Washington Redskins
The Washington Redskins are a professional American football team based in the Washington metropolitan area. The Redskins compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the NFC East. The team plays its home games at FedExField in Landover, Maryland; its headquarters and training facility are at Inova Sports Performance Center at Redskins Park in Ashburn, Virginia, and the Redskins Complex in Richmond, Virginia, respectively.
The Redskins have played more than 1,000 games since their founding in 1932, and are one of only five franchises in the NFL to record over 600 regular season and postseason wins, reaching that mark in 2015. The Redskins have won five NFL Championships (the latter three in Super Bowls), and have captured 14 divisional titles and five conference championships. The Redskins were the first NFL franchise with an official marching band and the first with a fight song, "Hail to the Redskins".
The team began play in Boston, as the Braves in 1932, and changed its name to "Redskins" the following year. In 1937, the team relocated to Washington, D.C., where they have been based since. The Redskins won the 1937 and 1942 NFL championship games as well as Super Bowls XVII, XXII, and XXVI. They have been league runner-up six times, losing the 1936, 1940, 1943, and 1945 title games, and Super Bowls VII and XVIII. With 24 postseason appearances, the Redskins have an overall postseason record of 23–18. Their three Super Bowl wins are tied with the Las Vegas Raiders and Denver Broncos, behind the Pittsburgh Steelers and New England Patriots (six each), San Francisco 49ers and Dallas Cowboys (five each), and the Green Bay Packers and New York Giants (four each).
All of the Redskins' league titles were attained during two 10-year spans. From 1936 to 1945, the Redskins went to the NFL Championship six times, winning two of them. The second period lasted between 1982 and 1991 where the Redskins appeared in the postseason seven times, captured four Conference titles, and won three Super Bowls out of four appearances. The Redskins have also experienced failure in their history. The most notable period of general failure was from 1946 to 1970, during which the Redskins posted only four winning seasons and did not have a single postseason appearance. During this period, the Redskins went without a single winning season during the years 1956–1968. In 1961, the franchise posted their worst regular season record with a 1–12–1 showing. Since their last Super Bowl victory following the end of the 1991 season, the Redskins have only won the NFC East three times with just nine seasons with a winning record. In those, the team only made the postseason in six of them.
According to Forbes, the Redskins are the fifth most valuable franchise in the NFL, and the 14th most valuable sports franchise in the world as of 2019, valued at approximately US$3.1 billion. They also set the NFL record for single-season attendance in 2007, and have the top ten single-season attendance totals in the NFL. The team's name and logo have drawn controversy over its history, with many criticizing it as offensive to Native Americans.
The team originated as the Boston Braves, based in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1932, under the ownership of George Preston Marshall. At the time the team played in Braves Field, home of the Boston Braves baseball team in the National League. The following year, the club moved to Fenway Park, home of the American League's Boston Red Sox, whereupon owners changed the team's name to "Boston Redskins"; to round out the change, Marshall hired William Henry "Lone Star" Dietz, who was thought to be part Sioux, as the team's head coach. However, the team had difficulty drawing fans as Boston was not much of a football town at the time.
The Redskins relocated south from New England after five years to the national capital of Washington, D.C. in 1937. Through 1960, the Redskins shared baseball's Griffith Stadium with the first Washington Senators baseball team of the American League. In their first game in Washington, the Redskins defeated the New York Giants in the season opener, 13–3. That same season, they earned their first division title in Washington with a 49–14 win over the Giants. Shortly after, the team won their first league championship, defeating the Chicago Bears. In 1940, the Redskins met the Bears again in the 1940 NFL Championship Game. The result, 73–0 in favor of the Bears, remains the worst one-sided loss in NFL history. The other big loss for the Redskins that season occurred in September during the coin toss prior to the Giants game. After calling the coin toss and shaking hands with the opposing team captain, lineman Turk Edwards attempted to pivot around to head back to his sideline. However, his cleats caught in the grass and his knee gave way, injuring him and bringing his season and hall of fame career to an unusual end
In what became an early rivalry in the NFL, the Redskins and Bears met two more times in the NFL Championship Game. The third time in 1942, where the Redskins won their second championship, 14–6. The final time the two met was the 1943, which the Bears won 41–21. The most notable accomplishment achieved during the Redskins' 1943 season was Sammy Baugh leading the NFL in passing, punting, and interceptions.
The Redskins played in the NFL Championship one more time before a quarter-century drought that did not end until the 1972 season. With former Olympic gold medalist Dudley DeGroot as their new head coach, the Redskins went 8–2 during the 1945 season. One of the most impressive performances came from Baugh, who had a completion percentage of .703. They ended the season by losing to the Cleveland Rams in the 1945 NFL Championship Game, 15–14. The one-point margin of victory came under scrutiny because of a safety that occurred early in the game. In the first quarter, the Redskins had the ball at their own 5-yard line. Dropping back into the end zone, quarterback Baugh threw to an open receiver, but the ball hit the goal post (which at the time was on the goal line instead of at the back of the end zone) and bounced back to the ground in the end zone. Under the rules at the time, this was ruled as a safety and thus gave the Rams a 2–0 lead. It was that safety that proved to be the margin of victory. Owner Marshall was so mad at the outcome that he became a major force in passing the following major rule change after the season: A forward pass that strikes the goal posts is automatically ruled incomplete. This later became known as the "Baugh/Marshall Rule"
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