The Return of the King

Forget Frodo, Gollum, Aragorn and Tolkien. The real "Return of the King" is not taking place on Middle Earth, but here in the Nations Capital. Joe Gibbs is returning to coach the Washington Redskins.

After 11 years of mediocrity, Redskins fans have waited, often impatiently, for this moment to arrive. The question on each and every Redskins fan for the past 11 years has been "will he come back?"

Well, now our questions and prayers have been answered. Now the only question left is -- can Gibbs bring the Redskins back to the glory days of the '80s, before the days of cell phones, Sharpies, Dan Snyder, and most importantly free agency?

Gibbs won three Super Bowls with three different quarterbacks, Joe Theismann, Doug Williams and Mark Rypien, but in front of these quarterbacks was an offensive line that stayed together for the better part of Gibbs' and the Redskins' Super Bowl runs of the '80s and early '90s.

Fast forward to the present and any team would be hard pressed to keep any sense of continuity for more than two or three years, and that's being generous.

Gibbs will find a very talented group of players for him to work with, mold, coach, teach and motivate. Laverneaus Coles is as explosive a receiver as Gibbs had ever coached. Same goes with gifted O linemen Jon Jansen, Chris Samuels and Randy Thomas.

The names on defense reads like a pro-bowl starting lineup. You don't think Gibbs will be excited to find a Champ Bailey, Lavar Arrington and Fred Smoot defending and causing turnovers for him.

We've seen what Gibbs can do with quarterbacks and Patrick Ramsey has enough arm strength and smarts to run a Gibbs offense.

Remember Timmy Smith? No? Super Bowl XXII and the Super Bowl record for most rushing yards at 204? Gibbs can find a running game with any back that can hold on to the ball. So why haven't the Redskins been winning or at the very least been competitive with all this talent?

That's what Gibbs is here to answer. He is here to finally pull it, whatever "it" is, together and provide the fans what they have been missing since he left to race cars.

Gibbs is a winner in all sense of the word, from RFK to Talladega. He's preserved his legacy and mystique by calling it quits way before his time was due and now he is back to uphold the images of "The Fun Bunch," "The Smurfs," and most importantly "The Hogs."

I would like to think that he saw his old team in utter disarray and just couldn't stomach watching his beloved Redskins go year after year stuck in the mud headed in no particular direction. I would like to think that he felt a sense of duty to his old friend Jack Kent Cooke to bring the Redskins back to, not just to respectability but to glory. I would like think that he couldn't watch his rival Bill Parcells take the Cowboys and just annihilate the Redskins.

Gibbs couldn't hold back his competitive spirit any longer. He had to see what he could do in the new NFL. However, unlike Steve Spurrier, you won't find him playing golf days before training camp. Unlike Norv Turner, you won't find him making sorry excuses on why they lost another game in the last two minutes. Unlike Marty Schottenheimer, you find him screaming and yelling for more control because Snyder will give it to him, and unlike Terry Robiskie, he'll coach more than three games, okay that last one was a cheap shot.

Of course, the challenge of turning sports' most valuable franchise back into a winner will be tough to say the least, and after the giddiness subsides, Gibbs will find a team that is long on talent but short on confidence.

Gibbs will have to work his magic in a town starving for the Redskins to succeed again. The fans will show him more patience than any other coach Snyder would have hired, and I couldn't think of any other coach that players will hold in a reverential way.

Everyone I know is digging deep into their closets to find the mesh "R" Redskins hat, the satin maroon Redskins jacket, the Monk, Clark, Riggins jerseys. In the year where retro is in, the Redskins are looking to go old school and get back to their winning ways.