying to sign Adam Dunn or failing to go after Ben Sheets, Derek Lowe, or whoever. I know people will always complain on message boards, and frankly, they have the right to after the last decade plus, but the organization is finally rebuilding the right way -- and now is the time to start complaining? The Orioles aren't going to be very good next season, so what's the point in paying a lot of money for players who won't be able to help the team? The past several seasons have shown that quick fixes just don't work, especially for the Orioles, and it's time to do things the right way. I have no problem with anything that Andy MacPhail has done so far; I wish more people shared that enthusiasm.

Wednesday, 1/7:

-- Even though Washington Post writer Jason La Canfora, who covers the Redskins, seems to like stirring up some trouble, he had some very interesting comments about Redskins rookie wide receiver Devin Thomas in a recent blog posting. La Canfora hinted that Thomas didn't exactly have an easy time adjusting to life in the NFL, to say the least. He wrote:

With a swagger that was not backed up by his play, he did not do enough to get himself physically and mentally ready to play, and many in the organization wonder if he ever will. He could be surly, he enjoyed the nightlife and he never made any real strides toward becoming a regular part of the offense. He continually ran poor routes - often three yards or more too deep or too shallow - which is a massive difference in an intricate precision system. He didn't do nearly enough to earn the confidence of the quarterbacks. He was drafted to be the bigger, deep threat to complement Moss on the opposite side, replacing Brandon Lloyd, and ended up being similar to Lloyd in far too many ways. Thomas has already talked about the need to get away from football for a while, which, for as little as he played, is alarming. He needs to work his tail off all offseason to be ready to help this team.

Not exactly a promising summary of his rookie season, is it? Here's to you, Vinny Cerrato.

-- After that solid win over the Cavs, the Wizards went right back to putting up awful performances. They lost to the Magic, which wasn't surprising, but then the Toronto Raptors came to the Verizon Center. With injuries to Jermaine O'Neal, Jose Calderon, and Jamario Moon, the 14-21 Raptors were without three of their five starters. Fortunately for them, they were playing the Wizards, who were apparently intimidated by such fill-ins as Will Solomon at point guard, who scored 14 points on seven of 11 shooting, grabbed four rebounds, and dished out five assists, and solid NBA starters Jake Voskuhl and Roko Ukic. For the record, until this season, Solomon hadn't played in the NBA since being a member of the Memphis Grizzlies in 2001-2002.

-- Not to be outdone, the Terps fell at home to Morgan State, 66-65. That's right -- Morgan State. Greivis Vasquez shot five of 21 from the field and one of nine from three-point range. As a team, the Terps shot just one of 14 from outside the line.

Obviously, Gary Williams was not pleased with the performance:

"Until you get to where you're playing at a very high level for all 40 minutes or at least close to 40 minutes, that's always a possibility," Williams said. "We got caught tonight against a team that made some big shots and played with a lot of poise. When we had to run some really good plays, we settled for the first open shot and that really hurt us. We can't get away from the fact that we have to pass the ball very well. We missed some shots inside that we should make, but we've done that all year. This is our 14th game so we have to accept the fact that that can happen."

Thursday, 1/8:

-- The Florida Gators beat the Oklahoma Sooners in the BCS National Championship Game. Hooray. We still want a playoff.

Saturday, 1/10:

-- To be fair, Maryland did rebound nicely (sort of) by at least getting a win in the team's ACC opener against Georgia Tech. It wasn't the best-played game ever -- Georgia Tech committed 28 turnovers, and the Terps shot 31.5 percent from the field -- but they still got the win.

So I guess I'll end on this positive: the Redskins still can't draft properly, the Orioles won't be good next season, and the Wizards stink right now. But Maryland basketball won and at least showed a little promise. If they can get into the NCAA Tournament this year, I'll be happy.