Team of Uniters, Not Dividers

These days in Washington, the buzz isn’t about the terror threat level. Policy discussions about immigration reform, mad cow disease and the omnibus spending bill are on the back burner. The Democrats’ campaign comments are getting short shrift from the politicians and pundits.

Staid, serious, wonky Washington is crazy again over football.

The Washington Redskins’ decision to entice Joe Gibbs, the franchise’s most successful coach, out of retirement -- with a five-year contract for more than $5 million a year -- lifted the spirits of a town that is partial to partisan bickering, vicious tactics and suspect motives.

Never mind that Gibbs, 63, hasn’t coached in 11 years. Never mind that the most recent coach, Steve Spurrier, was also hailed as a savior when he was hired two years ago (his teams went 12-20). Gibbs, already enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, is a proven big-league winner.

His lifetime record, including the playoffs, is 140-65. During his 12 years with the Redskins, which ended after the 1992 season, the team appeared in four Super Bowls and won three of them. And in football, as in politics -- to quote another legendary Redskins coach, Vince Lombardi -- “Winning isn’t everything; it’s the only thing.”

“People here admire leadership,” said Scott Armstrong, a specialist on government secrecy whose son played in the National Football League. “Everybody in Washington likes to play war. With a good field commander, it’s like being president.”

Here, football may not be the only game in town, but it is the most important. There is an NBA franchise, the Wizards -- but not even Michael Jordan could turn that team around. The hockey team, the Capitals, has seldom made it much past the early rounds of the Stanley Cup playoffs in its three decades. There’s been no baseball since the Senators decamped to Texas in 1971 -- and that team’s legacy was a description of Washington as “first in war, first in peace and last in the American League.”

The Redskins have been in Washington longer than Strom Thurmond was in the Senate. Seniority commands respect here. So does competition.

“The game is a lot like the town,” said Chris Bender of the deputy mayor’s office. “It’s about power. One body of people has an agenda, and another group is trying to keep them from having their way. That’s football. It’s also a metaphor for this city.”

The proximity of political power and gridiron prowess is best exemplified by Sen. George Allen (R-Va.).

Allen’s father, also named George, was the coach of the Redskins from 1971 to 1977 and never had a losing season. Allen was 19 years old when his father joined the Redskins after five years with the Los Angeles Rams.

“I know this from personal experience, he was absolutely amazed,” said Allen, a former governor of Virginia.

Washington had not had many winning seasons since the late 1940s. “There was a winning season in 1971, and the place went wild. We beat Dallas on New Year’s Eve in 1972 [to reach the Super Bowl] and the place went wild. This city had been wracked by race riots, by all sorts of divisive matters. When the Redskins started winning, it was like Camelot.”

The Kennedy administration was instrumental in making Redskins winners again after a long drought in the 1950s and into the 1960s.

Owner George Preston Marshall moved the Redskins to Washington from Boston in 1937 and the team immediately won the National Football League championship, helping establish immediate fan support. But during the 1950s, Marshall steadfastly refused to integrate the team, contributing to its decline. The segregated Redskins -- Washington Post sportswriter Shirley Povich called the team “the Confederates of the NFL” -- were usually dreadful.

The Kennedy administration’s Interior secretary, Stewart Udall, threatened to deny the Redskins use of a new federally financed stadium unless the team recruited African American players. After the team integrated, they began to improve.

These days the team’s fan base defies racial lines or political labels. In fact, the greatest parlor game in town is to see what notables are sitting in owner Dan Snyder’s box on game day. A spot next to Snyder is an acknowledgment of power, whether you are District of Columbia Mayor Tony Williams or Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan.

Many believe the Redskins’ lock on Washington’s heart owes something to the transient nature of the town. Residents arrive from all parts of the country and often stay, addicted to the preoccupation with policy -- Potomac fever, some call it. But Thomas Boswell, a sports columnist for the Washington Post and a native Washingtonian, thinks the passion of Redskins fans owes more to the loyalty of those born here.

“It is a deep, deep thing,” Boswell said. “Washington was down in sports for a long time -- no World Series after 1933, a 25-year period after World War II when both teams were horrible. You could go through an entire generation with no gratification.”

Still, he added, “there was a deep abiding loyalty.”

Boswell also thinks that outsiders misplace Washington’s devotion to the Redskins as further indication of a sleepy company town of government bureaucrats with little else to root for. Washington and its suburbs, with 5.6 million people, now comprise one of the nation’s largest metropolitan areas. And government is no longer the only game in town; thanks to America Online, which started in the Virginia suburbs, there’s a Potomac version of Silicon Valley.

“The truth of the matter is that this is not a sleepy government town anymore,” said Bob Sweeney, executive director of the Greater Washington Sports Alliance. “But the Redskins are the only organization in town that no matter what race you are, no matter what party you are, you can be a fan.”

In accepting the position Thursday, Gibbs praised the fans, calling them “the best thing going for us.” He also said he understood there was no room for failure. “That may be the biggest thrill, knowing how tough it is,” he said.

Indeed, the fans seem remarkably patient. “It takes three years to be a contender,” said taxi driver William Riley, a native Washingtonian and lifelong fan.

Allen agrees that Washington’s love affair with football owes something to the game’s similarity to politics. “I’ve always said that the Senate scores points by personal fouls and delay of games,” he said. Calling them both contact sports, Allen added, “at least in politics you don’t get knee injuries.”

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Times staff writer Don Frederick contributed to this report.