- 29 minutes ago
Kevin Sheehan breaks down his Washington Commanders game take from a frustrating, injury-plagued battle against the Dallas Cowboys in week two. Kevin analyzes Jayden Daniels’ dominant performance before his soul-crushing injury, rants about the controversial replay decision on Dyami Brown's overturned touchdown, and outlines why Washington's defense must step up and generate turnovers while Marcus Mariota takes over under center.
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00:00What I liked from the game yesterday, well, Jaden Daniels before the injury.
00:04I mean, he was incredibly sharp throwing the football,
00:08with the one exception of overthrowing Burks by a bit.
00:11He was an absolute lethal running option,
00:16protecting himself on every single scramble.
00:19Total control he was at the line of scrimmage.
00:22He had complete control at the line of scrimmage,
00:25checked to a really good run to Rashad White,
00:28where I think it was obvious pass was called on a third down.
00:32I think Brady talked about how in this offense,
00:36it's great to hear Brady on this call.
00:39I know that some believe that he's just overly positive when it comes to the quarterbacks.
00:43I don't feel that way. I've watched him enough.
00:46I've heard him certainly levy some criticism against quarterbacks in games that he's called.
00:52But he said that Jaden's got more authority in this offense at the line of scrimmage.
00:58You can see that.
01:00He missed the bomb to Burks.
01:02He overthrew him by a bit.
01:03It's too bad because that was the drive,
01:07the 15-play drive that ended the first half and ended his game,
01:12and perhaps we'll see several games, if not more.
01:17That was the one throw that he missed.
01:21Again, the goal line sequence, did he miss Bates on the second and goal from one?
01:28Bates did come open.
01:29I don't know where Bates was in the progression.
01:32You've got to understand when you take that snap with eight seconds to go,
01:35one thing you cannot do is get tackled in the field of play.
01:39And the defense, remember, knows pretty much that you're going to throw the football
01:44because of what would happen if you ran the football and got stopped.
01:50But look, I mean, 165 total yards before the injury, 96 through the air, 69 as a scrambler, as a
02:00runner.
02:00He made it easier for White and Krosky Merritt because clearly when Jaden is lined up in that pistol in
02:08particular
02:09and he was in the pistol a few times with some zone read calls, even though he didn't pull it,
02:14I thought he should have pulled it on one, but even when he doesn't pull it,
02:19you've got to play the quarterback.
02:20It makes it easier for the running backs.
02:22We've understood that as NFL fans, as Skins fans, forever going back to 2012.
02:29He converted over and over again on third down, the first one coming on that third and 18
02:34after that absurdly horrible offensive pass interference call against Terry McLaurin.
02:41And yet on third and 18, he hangs in there, steps up, and drills a 24-yard completion to Terry
02:48moving the sticks.
02:49Really, that was the play.
02:50Second drive of the game ignited the offense, and they were off to the races.
02:54I mean, I think this was an offense that was going to put up easily 30-plus in the game,
03:00and you were going to be involved in a crazy shootout.
03:03The third and two where he scrambled for 18 yards on their first scoring drive.
03:07The third and six on that final drive of the first half where he finds digs versus the blitz.
03:14Blitzing him, by the way, is very, very dicey if you're a defense.
03:18There are not a lot of answers when he is seeing it and feeling it.
03:23He had an excellent check, as I mentioned, to Rashad White on a third and two.
03:29It looked like Brady said, you know, he recognized cover two.
03:33He immediately checked to the run on third and two, and White easily gets six, seven yards to move the
03:40sticks.
03:40He was accurate on pretty much every throw except for the deep ball to Burks.
03:44They went hurry up a few times, caught the defense, similar to last week where they went quickly,
03:52and the touchdown pass to digs was on the money.
03:55He hit Terry in the end zone with Bland in coverage.
03:58That was a good ball.
03:59Terry couldn't pull it in, although the expectation, because they called it a touchdown and then reversed it,
04:04is Terry catches those contested balls.
04:08It was reversed by replay.
04:11You know, I guess you could ding him for the pitch to Krosky Merritt on the field goal drive.
04:17I don't know if Krosky Merritt didn't get to the mark he was supposed to get to,
04:21or it was just a wild pitch by Jaden.
04:24That's something that the coaches, David Blau, would be able to tell you.
04:27But that cost him a touchdown, you know, on that third and 18.
04:31I thought he did a good job there.
04:34You know, that's where after a bad play like that on a condensed, you know, field situation,
04:40you really have to make sure that if you're going to take a chance, it is easy.
04:46If not, you check it down and you come away with three, and he checked it down to White for
04:5012, 13 yards.
04:51I thought that was maybe 14 yards.
04:53I think that was the smart thing to do.
04:54And again, on the two plays before the injury play on third down with three seconds to go,
05:03I didn't see anything there on first down.
05:06On second down, he does perhaps have an opportunity to throw to Bates.
05:12But look, before that injury, he was lights out.
05:18He was Jaden Daniels like he was at the end of last week.
05:21And they were going to need him to be Jaden Daniels in that game.
05:25It was pretty obvious, right, after 29 minutes and 57 seconds of the first half.
05:30This was going to be a game that went back and forth, and defenses were going to have to get
05:35a penalty,
05:37you know, a drop pass, something like that, or stand up big in the red zone.
05:42You know, that was going to determine the game the rest of the way.
05:45Anyway, Jaden Daniels, before the injury, leads the list of things that I liked from the game.
05:54Stefan Diggs is just a supreme route-running wide receiver.
05:59Boy, does he get separation easily, whether it's man or in zone.
06:04He always has the feel for where to get to, where to set it down.
06:07And his hands are A+.
06:12Great pickup, going to be significant, you know, for the next few weeks with Mariota at quarterback.
06:18He's going to need a go-to guy.
06:20And, you know, I'm not so sure that Stefan Diggs isn't really a 1A in this offense to Terry McLaurin.
06:29I thought Rashad White was outstanding in the game yesterday, and I, you know, I didn't like,
06:35I thought I saw a much, much slower version of Rashad White last week in week one.
06:43Yesterday, against a lesser defense, of course.
06:46I mean, I think we can say that.
06:48All the talk about, you know, Dallas, kind of the same conversation we had about our team.
06:54Can they just be an average defense?
06:56If they're an average defense, they've got an offense, they should be a pretty good football team.
07:01And they added to the defense, and they started adding last year.
07:05Remember, towards the trade deadline, they had some injuries coming in.
07:10They lost more players.
07:12They're not very good through two weeks, anyway, on defense.
07:17That is for sure.
07:19But Rashad White was really good with his vision as a runner.
07:22It does help when Jaden's kind of posed as a run threat, you know, out of that pistol.
07:28They were in the pistol several times in the first half.
07:31The pistol difference is about a yard closer to the center, and then the back's directly behind the center.
07:37Whereas the shotgun may be a yard further back, and the back, if there is one, is offset.
07:43They were in the pistol a few times because they wanted to show that zone read threat.
07:48You can do it from the shotgun as well.
07:50And I think Jaden could have pulled it on one occasion, but it certainly benefits the running backs when the
07:56defense has to play quarterback as well.
07:58Because it is, in many ways, at least a chance of, as the Shanahan's used to say, 11 on 11
08:07in the run game.
08:09Which is huge advantage offense.
08:12I thought Rashad White was excellent as a pass catcher.
08:14I think he made people miss yesterday where he didn't do that last week.
08:18Rashad White on the list of things that I liked.
08:22I mean, what was his total yardage in the game?
08:25Let me just look that up.
08:26Because he had seven carries for 43 yards.
08:30So that's over six yards per carry.
08:326.1 yards per carry.
08:33And he had six catches for 40 yards, you know, on six targets.
08:38And by the way, really, you know, against, you know, that too high safety, when sometimes you do have to
08:44check it down.
08:45When you check it down, you want to check it down to a back that's going to make that first
08:49guy miss.
08:51You know, on a check down against zone too high, you should be able to get five, six yards.
08:58And Rashad White was able to do that in the game yesterday.
09:04Also on the list, you know, I thought Blau bounced back with a game.
09:10Look, I think he was smartly patient last week, but probably a little bit too conservative until they, you know,
09:19got to the late third quarter and fourth quarter.
09:22But I thought he and Jaden against Philadelphia played it like, hey, we're in this game.
09:28Mistakes could absolutely knock us out of this game.
09:31Let's not make any.
09:33But yesterday, I think he definitely came out more aggressively.
09:39And I loved the second and one shot to Traylon Burks.
09:44It's too bad that it didn't connect.
09:47So I thought a decent day for him.
09:49I thought for the most part, you know, another decent day from the offensive line.
09:57Now, Jaden made some, you know, pressure look silly with his ability to escape it.
10:04There's no doubt about that.
10:07But I thought overall, like, there was some good pass protection.
10:12That's always something that's tough for us to really evaluate.
10:17But I'd like to know what their evaluations are through two games of their pass protection, because I think it's
10:23been pretty decent so far.
10:28Obviously, the loss of Cosme could be huge, could be massive.
10:33He's their best offensive lineman.
10:35There's no doubt about it.
10:38What else is on the list?
10:40It's tough to give anybody any credit defensively because they were shredded by Dallas.
10:46Dallas scored on seven of their eight drives.
10:50They scored 37 points.
10:52They punted one time and converted seven of 11 on third down.
11:01You can win games like that, but you've got to do it offensively by doing what they did.
11:07Eight of 14 on third down.
11:0924 first downs.
11:11Nearly 400 yards of offense Washington generated.
11:14265 of those yards in the first half.
11:17I think 225, whatever it was.
11:19But Dallas only had eight possessions.
11:22You know, they had only six possessions against the Giants.
11:26Only eight in this game.
11:28And they scored on seven of them.
11:31Let me repeat that.
11:33They had eight possessions offensively and scored on seven of them.
11:40And it was easy.
11:42Like, people were open, like, with nobody around them, especially in the first half.
11:47I thought the coverage in the second half was better.
11:49Look, Sandra still is not very good right now.
11:52Let's face it.
11:53But at least yesterday, he was in the vicinity of a couple of those balls.
11:57CeeDee Lamb is obviously a pretty damn good receiver.
12:00Plus, they've got pickings.
12:02Plus, they got the big tight end in Ferguson.
12:04Plus, Javante Williams is an option.
12:09But it's hard to really say that anything defensively was very good.
12:15But I did write down three things.
12:18They were decent against the run, even though Dallas didn't need to run the football.
12:22I thought Kinlaw, before his injury, looked good to me.
12:26And I think Amik Robertson, in his first two games, looks like, right now, their best corner.
12:32Through two games.
12:35All right.
12:36That completes the list of things that I liked.
12:43What didn't I like from the game?
12:44Well, the injuries.
12:45The Jaden injury, of course.
12:47Just soul-crushing.
12:50Kinlaw, Cosme, we'll see what happens with them.
12:53I just cannot get over the fact.
12:56And maybe I'll look silly in talking about this because the league's going to have some sort of other view
13:04that they had in New York to look at of the De'Ami Brown catch for a touchdown.
13:10But he had possession.
13:12He had a knee down equals two feet before anything touched out of bounds.
13:18And that ball was secured right through the process of the catch.
13:23I don't know how, in God's name, that the NFL, you know, $30 billion top-line business or whatever it
13:32is at this point, can't have somebody say, that's a touchdown.
13:37Everybody that watched it, including Dean Blandino, said, that's a touchdown.
13:42Again, maybe everybody that said it was a touchdown will get an explanation.
13:47More likely, I would say, the team's going to get an apology.
13:52Doesn't help now.
13:53Great catch by De'Ami.
13:54Really good throw by Marcus Mariota.
13:56And the score should have been 17-17 early in the third quarter.
14:01I'm at a complete and utter loss.
14:04What did I miss from that play?
14:07Maybe I missed something.
14:09They had to kick a field goal two plays later.
14:12The Terry offensive pass interference is one of the weakest offensive pass interference calls I've seen in forever,
14:18especially when on one of C.D. Lamb's touchdown catches, there was a push-off, I think, on Sanristill.
14:23Sanristill was in a bit of zone but was up at the line of scrimmage, and it was more egregious
14:28than what Terry did.
14:29I thought the officiating, you know, look, it probably wasn't going to make a difference once Jaden went down,
14:35but it was not, you know, one of those, ah, it all evened out.
14:39No, it didn't, actually.
14:43The defense, obviously, on the list of things that I didn't like from the game, as I've already mentioned,
14:48I mean, you're going to be hard-pressed to win football games in which the other team possesses the ball
14:54eight times
14:54and scores on seven of the eight drives.
14:59And is very, very non-stressed at any point during the game.
15:06Also on the list, the missed scoring opportunities, the double pass, I mean, I love the call, you know.
15:14I don't know if they do that call with Jaden in the game, but, you know, Ben Johnson has a
15:18lot of tricks in his bag,
15:20and David Blau was around Ben Johnson.
15:25The double pass was set up beautifully, and Antonio Williams, I guess they thought he could throw it,
15:30and he made a bad throw.
15:32And, yeah, Terry could have, but he didn't, and it wasn't on him.
15:36I don't put it on Terry.
15:37I don't know if that's going to get called as a drop.
15:40I don't think so.
15:41It was a bad throw.
15:42But I loved it.
15:43It should have been an easy touchdown.
15:45The missed field goal, a 51-yarder from Stevens, is the second missed field goal in two weeks.
15:52You know, those are big.
15:54And overall, you know, minus one in the turnover margin meant that instead of the final score probably being 30
16:03to 23 or something like that,
16:06it was 37 to 20.
16:07For a second straight game and a continuation of last year, no takeaways for the defense.
16:13Zero.
16:15Next to last in takeaways last year, and they are dead last right now in takeaways through two games.
16:22And the only reason I know that is when you have zero, you're at least tied for last.
16:27Zero takeaways in two games.
16:28This team, if it's going to be a team that can at least keep their head above water to a
16:38certain degree,
16:38if Jaden's going to be back, let's just say after the bye week, six games in, you know,
16:43could they steal two against the Giants or Indy in London, you're going to have to get some takeaways defensively.
16:53The defense is going to have to be a part of doing their job to keep the team in games.
17:02Last year, they had very little chance without Jaden Daniels and then zero chance because their defense was an absolute
17:11sieve.
17:13So, the defense is going to have to step up.
17:16Look, that's a very good opponent they played yesterday.
17:20It won't be the same, I don't think, Sunday with Drew Locke at quarterback, if Locke's the quarterback,
17:25but he had a big day yesterday, I think.
17:27They scored 31 points.
17:28I haven't spent a lot of time looking at that game.
17:31Daniel Jones and company moved it up and down the field on Sunday night football against the Chiefs.
17:36Neither one of these next two opponents are going to be what the Cowboys were offensively,
17:41with Lamb and Pickens and Dak.
17:45But you've got to get some takeaways.
17:47You've got to win a turnover margin once or twice in these games upcoming.
17:54That's going to give you a chance to stay in there and steal one or two of them.
17:59I mean, they are allergic to takeaways.
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