While the Washington Redskins won’t argue that they were completely outplayed by the Carolina Panthers, there’s a feeling that referees are hurting the team on purpose because of the Redskins nickname, which has been causing so much controversy for the last few years, with more and more people trying to have it changed.
Jason Hatcher, the team’s defensive end, made something of a plea to the league or officials (which usually don’t give too much of a f@#% about what players think) to start ruling fairly during games, and not blame the players for what they perceive is a mistake, or worse, by the team’s ownership.
I’m not saying this out of character to get fined, but it is what it is. I don’t know if it’s about the name or what, but at the same time, we play football, too. We work our butt off, too. Don’t single us out. At the end of the day, it’s the name. Don’t worry about the name — we’re players and we work our butts off, too. I’m just frustrated with it. We shouldn’t have to be punished for that. It’s been every game, calls after calls that should’ve been made in our favor, but it goes to them. It’s just not right. We’re in the league, too. We’re NFL players. We got a team, too. We go out there, and we sweat and work hard, too. I don’t give a crap about the name. We are players. We’ve got feelings, too, and we want to win, too.
The two plays in particular the Redskins were frustrated with were a unnecessary roughness penalty on cornerback Chris Culliver for a hit on Greg Olsen, and the other was a Kirk Cousins run to the 3-yard line of the Panthers being overturned because tight end Jordan Reed was called for holding. The two teams were almost identical in number of yards penalized for, only the Redskins felt it came in pivotal moments when they were called for them.
Either way, the loss was a painful return to reality for the Redskins. The Wild Card race in the NFC is wide open, but their pass protection crumbled and their defense was unable to keep up with Cam Newton or the running game, while they got just 14 yards on the ground against what may be the best defense in the NFL. In the NFC East, anything can happen, but Kirk Cousins and the Redskins in general were humbled by the loss.