Washington Redskins

Tight end Chris Cooley re-signed with the Washington Redskins on Monday to fill the void left from Fred Davis' season-ending Achilles injury suffered Sunday in a loss to the New York Giants. Cooley was released by the Redskins on Aug. 28. Davis was the team's leading receiver with 24 catches for 325 yards. "I had a lot of things I wanted to do this year, and I was doing it," Davis said. "It's very discouraging. " Cooley, 30, has spent his entire eight-season career with the Redskins.

Jack Pardee, an All-Pro NFL linebacker whose career with the Los Angeles Rams was interrupted in the mid-1960s when he battled malignant melanoma before returning to the field and becoming a well-traveled coach, has died. He was 76. Pardee, who was found to have gallbladder cancer in November, died Monday in Denver, said David Bassity, a spokesman for the University of Houston, where Pardee coached in the 1980s. After 13 seasons with the Rams, Pardee finished his playing career with the Washington Redskins and then began his coaching odyssey.

Robert Griffin III isn't the only rookie sensation on the Washington Redskins' roster. Running back Alfred Morris rushed for a career-high 124 yards during the team's 17-16 victory over the New York Giants on Monday night to become only the second player in franchise history to rush for more than 1,000 yards in his first NFL season. Morris' total of 1,106 rushing yards this season is now the best in team history for a rookie player, replacing Reggie Brooks' 1,063 from 1993. The sixth-round draft pick out of Florida Atlantic is also the first Redskins player to rush for 1,000 yards since Clinton Portis in 2008.

"Duck Dynasty" star Phil Robertson seems a bit eccentric, but this may be plain old crazy. Robertson reportedly turned down an offer to play for the Washington Redskins so he could pursue his hobby: hunting. In the 1960s, Robertson played quarterback at Louisiana Tech. He apparently was good, so good that he started ahead of Terry Bradshaw, who went on to win four Super Bowl titles and was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1989. According to Sports Illustrated , the Redskins made Robertson an offer to turn pro during his junior year.

Robert Griffin III has had his share of magical moments throughout his NFL career -- all 12 games of it. Even when RG3 makes a mistake it can still turn into something positive for the Washington Redskins. Take a play from the first quarter of the Redskins' 17-16 win over the New York Giants on Monday night. The quarterback picked up 12 yards on a running play deep in Giants territory but had the ball stripped by Stevie Johnson on the way down. Normally that would be disastrous, a scoring opportunity down the drain.

TEAM Standings (A): AFC or AFL. (N): NFC or NFL. W L Pct. PF PA Pittsburgh Steelers (A) 4 0 1.000 103 73 Green Bay Packers (N) 2 0 1.000 68 24 San Francisco 49ers(N) 2 0 1.000 64 37 Chicago Bears (N) 1 0 1.000 46 10 NY Giants (N) 1 0 1.000 39 20 NY Jets (A) 1 0 1.000 16 7 Oakland-Los Angeles Raiders (A) 3 1 .750 111 66 Baltimore Colts (N-A) 1 1 .500 23 29 Kansas City Chiefs (A) 1 1 .500 33 42 Dallas Cowboys (N) 2 3 .400 112 85 Miami Dolphins (A) 2 3 .400 74 103 Washington Redskins (N) 1 2 .

Here's what Thomas said after the game: "You got to give credit to the Washington defense. Our no-huddle offense is a fast-paced offense, but they stayed with it. At one point, I thought we had them on the ropes, but their offense ran off a drive and gave them a rest." The Redskins on the ropes? What game was Thomas watching? Thomas, who rushed for 13 yards in 10 carries, also said: "We made a lot of mental mistakes.

In his first game in 1963 with the San Diego Chargers, Walt Sweeney established a pattern that would mark his 13 seasons as a star in professional football. Even though it was only an exhibition, Sweeney played with a fearsome aggressiveness. As a special teams player, he raced down the field ahead of the veterans, making several tackles over the course of the game and becoming a fan favorite as the Chargers beat the Oakland Raiders. But there was something the fans did not know: Sweeney, then a 22-year-old first-round draft choice from Syracuse University, was so high on speed that his heart would not stop pounding after the game.

The Manti Te'o saga may not be as unusual as we thought. Although an athlete finding out that his deceased girlfriend never existed in the first place -- as the Notre Dame linebacker claims to have happened to him -- is an extreme example, Te'o apparently is not the only athlete to be duped into a relationship with someone who has assumed a false identity. A woman using the Twitter handle @RedRidnH00d established dialogues with pro athletes, particularly players for her favorite team, the Washington Redskins, while going by the pseudonym Sidney Ackermann and using photos of Internet adult entertainer C.J. Miles as her own, according to a story on NFL.com.

Even though Robert Griffin III continued playing for the Washington Redskins on an injured knee, the NFLPA will not demand a formal investigation of the team's handling of his injury, the union announced Friday. The NFLPA launched an informal inquiry this week but decided that a formal probe was not needed. “The quality of medical care [Griffin] ultimately received is only one part of this,” the union's medical director, Thom Mayer, said in a written statement. Griffin appeared to re-injure his knee in the first quarter of Sunday's game against the Seattle Seahawks yet he continued to play.

Robert Griffin III underwent reconstructive knee surgery Wednesday and faces a challenging rehabilitation if he is to return for the start of next season. The Washington Redskins quarterback had his lateral collateral ligament repaired and his anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee reconstructed for a second time. The surgery was performed in Florida by orthopedist James Andrews , who was optimistic that Griffin would be back on the field this fall. "We expect a full recovery, and it is everybody's hope and belief that due to Robert's high motivation, he will be ready for the 2013 season," Andrews said in a statement released by the Redskins.

Is it any surprise that Richard Sherman graduated from Stanford with a degree in communications? Of the survivors in the NFL playoffs, there's no more watchable communicator than Sherman, the trash-talking, playmaking cornerback for the Seattle Seahawks whose constant, boisterous button-pushing on the field belies his friendly, easygoing attitude off it. "You have to be that way," Sherman said this week in a phone interview. "I'm not rude or anything off the field, but on the field I'm a dog. " And there's bite to go with his bark.

  Robert Griffin III had to leave the Washington Redskins' 24-14 playoff loss to the Seattle Seahawks on Sunday when he injured his knee while trying to recover a bad snap. The heralded rookie quarterback, who led Washington to the playoffs for the first time since 2007, already had his right knee braced because he strained a minor ligament during a game against the Baltimore Ravens on Dec. 9. With more than six minutes remaining in Sunday's game, which featured the first NFL playoff matchup of rookie quarterbacks, the Redskins were set to run a play from the shotgun formation when a low snap glanced off Griffin's left hand and began to roll on the ground.

LANDOVER, Md. -- Throughout the NFL season, Washington Redskins quarterback Robert Griffin III showed he can do just about anything on the football field. Sunday, he showed what he couldn't do. He was incapable of pulling himself from a wild-card playoff game against Seattle — Redskins coaches couldn't, either — and the results were stomach-turning. Washington lost, 24-14, and Griffin suffered an injury to his already weakened right knee, which with 6 minutes 19 seconds left bent in an unnatural way as he chased a low shotgun snap.

Robert Griffin III has gone to the playoffs every year of his NFL career. OK, so RG3 has only been in the league one year, but it's still a pretty impressive accomplishment for a rookie quarterback to lead his team into the post-season. Especially if that is the Washington Redskins, who haven't played beyond the regular season in five years and needed seven straight wins down the stretch to punch their ticket this year. Tony Romo has only been to the playoffs three times in his seven seasons as the Dallas Cowboys' starting quarterback.