I know my place and I usually stay in my lane. I am not a football analyst; I can’t break down film or decipher X’s and O’s. I have no special insights. I’m just a fan with a keyboard with the time and inclination
to make sure that there’s content to read and discuss every day. My biggest skills are the ability to copy & paste, the discipline and sobriety needed to stick to a regular schedule, and a more-than-passing acquaintance with English grammar and punctuation.
I have my opinions, but, for the most part, I try to air them in the comments section like everyone else. It seems like a bit of abuse of privilege to fill up an article with thoughts from my head, which are nothing more substantial than the opinions of any other Washington fan.
Normally, when I do write an article about a football topic, as I did last week, talking about special teams, I make a sincere effort to write an article that is evidence-based, and which will inform the reader, even if the ideas I share in the article are not useful. Hopefully, the evidence in the article provides good information regardless of the value of my associated thoughts.
Once or twice a season, however, I give into the urge to write an opinion article — an editorial, if you will. When I do, I casually toss out the window the idea that I need to include valuable information or evidence and I simply indulge myself in sharing my burgundy-tinted opinions, giving this type of article all the nutritional value of artificial whipped cream. I usually reserve it for the bye week, but I have enough loose thoughts rattling around in my head at the moment that I thought I’d let loose this week.
If you’re not interested in reading my ramblings, I don’t blame you — I’ll see you later in the Daily Slop.
If, against the odds, you still want to read what I’ve written, grab your napkin and spoon and dig into a big bowl of aerated fat & sugar.
The Matt Gay criticism is too much of a ‘knee jerk’ at this point
Washington’s kicker struggled through a rough training camp and an uncomfortable preseason. After not attempting a field goal against the Giants in Week 1, he had a bad game (1 successful field goal on 3 attempts of 50+ yards) against Green Bay, then missed his first attempt against the Raiders. We were all, rightfully, deeply concerned about the kicker. Trust me, I was right along with you in my criticism of how the position had been handled in the offseason.
Since the miss in the first quarter of the Raiders game, Matt Gay has attempted 10 field goals, making 9 of them. His lone miss bounced off the upright on a 50-yard attempt in the rain on Monday night. His 9 successful kicks comprise 3 from 50+, 4 from 4-49, 1 from 30-39, and 1 from 20-29. He’s a perfect 16 for 16 on PATs this season. He’s also 4 of 7 on attempts of 50+ yards on the season.
In short, while every missed field goal drives fans crazy, no kicker is perfect. Gay, who looked like he might be a genuine problem from training camp to halftime of Week 3, now appears to be kicking like a typical NFL kicker. While I would have liked to have seen training camp competition for the job, that didn’t happen, and I’m not gonna worry about that decision now. Over the last 15 quarters of regular season NFL games, Matt Gay has hit 90% of his field goals, missing from 50, and 100% of his PATs. He has hit 3 or his 4 attempts from 50+ yards in those 15 quarters of football.
The shouts for him to be replaced sound a bit shrill to my ear at the moment, especially given the limited options that are likely to be available in mid-October.
I’m encouraged by the loss to the Bears
Like pretty much every NFL fan, I don’t enjoy watching my team lose. The ‘gut punch’ factor on Monday night, in my mind, comes not so much from the fact of the loss itself as from the fact that the Commanders had the lead and the ball with the clock winding down, but lost — not because of some great play by the opposition — but because of a self-inflicted mistake. Jayden Daniels lost control of a wet, slippery ball, and the game changed instantly.
That was not the only mistake that Jayden made on Monday night, nor was it the only egregious error made by the offense during the game.
So, why am I encouraged?
Because, despite the number of significant mistakes made by the team, the Commanders were ahead on the scoreboard and actually held the advantage on the field for the entire 4th quarter — which began with the blocked field goal — up until the moment that Jayden fumbled on the 3rd & 1 play.
Despite the huge number of errors made by the Commanders on Monday night — including 3 turnovers — the result was a 1-point loss. Washington wasn’t beaten by the Bears so much as let down by some uncharacteristic mistakes that I don’t expect to be repeated every week.
This was a win that the Commanders gave away. That’s why it stings so sharply, but that’s also why I see it as an encouraging sign for what’s to come.
What good news is on the horizon?
I heard someone, yesterday, comment that the Cowboys would be tougher this week because the team might get CeeDee Lamb back from injury.
Well, yeah. Washington may get Terry McLaurin back, and that should change the way opponents have to play against the Commanders offense.
Other potential good news (this week or next) could include the return of Noah Brown and the activation of Sam Cosmi.
Defensively the Commanders really missed Eddie Goldman on Monday night, who was inactive due to an illness. That should be a one-off event.
CB Jonathan Jones, who went on IR with a hamstring injury in mid-September, has already missed 4 games and will be eligible to return — providing needed depth — as soon as he is healthy.
Safety Will Harris has been badly missed since he went on IR in late September with a fractured fibula. It seems like a December 1st return (the Denver game after the bye week) might be a good target for his return.
Of course, the best return has already happened — that is, Jayden Daniels returning from a 2-game absence following a knee injury.
The Commanders have reached 3-3, which is not really a bad outcome, with Jayden missing 2 games, Terry missing 4 games, Sam Cosmi missing 6 games, and several other key short-term injuries. It seems likely that the team will be healthier going forward than it was in September, which makes me optimistic about the arrow pointing up during the remaining 11 games.
More help is on the way in the form of players getting healthy and re-joining the active roster.
Jayden is the key and the Bears game was the outlier
Jayden Daniels is 16-8 as an NFL starting quarterback. In his 24 starts, he has been personally responsible for 2 turnovers in a single game three times. He did it in Weeks 12 and 16 of 2024 when he threw two interceptions against the Cowboys and two against the Eagles. He also did it this week with a fumble and an INT against the Bears.
In those three games, he is 1-2 as a starter, meaning that he is 15-6 when he doesn’t personally turn the ball over twice in a game.
Jayden Daniels is the reason why the Commanders achieved 12 regular season wins and reached the NFC Championship game in January.
Jayden Daniels is a force multiplier; he is the definition of a franchise quarterback — a guy who lifts the entire roster to achieve more than the sum of its parts.
Jayden killed two drives with a pair of key mistakes that came at key moments in the first and fourth quarters on Monday night. That was an aberration — the Bears game was an outlier. Play that game 100 times and Jayden beats Chicago 95 times. His two key turnovers in this game were not reflective of the kind of play Jayden Daniels normally delivers.
He’ll be better because he is better.
Jayden’s production — 211 yards, 3 TDs passing; 52 yards rushing — was the reason Washington was winning the game with 3:10 on the clock. That level of play is the norm for him. He will lead the Commanders to more wins than losses going forward.
I feel confident about the road ahead because the Commanders have Jayden Daniels.
Playoffs?
I frequently discuss the importance of winning games against division and conference opponents because of the NFL’s tie breaking rules for declaring division winners, playoff participation, and setting playoff seeding.
Each loss to a division or conference opponent increases the importance of winning those that remain.
I had hoped that the Commanders would beat the Bears (NFC) and Cowboys (NFC East) to improve the team’s tie-breaking credentials. Well, we know what happened with the Bears.
With wins against the Chargers and Raiders, the Commanders are 2-0 vs the AFC but only 1-3 vs the NFC — though Washington does boast a 1-0 record inside the division.
Thanks to the tie between the Cowboys and Packers, Washington is unlikely to have to apply any tie-breakers with either team. Since the Packers own the first tie-breaker (head-to-head games), this is a good thing.
The Commanders need to build up the team’s division and conference records, though, in the remaining games. If Washington finishes with the same overall record as the Giants or Eagles in January, division wins come into play if the teams have split their two regular season games. Likewise, if Washington is competing for a wild card spot in the playoffs as a non-division winner, wins against NFC opponents are hugely important. Washington needs to beat Dallas on Sunday to get back above .500 in overall record, remain undefeated at 2-0 inside the NFC East, and add a win to improve to 2-3 in conference play.
The best way to get to the playoffs will be to win the division. That would have felt more realistic if Washington had beaten the Bears on Monday night, but even with the loss, the Commanders sit just a game back of Philly with 11 to play.
Like Washington, all three division rivals, including the Eagles, sit at a crossroads on the season as we enter Week 7. For all 4 teams, the season could come together or fall apart over the next few weeks. Beat Dallas this week and the Commanders could easily be playing for the NFC East title and home games in the playoffs when it faces the Giants, Cowboys and Eagles (twice) in the final 4 weeks of the regular season.
One interesting bit of trivia is that the Commanders are the ONLY NFC East team with a positive point differential through 6 weeks. Washington is +32 while the Eagles, Cowboys and Giants are -1, -6 and -23, respectively. League-wide, the Commanders rank 6th in point differential. This means that the team has been losing close games (9 pts, 7pts, 1 pt) while winning by bigger margins (15, 15, 17 points).
The combined record of the 5 teams above Washington in point differential is 19-10. The combined record of the next 5 teams behind Washington is 18-10-1.
The Commanders are one fumble away from a 4-2 record, which would fit right in with the other 10 teams that have a point differential of +27 or better. Washington is playing better football than the 3-3 record indicates.
Speaking of that Dallas game
The Cowboys offense is 1st in the NFL in scoring at 29.7 points per game; the Commanders are 13th at 26.3.
Defensively, Dallas is 31st in points allowed, giving up 30.7 ppg; the Commanders rank 13th at 21.6.
This feels like a shootout waiting to happen. It needs to be a shootout that Washington wins.
Maybe it’s time for DQ and Joe Whitt to stop talking about defensive turnovers
“Ball is life”
Since Joe Whitt’s arrival in DC, he has said that creating turnovers is part of his defensive squad’s identity. Dan Quinn has echoed and doubled down on that idea.
But it hasn’t happened. Washington is 29th in defensive takeaways through 6 weeks. Not so coincidentally, I think, the Commanders defense ranked 29th in defensive takeaways in 2024. Talk about consistency!!
Perhaps it’s time for DQ and Joe Whitt to admit that this defense is not “producing the ball” as the defensive coordinator likes to phrase it.
There is only so much time and so many messages that a coaching staff can preach in a week of NFL preparation. Every good manager and coach knows that you get what you prioritize — at least, that’s where subordinates or players will put their emphasis.
DQ and Whitt have been preaching the importance of turnovers since they got here last year. The offense has generally been pretty protective of the ball, but the defense has not been getting it away from the opposition with any regularity.
Lately, both coaches have criticized things like secondary run fits, over-trying, and “putting on the cape” — that is, players ‘guessing’ or trying to do more than their own jobs. I wonder if that’s related to the constant messaging about creating turnovers.
I’m now wondering if Whitt and Quinn should let go of this treasured part of the defensive identity that doesn’t match reality. To date, Commanders’ defensive turnovers are largely a myth.
Perhaps it’s time to change the messaging to things like the importance of good tackling, run fits, or playing the right coverage on every play. Let’s get the defensive players focused on something that they can accomplish immediately to make a difference instead of chasing the apparition of creating turnovers like Quinn’s old Dallas defenses did.
Speaking of coaches speaking
I have always been a keen observer of public speakers. As a one-time corporate trainer in the US and a long-time teacher in Thailand, I’ve spent an inordinate amount of my working life speaking to rooms full of people. As a teacher here in Bangkok, I taught English-language public speaking courses every semester for 14 years. In fact, my experience in public speaking stretches back to 1981-82 when I spent a year in the pulpits of Catholic churches convincing congregants to part with their hard-earned money to support a diocesan outreach program.
When Jay Gruden was the coach of the Redskins, I was so fascinated by how he spoke to the media that I used to write lengthy articles to dissect what he said and what he meant. I did it a few times with Ron Rivera, but it wasn’t as much fun.
Dan Quinn is an excellent public speaker. He listens carefully to questions, is clear and organized in his answers, and he is keenly aware of giving reporters what they need to do their jobs.
Quinn is also skilled at not saying things he doesn’t want to say. What I find most intriguing in most of his press conferences is what he doesn’t say. A simple example is what he said about Sam Cosmi during training camp. DQ said with regularity that Sam was progressing well; that they ‘wouldn’t miss a step’ with him, and that Quinn didn’t rule out a Week 1 return. Many fans and some sports writers interpreted that to mean that a Week 1 (or early September) return was likely. Those people were surprised when Cosmi opened the season on the PUP list.
There’s a reason that everyone seems to think that Noah Brown or Terry McLaurin — as they did with Sam Cosmi — is probably gonna return any day now. It’s because Dan Quinn doesn’t say they won’t. He says the player is ‘making progress’, ‘hitting all his markers’, or ‘had a good practice today’, which, if you think about it, reveals nothing about his actual return to play.
There’s a reason why, when DQ gets asked multiple times in a single week about a possible re-shuffle of the offensive line, he can say that it’s being considered, and the assembled press can still be shocked to learn on game day that Chris Paul is replacing Brandon Coleman. It’s because Dan Quinn admits to the general principle of competition without saying who’s winning or losing.
On Tuesday this week, Nicki Jhabvala asked about the report that the Commanders were signing Drake Jackson, whom she identified by name in her question. Here’s DQ’s answer:
I thought at the end of the half we had some good pressure, and I know [Dorance Armstrong] and Frankie [Luvu] ended on one. It was good to see that as a two minute at the end of the half. But it’s just from, you know, us digging in always, that’s where we’re not ever going to stop competing, you know, and finding ways and looking. So, we’ll do that, you know, kind of the whole way through.
Not a word about Jackson — of course, DQ isn’t gonna talk about a player who isn’t on the team before his signing is formally announced. He thus avoids any questions about who is coming off the roster if Jackson is being signed. Quinn identifies good performance from two specific players and reinforces the general principle of competition, but gives away no new information. Importantly, though, the reporters still get the quote(s) they need to write their stories.
Remarkable
One of the first things I came to admire about Quinn early in his tenure was his reliance on the word “remarkable” when discussing players. Asked about almost any player’s performance or attitude, Quinn, when he first arrived, would say what he found to be “remarkable” about it.
The interesting thing here is that, while it sounds like strong praise, “remarkable” is not inherently good or bad. One can find something remarkable because it is unusually positive — or unusually negative. When Quinn, last year, talked about players being remarkable, he was often giving little or no useful information in his response, but it gave reporters grist for the mill.
When DQ started to sound unintelligible
This season, Quinn’s clarity of speech began to break down. There were two habits that became increasingly apparent and annoying (to me). One was his use of the phrase “this space” or “those spaces”, which he was randomly inserting into his answers to questions to the point where his answers were sometimes nearly unintelligible because the phrase (that/those space(s)) had no clear meaning. The other was his use of the words “to go” as a tag at the end of sentences.
This space / those spaces
I mentioned my annoyance with Quinn’s use of this space/those spaces in an article I wrote in September. I wonder if a staffer at Ashburn read my article, because almost immediately, DQ cut his use of the phrase by about 90%, and it has almost disappeared from his answers in the past week or so.
To go
What didn’t disappear, however, was his random use of the words “to go” when speaking to the press. I didn’t mention it in my earlier article, but I’m mentioning it now for a specific reason, and I hope it doesn’t lead to Quinn correcting the annoying habit.
Despite the fact that Quinn has typically used the “to go” phrase a dozen or more times in every press conference of the 2025 regular season, in his Tuesday press conference following the loss to the Bears, I didn’t hear Quinn use it a single time. It was deafening in its absence.
I have a theory about the change in speaking pattern.
On Tuesday, I think DQ was a bit raw emotionally from the loss on MNF. He was doing the presser because he had to — it’s a weekly obligation — but he was tired, pissed off and disappointed. As a result, I think his answers were a bit more “honest” than usual, by which I mean, less filtered.
I surmise that, when DQ is simply trying to be a good guy and give reporters quotes for their stories, his use of “to go” is a bit of a ‘tell’ that he is…well…‘constructing’ an answer that meets the needs of the assembled reporters. When you hear it used, I think you can identify that Dan Quinn is ‘on stage’ and managing what he says — and what he doesn’t say. It’s absence may indicate that DQ is speaking more ‘from the heart’ and that his answers are a bit less filtered, meaning that he may be more inclined to give real hints about what he is thinking, rather than avoiding doing so by his usual habit of focusing on general principles (like competition) while telling reporters what’s not happening (like, we’re not gonna miss any steps in his recovery process).
While I’m critiquing public speakers, let me mention one thing about John Keim’s podcast
Today, I listened to a John Keim post-MNF podcast with Bram Weinstein as his guest.
I’m not going to critique the content of the podcast (which was good) or Keim’s speech patterns (which identify him as a professional writer), but mention a decision he made about his paid advertising.
Twice during the podcast, once at the beginning and once in the middle, Keim had to do paid reads, where he reads messages from paid advertisers.
I’ve been listening to John Keim podcasts for as long as he’s been a podcaster. What surprised me this time was that he chose to clearly apologize to the audience prior to reading the paid ads. He didn’t just do it the first time; he did it both times. He also said, “and one more” as a transition from the first ad to the second on each read, presumably to include it in the apology.
I was a bit stunned that he would feel the need to apologize. I imagine it was in response to some sort of feedback from listeners, but I can’t imagine that anyone fails to understand that TV, radio, podcasts and even sports blogs are commercial activities that primarily earn revenue from advertising. The audience for these media must understand that hearing or seeing the ads is part of the tradeoff, right?
My thought, when I heard it, was that if I were a paid advertiser, I’d be disappointed to hear an apology ahead of my paid read. My further thought was that if I were in Keim’s shoes (I’m not), I wouldn’t apologize to my audience for paying the bills with ads.
As an audience member (which I am), I can say that I not only expect it, but I’m glad to put up with it because of the high quality content that John Keim, Bram Weinstein (and many others) provide on their podcasts.
Let’s kick ass in Dallas!
