Bruce Allen hired as new Redskins GM after Cerrato quits

By Barry Svrluga

WASHINGTON 

The Washington Redskins began a monumental shake-up of their organization Thursday, first announcing the resignation of executive vice president of football operations Vinny Cerrato and within hours replacing him with veteran NFL personnel executive Bruce Allen, who will immediately begin serving as the team’s general manager — the man in charge of assembling the roster and the coaching staff.

The moves, with three weeks left in a disappointing season, essentially overhaul the upper levels of the Redskins’ football operation, with Cerrato — a controversial figure who had a close relationship with owner Daniel Snyder — leaving the organization he served for most of the past decade.

“Obviously this has been a very disappointing season. We disappointed everybody: ourselves, fans,” Snyder said at a news conference at Redskins Park on Thursday afternoon at which he introduced Allen. “With everything that happened, it was time for change.”

Allen, who helped build a team that went to the Super Bowl in Oakland and most recently worked for five seasons as general manager in Tampa Bay, is a former NFL executive of the year. As the son of late Washington coach George Allen, he also provides a direct link to the Redskins’ more glorious days.

Allen told reporters that, with three games left in the season, he wanted to watch the Redskins players and coaches at work and begin to build for 2010. He would not speculate on the future of coach Jim Zorn, saying he had only met with him briefly Thursday, or address reports about candidates to replace the coach, including Jon Gruden, who coached for Allen in Oakland and Tampa Bay, and former Broncos coach Mike Shanahan.

“We don’t have an opening at that position ... Jim Zorn is our coach,” Allen said. “Give us some time to see our relationship develop.”

Reached by text message, Cerrato only thanked a reporter and did not comment on the reasons behind his resignation.

“We agreed that the franchise needs someone different in this position,” Cerrato said in his statement. “I’m thankful to Dan Snyder and other members of his ownership team for the opportunities I’ve been given over the years.”

Asked whether Cerrato had been offered another position with the Redskins, Snyder said: “The best way to put it is it was time for a change.”

“He’s the consummate optimist and has always made decisions based on what would be the best for the team,” Snyder said.

 There is no doubt about the dramatic nature of the shift. Since he took ownership of the team in 1999, Snyder has been criticized for failing to install a savvy general manager to oversee personnel and the composition of the roster. He swiftly dismissed the general manager he inherited from the estate of former owner Jack Kent Cooke, Charlie Casserly, and instead used a series of front office structures that some in the league found odd. Cerrato served the team in several capacities since 1999  but he never had the title “general manager.”

 Allen, 53, was given the title of executive vice president/general manager. The appointment of a new head of the Redskins’ football department immediately leads to questions about the future of Zorn, who is 12-17 with three games left in his second season. Cerrato originally recommended Zorn, a quarterbacks coach with the Seattle Seahawks, to Snyder as an offensive coordinator, and the pair later hired the former NFL quarterback as the head coach despite the fact that he had never served in that capacity at any level.

 Though Zorn and the rest of his coaching staff remain at Redskins Park, Allen’s first major decision will be who to hire as the team’s head coach, be it Zorn or someone else. The most logical choice would appear to be Gruden, the Super Bowl-winning coach who worked under Allen both in Oakland and in Tampa Bay. Gruden and Allen were fired by the Buccaneers after a disappointing end to the 2008 season left Tampa Bay out of the playoffs. Gruden signed on as an analyst for ESPN’s “Monday Night Football,” and on Nov. 16, he agreed to what the network called a “multi-year” contract . It’s not clear what hurdles Gruden would have to clear to get out of his ESPN deal .

Shanahan, who won two Super Bowls with Denver, is also a potential candidate.