The more film Redskins head coach Ron Rivera watched of quarterback Dwayne Haskins, "the more intrigued I was," he told The Sports Junkies on Thursday.
When Rivera first got the Redskins job in January, he sat down to watch film of Haskins, to see exactly what he had in the second-year pro.
"The more I watched, the more intrigued I was by him," Rivera said on 106.7 The Fan. "So far, getting to meet with him, getting to talk with him, watching him in the Zoom meetings, I've been impressed. I really have."
"The thing I liked about Dwayne when he was coming out was he had a live arm," Rivera said of scouting Haskins coming out of Ohio State. "He really did. He threw a good ball and a fairly accurate ball for what they did. He ran that offense with a lot of confidence."
Fast forward to last season, Rivera recalled watching film of Haskins in Washington's Week 12 win over Detroit, who the Redskins beat 19-16 the week before beating Rivera's Panthers.
"Get an opportunity to prepare for him and watch him, I was impressed," Rivera said. "But the thing that impressed me the most, when you go back and look at it – I've talked about this – is how he handled the Detroit game. When you had to score and you had to score twice, once to tie and once to win.
"And in both those situations you could see his confidence. You could see him play and react to what was going on, and he plays fast and he was ahead of the defense. And I kept thinking to myself, 'Wow. That was pretty impressive.'"
"This is a young man that, given an opportunity to grow, I think he can," Rivera said, before noting offensive coordinator Scott Turner was with him in Carolina when they made Cam Newton the first overall pick in 2011.
"He was part of the group of guys that had the plan for Cam Newton," he said. "And one of the things that Scotty and I talked about was a plan to develop Dwayne. And that's the thing that we wanted to make sure we understood, was we're gonna treat him as if we're starting all over, which we are, because it's a new offense with this young man.
"And what do we have to do to give him an opportunity, to give him a chance to succeed and be successful? So, again, it was about having a plan."
"Then Kenny Zampese, who's our quarterbacks coach we brought in, you know he was at Cleveland when they first had Baker Mayfield," Rivera said. "And he talked about a plan. So that to me was what you have to have. You have to have this plan to be ready to go forward.
"And, again, that's what we wanted to do and that's what we want to do going forward with Dwayne, is give him every opportunity to grow, create some competition – we went out and got Kyle (Allen) – and we'll see what happens and how it all unfolds, hopefully, when things settle back to some sort of normalcy and see what happens."
The Redskins never really considered drafting Tua Tagovailoa with the second overall pick, Rivera says, although they did have the Alabama quarterback slotted exactly where he went at No. 5 to Miami, he admits.
"No. Not real (consideration)," Rivera said. "And believe me, we had Tua ranked right where he got picked. We really did."
"Very impressed by who he is as a football player," he said. "A very courageous player and just a guy that has got a good game, but we just feel based on the things that we saw from Dwayne in the last quarter of the season as here's a guy that potentially can grow. And so we'll see."
"I feel good enough about him that I'm willing to take that chance, take that opportunity," he said. "I feel good about who Kyle is. And you never know with Alex, either. We'll just have to wait and see what happens."
Rivera also noted he thinks the Redskins got a steal in the fourth round, in LSU offensive lineman Saahdiq Charles.
"He’s a young man that had a situation that dropped him in the draft, but he's a guy that we believe can come out and help us," Rivera said.
Agent: Jordan would average 50-60 points today
TINSMAN: Trying to make sense of the Trent Williams trade
Redskins need to name Kyle Smith GM