I don’t care if you’re not a football fan.
You need to read this article on the Washington Redskins quarterback Robert Griffin the third via the Washington Post.
“My strategy was to come in and try to lead by example first. Being a rookie, you don’t want to come in talking right away. You can rub a lot of guys the wrong way. . . . One thing you can’t do as a leader is come out and say you’re the leader.”
“Everybody gets in line behind him and says, ‘Take us to the promised land,’ ” wide receiver Santana Moss, a 12-year veteran said. “I know it sounds funny saying that, but he shows what it takes every day to get to where he’s trying to get by how he prepares. It shows up on the field on Sundays. There’s no question you want that guy to be a captain.”
“His expectation of winning and playing great is a huge influence in here,” said veteran tight end Chris Cooley. “It’s been a drastic change of culture, and you could say Robert has been the biggest part of that. He’s a natural leader. When he talks, people listen — and people believe. No one said, ‘Okay, you’re the quarterback, so we’re going to listen to what you say.’ You build that trust. “It’s an unbelievably hard thing to do. I don’t think he came in and in his mind said, ‘I have to make everyone believe in me.’ I think he came in and said, ‘I believe in myself, and I’m going to do what I do best.’ And the rest just falls into place.”
“We knew when we drafted him he was going to bring a different dynamic to this team that we hadn’t seen before,” left tackle Trent Williams said. “So we welcomed him with open arms.”
As the first Redskins players boarded the team bus at their Buffalo, N.Y., hotel on Aug. 9, on their way to Ralph Wilson Stadium for the team’s first preseason game against the Bills, they were met by a solitary figure in the front row. It was Griffin, and as each teammate walked past, he looked them in the eye, nodded and held up his fist for a fist-tap.
By this point in training camp, Griffin had become well known around Redskins Park as the first to arrive each morning and the last to leave each evening.
“I made sure I showed up early. I stayed late. I worked hard in practice.”
“When I first met him, we were passing on the stairs [at Redskins Park], and he stopped me and said, ‘I’m Robert Griffin III. I’m the quarterback they drafted in the first round,’ ” recalled fullback Darrel Young. “I just looked at him and thought, ‘Yep, we’re going to be just fine here. This kid is as humble as they come.’”
When you have a guy like that leading your team who is so excited to play — who wants to go out and do big things and take this team places it hasn’t been in years, it’s so easy to be excited with him,” long snapper Nick Sundberg said. “His attitude is extremely contagious.”
“His will to win,” said tight end Niles Paul, “is never-ending.”
“Sometimes people think it’s what you say when you’re in a huge group that makes you a leader,” Griffin said. “But sometimes it’s the one-on-one conversations you have with guys individually, just getting to know them. I think I’ve done that a lot. Not intentionally — it just happens.”
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