Donovan McNabb: Robert Griffin III is 'getting brainwashed'

Either Donovan McNabb is a glutton for punishment, or I am… or we all are… or… I don't even know anymore.

Yesterday, I wrote on how Washington quarterback Robert Griffin III was asked by GQ Magazine about Donovan McNabb, and said: "It's probably best we don't talk."

Well, McNabb clearly did not listen. In fact, he did the exact opposite. On his NBC Sports Radio show, McNabb said that Griffin has been "brainwashed."

Credit to the Washington Post's Sarah Kogod, who in the ultimate act of journalistic selflessness (a phrase I would not otherwise use to describe the subject at hand) listened to the show and transcribed McNabb's remarks. I don't think I would have been able to get all the way through them without leaving my computer to go smash some air guitars.

"I'm just trying to help him," McNabb said of Griffin. "Clearly the young generation, they think they have all the answers. He's going through a little turmoil right now, trying to make it out on the field, and it's unfortunate."

A little turmoil? Unfortunate? Yeah, that's how I'd describe the gruesome knee injury that ruined his rookie season.

And clearly, it's all the fault of "the young generation." Because McNabb was so perfect in every way.

(Okay, now I'm venturing into territory I'd rather leave to McNabb's fellow sports radio hosts.)

"But that's where we're at right now as far as these young quarterbacks who think they have all the answers," McNabb continued. "Until things start to fall apart and come down trembling on you, then you want some help."

Then came the kicker.

"I honestly think that over there in Washington, he's getting brainwashed," McNabb said. "He's getting input from whoever it may be on, 'There's no reason to talk to him, it didn't work out here.' "

Wouldn't there be a pretty good chance that the "input" from "whoever it may be" is in some way tied to Mike Shanahan? As in the same coach who coached McNabb during his disastrous tenure in Washington?

(Well, maybe it wasn't so disastrous if you're an Eagles fan. But you get my point.)

McNabb kind-of-sort-of acknowledged as much.

"If they expressed their dislike when I was there, or what I used to do, so be it," he said.

I can't speak for the coaching staff,  but I'm pretty sure the fans at FedEx Field did plenty of expressing dislike when McNabb's lone season in Washington ended with a 6-10 record.

McNabb attempted to finish his remarks on a positive note. Like so many of his pass attempts, though, they went awry at a key point.

"I hope the best for the young man, but the direction he's going in is really a direction he does not want," McNabb said. "He does not want to go there with me, especially when I got the last word."

Really?

Allow me to make two small suggestions.

The first is that Griffin will do just fine going there, because he's more popular - and has much more of his career left - than McNabb.

The second is that McNabb has not "got the last word." At all. And it's his fault, not Griffin's or anyone else's.

As one of my colleagues - I will leave him nameless for now, out of courtesy - said of McNabb this morning: "He needs to retire from the world."

That's a better last word than anything McNabb has come up with so far.