By Mark Pierce

It was one series of a game played in August. A game which the starting quarterback threw a total of six passes. A cameo performance. Yet that one thrilling series contained enough offensive punch in the form of Robert Griffin to Pierre Garcon to provide Redskins fans with a reassuring jolt of confidence in their team’s future. This is what we had paid to see. A sketch of the possibilities. On the night Griffin was 4-6 for 70 yards and a TD. Garcon caught three of the four passes RG completed on the game winning drive. The game winning score comes on a screen play that was in particular well executed by the ( gasp) offensive line.

There’s your highlight folks, because after Griffin and the first team made their exit, the Redskin offense in effect disappeared. Rex Grossman was a miserable 2 for 10 as a backup, and although Cousins was marginally better in late game duty, he coughed up an interception. The Niles Paul at tight end experiment began officially with a great big wipeout. Paul was terrible, as was Brandon Banks, who, although targeted a total of nine times, managed to catch only two passes for seven yards. Josh Morgan had a successful night, catching four balls. Alfred Morris had a solid outing.

The defense played well, better than expected in some areas, keeping Buffalo from sniffing the end zone all evening. There were three easy interceptions dropped by the defense however, something that will surely be addressed by Shanahan in film study this week. Seventh round draft pick Richard Crawford did manage to come up with a pick, tacking a sixteen yard runback on the play.

All things considered, the Redskins began the RG3 era with a game that was by and large successful on the part of the first team, which should be sufficiently encouraging news for fans.