So Many Questions, but No Answers From Snyder

Here's a suggestion for Washington Redskins owner Daniel Snyder: Pick up the telephone and call Washington Capitals owner Ted Leonsis. Then ask him to read to you, out loud, several entries from his blog, located at TedsTake.com, specifically the Sept. 28 entry titled "Pledges."

On that day, Leonsis, one of the most enlightened team owners in any professional sport, very publicly listed 11 pledges to followers of his hockey team. We won't list them all, but Snyder could do himself a large favor by adapting several of Leonsis's recent promises to his team's growing legion of fans. Leonsis wrote:

-- We will always operate the team as if it is a public trust. It is our job and responsibility to hold a mirror up to our community and be a reflection of the best of our fan base.

-- We will always strive to be transparent and open and communicate often and honestly with our fan base.

-- We will strive to offer value in all offerings to our fans. We seek "Happiness" as a state of mind and being for our fan base.

-- We will be an innovator and leader in our marketing and customer relations efforts.

Much to his credit, Leonsis's words and deeds over the course of his stewardship of the franchise have demonstrated time and again that he really believes what he blogged last week.

Just the fact that he takes the time to produce an almost daily blog directed at his ever-burgeoning fan base speaks volumes. The same goes for the frequent appearances on local television and talk radio and his constant face-to-face interaction with fans in the stands during hockey games at Verizon Center.

Of course, it helps that his team has become a legitimate contender for the Stanley Cup. But even in those far-darker days, when the Capitals were rebuilding (and losing), when Alex Ovechkin was still a peach-fuzz kid scoring goals in a Russian junior league, Leonsis always put himself out there and never ducked the tough questions. Instead, he really did live up to that pledge of striving to be "transparent and open and communicate often and honestly" with the fan base.

Compare that with Snyder's bunker mentality in his dealing with the local and national media, not to mention his team's own loyal followers, for so many recent years.

This is a guy who once made his fortune with a company called Snyder Communications, and yet about the only time he meaningfully communicates with the people who passionately live and die with his team comes during photo ops, when he holds up the jersey of another high-priced superstar he's just signed in the offseason.

This is a guy who owns a string of local radio stations, including WTEM (980 AM), the flagship of his team's regional network. And yet during the season, Snyder does not appear on any of the station's talk shows. His own top football man, Vinny Cerrato, has a weekly show on the station, but Snyder remains a no-show on any show week after week.

This is a guy whose franchise works out deals with WRC (Channel 4) and Comcast SportsNet to be the "official local television station" and "official cable network" of the Washington Redskins, but the man in charge rarely appears on camera with reporters from those stations.

This is a guy whose franchise makes millions in rights fees from the four national television networks that broadcast NFL games. And yet he rarely appears on pregame or postgame shows, or does in-game interviews, from the very people who help prop up the sport.

Last week, my colleague Sally Jenkins wrote about Snyder's ongoing lack of accountability. Instead of showing his own face, he trots out his lawyers, his team executives and his head coach to take responsibility for the sorry state of this once-proud franchise. It goes without saying, of course, that Snyder declined Jenkins's request for comment.

(Snyder says through his spokesmen that he has a policy of not commenting publicly about the team during the season.)

But isn't it about time that Snyder made himself available in some sort of public forum, the better to answer just a few basic questions, as in:

-- What about all the rumors focusing on Jim Zorn's job security (ESPN's Adam Schefter said Sunday it was not a matter of if Zorn would be fired, but when)? At the very least, would it really hurt to give Zorn the dreaded vote of confidence with a statement that says "this man is my coach for the rest of the season, and hopefully longer," even if you probably don't mean it.

-- Why would you undermine quarterback Jason Campbell's already fragile confidence in the offseason by letting it be known you were interested in Jay Cutler and Mark Sanchez?

-- Why do you continue to throw huge piles of cash at big-name free agents who, year after year, take the money and hardly ever provide a decent return on the investment?

So many questions, but never any answers from the man who owns a franchise that constantly seems headed in the wrong direction. One last query: Can we get you Ted Leonsis's telephone number? Better yet, go to TedsTake.com and read that Sept. 28 entry. Take notes.

Here and There: One of the better lines in the immediate aftermath of Washington's 16-13 win over Tampa Bay came from WTEM's Steve Czaban, who declared that the rest of the Redskins 2009 season "feels like a [prison] sentence."

And did Channel 4's Dan Hellie really say the Redskins got a "boo-vation" as they walked off the field at halftime Sunday at FedEx?

Leonard Shapiro can be reached at Len.Shapiro@washingtonpost.com.