Brace yourselves Redskins fans - this one's going to hurt.
Washington Redskins head coach Jay Gruden used his press conference on the opening day of the scouting combine, ahead of April's 2015 NFL Draft, to announce that Robert Griffin III will be the team's starting quarterback next season.
Considering his shockingly poor and inept play to end the year, it's hard to imagine that would be the case had Griffin not cost the team three first-round picks and a second-rounder to acquire in the 2012 NFL Draft.
In fact, if former Redskins head coach Mike Shanahan had had his way, Griffin III wouldn't have been a Redskin at all. Instead, when the team entered the 2011 offseason with questions at quarterback, Shanahan focused his efforts on adding Peyton Manning, who had recently been released by the Colts.
"We were talking to Peyton at that time. That was a strong consideration," Shanahan said on ESPN 980 recently, via Pro Football Talk. "But at the end of the day I felt that with Eli being with the Giants he wasn't coming in our direction."
Losing out on Manning pushed the Redskins front office - owner Dan Snyder and GM Bruce Allen - to consider a trade up in the draft to the second-overall pick for either quarterback Andrew Luck or Robert Griffin III - something Shanahan said he was not really onboard with.
"I did not feel good about giving up two No. 1s and a No. 2, and they all knew I felt that way," Shanahan said. "I said, 'Hey, yeah, I would take the chance. But I want you to know that he's really going to have to commit to what we're doing.'"
Shanahan also revealed that the team "strongly considered" selecting quarterback Russell Wilson in the third-round, ahead of the Seattle Seahawks, before taking Kirk Cousins in the fourth-round.
Ultimately, Washington went with Griffin III with their first-round pick - one of five quarterbacks the team had rated highly in that draft - and Manning went to Denver where he's found immense regular season success and reached a Super Bowl. Wilson ended up in Seattle where he's now appeared in back-to-back NFL Championship Games, emerging victorious once.
While NFL lore is littered with "could have's" and "we shoulda's" just like this, these revelations from Shanahan have to hurt for a 'Skins fanbase that pinned their hopes and dreams on a quarterback whose professional prospects already seem shot to hell.
Oh, what could have been for Shanahan and the poor, poor Redskins.
