- 1 day ago
Ben Standig from The Last Man Standig Podcast and Substack joins The Kevin Sheehan Show to preview the Commanders vs 49ers primetime matchup where he breaks down the team's health heading into the game, discusses Dan Quinn's standing and Jayden Daniels' elbow brace, and offers his prediction for the prime-time contest.
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00:00Ben's out in Northern California where Washington faces San Francisco tonight on Monday Night Football.
00:06We'll find out, by the way, somebody asked me this during the break,
00:10about the Sunday Night Football game after the bye week against the Eagles.
00:15I think we'll know tomorrow, because I think it's 13 days, or at least with a Monday Night game here.
00:22If Washington wins tonight, it wouldn't surprise me if they leave Washington and Philadelphia in that spot.
00:27If they lose, it's going to get flexed, and if it gets flexed, it'll get flexed at 1 o'clock,
00:32more likely than not,
00:33because it's a CBS doubleheader. That's my guess.
00:38So probably the information on Washington-Philadelphia Sunday night, November 1st, scheduled for that time slot.
00:48There's been reporting that the league already is considering flexing it out of that spot.
00:52I would imagine if Washington loses tonight that it's flexed out.
00:56It might be flexed out regardless at this point.
01:00Joining us right now from Northern California is our guy Ben, the insider to this football team on this very
01:06show,
01:07at Ben Standing on X, and you should follow him and subscribe to his sub stack, which is called Last
01:14Man Standing.
01:16So I'll ask you what I asked callers and answered myself for the better part of an hour on today's
01:23show,
01:24and that is, A, do you think they have a chance tonight to win, and B, if so, how would
01:29they accomplish that?
01:33Well, I mean, they're one of the two teams playing, so from that perspective, sure.
01:37I mean, you know, I don't know where the line is now, but I know, like, it seemed like the
01:42line wasn't moving,
01:42despite the fact that, you know, all the money seemed to be going the 49ers away,
01:46and certainly the perception of this game is all that the 49ers are going to just run all over them,
01:51and Washington has no chance.
01:53So, I don't know, that says something to me.
01:55Plus, I think Dawgs this year on Monday night have been pretty good.
01:59I know that has nothing to do with the specifics of this game,
02:01but if you look at the specifics of this game, they're going to lose, right?
02:04So you've got to look at some of the other tangibles.
02:07I mean, they are getting generally healthier than, you know, week over week.
02:11I think Nick Cross plays tonight.
02:13Trey Amos practiced all week, so that certainly trends towards him being available.
02:18Stephon Diggs is listed as limited, but, you know, from what we can see in the small amount of time
02:23of practice,
02:24and he looks pretty reasonable to me.
02:27So if you bring these guys back, you know, all of a sudden you're getting as healthy as possible,
02:32you know, from what's realistic.
02:35So, you know, more turnovers.
02:37Don't be stupid.
02:38Control the clock.
02:40Get plays off on time.
02:42Things like that.
02:43I mean, that's their best hope.
02:44They need the 49ers to stub their toe, just like Seattle did when they won the turnover battle three zip.
02:49But the 49ers have just obviously been on their game.
02:52I don't think Kyle Shanahan still has animosity towards the franchise,
02:55especially with his guy Adam Peters and Dan Quinn in charge.
02:59But, you know, I'm sure somewhere in the back of his head he always likes beating Washington.
03:03You know, you and I talked about this, I think, on Friday, maybe even earlier than this.
03:08This is a very interesting situation coming off what they came off last week.
03:13I mean, a national essential beatdown and clowning of the head coach and the quarterback in particular.
03:20The O.C. is kind of anonymous for people outside of this market.
03:25And, you know, you could certainly say that right now, not only is the seat on fire that Dan Quinn
03:33is sitting in,
03:34he is borderline lame duck at this point.
03:37Now, Ron Rivera was lame duck heading into the season.
03:40That's not what, you know, Dan Quinn was heading into this season.
03:44But after the tie last week that felt like a loss and the way it happened,
03:51coming off other incidents, nothing as similar as last week,
03:54but other questionable in-game management calls,
03:59he's a borderline lame duck coach right now.
04:02But he's got 12 games to extricate himself from this situation.
04:06But do you agree with that description of him right now,
04:10that he is right there, you know, straddling the lame duck fence?
04:17Only reason I would say no is because of how bad the division is.
04:21And while just because, like, as we saw in 2020, you know,
04:24they won a division with a sub-500 record, that wouldn't, you know,
04:28if something similar were to happen, I wouldn't suggest that this team was good.
04:31It's just that everybody else was bad.
04:32But it's also the type of thing that the franchise can spin as, hey,
04:36we might have been not great, but we were still better than the rest.
04:39And as we're seeing right now, this whole division is a complete and utter mess.
04:42I mean, the Eagles now today likely lost Jalen Hurts for the year
04:47with these blood clots that he's developed.
04:49So hopefully that works out fine for him from a health standpoint.
04:52But from a football standpoint, that's obviously a big blow for the Eagles.
04:55We'll see what Tanner McKee can do for them down the stretch here.
05:00The Giants are already out with Jackson Dart.
05:03Now here comes J.J. McCarthy to be the QB savior.
05:06Okay, that's interesting.
05:08Dallas is just bad, I guess, right?
05:09I mean, they're the ones who probably are blowing this the most.
05:13And, you know, they've had their guys available, but they're, you know, terrible too.
05:17So, you know, this whole division, look, if they were to win tonight,
05:19they're in second place a game out of first.
05:22I'm not saying they will.
05:23But even if they lose, they're only two out.
05:25So my point is just that, like, sure, like, in a vacuum, I can just say, yeah,
05:33it seems like Dan Quinn, you know, the clock is loudly ticking.
05:38But on the other hand, it could easily be, you know, a different story pretty quickly.
05:43I mean, they play the Eagles the first game out of the bye week, right?
05:46So if they win that one, you know, short, long way to go.
05:49No, but I'm just saying I think because of the way the division is, I don't know about the lame
05:54duck situation.
05:56Now, I will add this.
05:57I think the one thing that Dan Quinn has on his side is he has kept his team together for
06:01two-plus years.
06:02There's no player outbursts.
06:04They do play hard for him.
06:06I think all that's completely accurate.
06:09They get blown out today.
06:11Does that continue?
06:13At some point do the players start to get loud?
06:16And if that happens, then I think Dan Quinn's days are getting shorter.
06:21But that hasn't happened yet, and the division is open.
06:25So I put a pause on the blame duck, but I totally get their point in a vacuum.
06:29So tell me what your sense was being out there last week about how they will rebound
06:36and what the feeling of Dan Quinn and Jaden Daniels, by extension, is after what happened last week.
06:42Do you expect, because you're 100% right, you know, other than the Minnesota game last year,
06:48which was the outlier in terms of truly being ready, truly playing at a level that was consistent with what
06:56we've seen overall,
06:57do you expect their best effort, high energy, competitiveness, you know,
07:03that there will be indications that there's nowhere near an example of him losing this team,
07:09for the lack of a better description?
07:12Yeah, I would be surprised if we don't see a good effort.
07:17Again, that's not the same as success, but I don't see them rolling over.
07:22And I think sometimes people can confuse losing by 20 points with not showing up.
07:26I mean, again, they've got to execute better and all that.
07:29They've got to make their plays.
07:30But, yeah, I'd expect them to come back out.
07:32I mean, you know, even this week I didn't sense any type of questioning of Quinn or Jaden or anything
07:40like that.
07:40Now, of course, what's been said behind the scenes, you know, I can't say it for sure,
07:45but I don't get the sense that that is the case.
07:48These guys do seem to be tight with each other.
07:52Part of me almost does wonder, though, would it actually be a good sign if somebody were to kind of
07:58pipe up a little bit?
07:59Not because of the Dan Quinn part of it, but just, you know, I think you do want the players
08:03at some point to get a little bit more angry.
08:06I'm not saying that they're not angry now.
08:07I think they're all pissed off that this is going the way it's gone.
08:09And after the way the last game ended, I really should have won or at least had a chance to
08:13win that they didn't even get the kickoff.
08:16But, you know, at some point, culture, I think we talked about this the other day, can't just have a
08:23sense of, like, being kumbaya.
08:25Culture has got to be a certain standard, and that standard is certainly not being met here in the way
08:30things have gone the last few games
08:32or basically this whole season except for the Seattle game for the most part.
08:35I guess the Philly game was fine, but, you know, that's got to be something that steps up.
08:40And, you know, I don't know if that means players are getting angry or what, but, you know,
08:43their deals need to be a little bit more overt urgency, I guess you could say.
08:48I would, you know, maybe I'm wrong on that, but that's kind of how I kind of sense the world
08:52right now.
08:54So Adam Peters this morning making his weekly appearance on the Junkies said,
08:59with respect to last week, I think everyone was aware they had zero timeouts remaining on the final play.
09:05We figured out where the miscommunications were, and it won't happen again.
09:11Don't want to go back.
09:13We've done enough of that.
09:15What do you know about what they've put in place to make sure that that doesn't happen again, if anything?
09:21I don't know that they've put anything in place other than just don't do that again.
09:25I mean, I don't know.
09:25I mean, don't do that again.
09:30There's no fail-safe button.
09:32You can't emphasize it just like with anything in life, right?
09:34Your kids make a mistake.
09:35You emphasize, hey, don't do that, whatever it is.
09:38So, you know, I think it's just a matter of that.
09:40I mean, maybe there was something technical that happened.
09:44Like, you know, maybe, again, this is just me talking out loud.
09:47Maybe Blau was talking too long and the headset cut off, thus not getting the full instructions to Jaden Daniels.
09:53I don't know that that's the way it went down.
09:55But other than that, I don't really know what is there to do.
10:00If they change somebody's role in the process, I mean, I don't know that.
10:05And it just seems, again, it's only week six.
10:10You know, somebody would have had to have been asleep at the wheel for them to be – you would
10:13think for somebody to be demoted.
10:16So, I think it's just, hey, we've got to be on top of it, you know, bottom line.
10:21And, you know, to some degree, I think that's all reasonable.
10:24I mean, you put in – you know, I don't have any doubts they've practiced these things a hundred times.
10:29How it didn't get through across the board.
10:32How is it that, you know, Quinn and Blau and Jaden Daniels all to some degree had a hand in
10:38what went down?
10:38That's – you know, it can't happen that there's no – that nobody is on top of, like you've pointed
10:44out before,
10:45when the clock starts getting to, like, 15 seconds and they haven't done anything.
10:48Like, hey, Jaden, you know, screaming, you know, just spike the ball, throw it away, do that.
10:53But, you know, none of that happens.
10:55So, I don't know if there's much more to say other than, hey, we've got to do better.
10:59I mean, and I think that's, you know, that's often the bottom line on a lot of these things.
11:03You know, sometimes, sure, it can make sense to make a coaching change or a lineup change
11:06or, you know, tweak something significantly.
11:08But, you know, oftentimes it's just, hey, you know, do – you've got to just do better.
11:15I mean, the Colts game, they were playing – they had it, you know, the first half.
11:19So, we know what thing turned.
11:21Last week, they were up 27-13.
11:24Then they couldn't stop the Giants late, et cetera.
11:27So, you know, it's not like they're miles away, but it feels that way for sure.
11:31Yeah, I mean, a couple of things on that.
11:34Number one, you know, it's really impossible to practice every potential clock management,
11:41game management situation.
11:42I mean, you can prepare and you can have a general thought of this is what we want to do
11:47here.
11:48Somebody has to be living in the moment that really understands what that situation is
11:55and the context around that situation.
11:58And that would be the one thing that I'd be curious about.
12:02Is this person, Connor, whatever his last name is, in the booth that apparently helps Dan with these decisions,
12:08is he saying run clock and then kick?
12:12Or is he saying run clock specifically down to this number, take a knee,
12:18and then run it down to this number and clock it?
12:20And then to your point, is it with Blau, is it before you get to the play call in these
12:27situations,
12:27it is first a reminder, A, the clock is running, B, we have no timeouts, just confirming,
12:35now this is what we're going to do specifically, and here is your abort, you know,
12:41if we start screaming abort, you know, that kind of stuff.
12:44So it could be perhaps the lack of true detail in that moment that cost him.
12:51It could be the lack of just one voice specifically telling the head coach what to do
12:59and maybe the offensive coordinator.
13:00So, I mean, I think I would hope, personally, after something that unique,
13:08I would hope that it's more or less, it's more than just, hey, don't do that again.
13:15I mean, because we've already seen that there are plenty of coaches,
13:20and in this case probably our head coach, that just struggles with this area of it
13:25and needs more help in that situation.
13:28And maybe the guy they have giving him the help isn't the right guy to give him the help.
13:33So I think it's interesting to see, and they're probably not going to tell us, right,
13:39specifically what those, you know, why it won't happen again.
13:43But, all right.
13:44Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, look, I think it's fair to say,
13:47I'm not saying this in any mean way, but, like, you know,
13:50I don't think Dan Quinn's the guy to have to always be on top of it
13:54when he has to make decisions on his feet.
13:56I think he comes in with a plan.
13:58Sometimes I wonder if that plan is easy to adjust when circumstances change,
14:01like you pointed out.
14:02And in the case of Blau, I've been saying this for months,
14:05it's easy to say, draw me a plan.
14:07But what's the plan when the S hits the fan and there's a minute to go,
14:11less than a minute to go?
14:12And, you know, how do you know how anybody,
14:15because like any of us in our day-to-day lives,
14:16until you're in a situation with pressure involved,
14:19how do you know how you're going to perform?
14:20That's why, to some degree, it comes back to the quarterback.
14:23It's got to be the one who bails everybody out of here.
14:26He's the last line of defense.
14:27He's the one who sees the field.
14:28He's got the controls.
14:30And, obviously, that didn't happen either.
14:31So, you know, that's why it's sort of on everybody.
14:35But, yes, I suspect I've done more than say just don't do it again.
14:39But, you know, I don't know if there's, like, a massive overhaul.
14:43I haven't heard that, at least.
14:46What do we have tonight?
14:48So, Krosky merits out.
14:50So, give me how you see the running back situation playing out tonight.
14:57Yeah, I mean, Rashad White and Austin Eckler are both limited
15:00the end of practice this weekend.
15:02With White's case, obviously, he's been banged up.
15:04And he played last week.
15:06So, I don't think it's anything other than just, you know, being cautious.
15:08He would be the logical guy to be the lead back.
15:11He's really the only running back they currently have who's, you know,
15:15been with them all year, right?
15:17I mean, no build.
15:19Case run out unreleased.
15:20So, it is White's the one that's been there.
15:23Eckler, I mean, the variance just feels pretty significant.
15:26You could tell me he gets 10 touches, maybe even a carry at the goal line,
15:30gets a couple catches, and is involved.
15:33Or you could tell me, hey, he's not quite, you know, it's not quite there.
15:37I know he showed some good stuff in London, but then was quiet last week.
15:40Like, the third running back, I mean, there will be one.
15:45The only reason I don't know about Jeremy McNichols is because in order to
15:49activate him off of IR, you then have to create a roster spot.
15:52And because they have so many injuries in other places, I don't know that
15:55that's what they want to do right now.
15:58So, maybe it's another Craig Reynolds elevation just to provide some depth.
16:04I mean, Reynolds has been around the league.
16:05I know the one play he was involved in didn't go well in the fourth down.
16:09But, you know, he's been around him.
16:11They signed Devin Neal to the practice squad.
16:14I just have no idea how, you know, one week, less than a week with the team.
16:17I don't know that that's a guy you're saying is, you know, ready to go.
16:22But McNichols is the obvious one.
16:23If they just say, we want our best guy on the field, it looks like he's, you know,
16:27should be good to go.
16:28But, yeah, well, I just don't know because they have to do some other moves
16:32potentially with their lineup.
16:34They got their defensive front all of a sudden, et cetera.
16:39So, I don't know how that's going to go.
16:41But we'll have to – that would be my guess.
16:43I mean, it's a Rashad White show.
16:44And then take a kind of guess from there.
16:48What about Steph Diggs tonight?
16:50What do you – what's your guess?
16:52I mean, he looked, you know, pretty spry when we saw him.
16:55Again, we're only seeing at a practice during the season sort of the lightest
17:00part of it, you know, stretching and then just some position drills.
17:02We're not seeing them go full, full out.
17:05But, you know, I thought he looked pretty good.
17:06He seems like the type of player where if it's borderline,
17:09he's going to really push to play.
17:11Like, you know, he wants in there.
17:13So, I would lean towards he plays.
17:15But, again, you know, we only see some of it.
17:19He was officially listed as limited.
17:22But, yeah, my guess would be he plays.
17:26Back to last week for a moment.
17:28We know that Sanra still ended up playing some safety because they were
17:32limited at safety.
17:33You know, they had Reeves and they had Quan Martin and that was it with
17:36Percy Butler out.
17:37But do you think that that is a potential – let's just say they were fully
17:41healthy at both positions and Amos is back.
17:44Do you think that they could end up playing Sanra still at safety,
17:49not a starting safety because they have good safeties in Reeves and Cross
17:55if both are healthy.
17:57But do you think that that is maybe a last gasp move with Sanra still?
18:05Yeah.
18:05I mean, I think as you look at it, he's not the fastest guy.
18:10He's certainly not the tallest guy.
18:12That means his coverage skills have got to be pretty impeccable and they have
18:15not been to – they have not been that way the last year and change.
18:19I asked Rontae Jones about this the other day and, you know,
18:22he just sort of gave the general, hey, we like his versatility and he helped us
18:25out this game and so on and so on.
18:27But, you know, with Trey Amos, whether it's this week or the next game,
18:31he's back.
18:31Again, I would think he plays this week, but we'll see.
18:34You know, with Trey Amos back, plus Amik Robertson, plus Rasul Butler,
18:39you know, Sanra still has already been pushed back to the, you know,
18:44to minimal playing time unless there's injuries.
18:46So then at some point, if he's going to be there, you're like, okay, well,
18:49how do we now cross-train him more at another position?
18:52I suspect ultimately if they were to move him to safety,
18:54it's probably an off-season project.
18:57But I don't know how you can't rule that out at this stage.
19:01And, you know, at least if nothing else, he showed them what he can do there.
19:05You know, he was obviously on the wrong end of some plays last week to Malik
19:10Neighbors in particular.
19:12So, yeah, I feel like safety is, you know, coming up as a position change.
19:18But, you know, realistically, that's probably more of an off-season project.
19:21And now it would just be, you know, being used in case of emergency
19:25at this point, I would think.
19:26One thing we didn't talk a lot about just because of, you know,
19:31the nature of the ending of last week's game,
19:33but there's been no talk of Brace this week.
19:38He looked good.
19:39It didn't seem to be a factor.
19:41How much of that conversation took place?
19:44And can we basically backburner that particular discussion?
19:49I mean, any injury with him is possible.
19:50But in terms of the Brace limiting his play,
19:53the answer at this point after one game would be emphatically no, right?
19:58Yeah, this is if they went out of their way to try to get us to stop
20:01talking about the Brace, they went too far.
20:03Yeah, they did.
20:06But, yeah, you're right.
20:06It was a pretty mild part of the conversation.
20:09You know, it doesn't seem like it was affecting him.
20:11You know, I wouldn't say, you know,
20:13when we said that he had a really good game last week,
20:14I mean, a lot of that is, of course, with his legs primarily.
20:17You know, it's not like the passing game was necessarily clicking.
20:21But, you know, at the same point, I think he looked comfortable out there.
20:24It was fine.
20:25So, yeah, it seemed like it was a non-issue.
20:27Of course, it really, you know, to some degree, I mean, there's the –
20:30does it feel uncomfortable to him as he's going through his play-to-play motion?
20:34But then also what happens should he land on it?
20:37I think he landed on his throwing elbow last week, and I was okay with that.
20:41So, I don't know if he took a direct hit this past week.
20:44But, yeah, as far as I can tell, it seemed to be fine.
20:47It wasn't a concern.
20:50And, you know, Ken, there were some things to talk about with him and the coaches.
20:55But, yeah, I don't think that was a huge factor in a negative way for him.
21:00All right, just clarifying.
21:02I just want to make sure I'm clear on this.
21:04Because you think there's – that Kross will be back tonight
21:07and that there's a chance Amos will be back tonight.
21:13Yeah, I think that's fair.
21:14I mean, again, in Nick Kross' case, you know, he had this internal injury, of course,
21:18but he's been, you know, with the team for weeks and months practicing.
21:20So, you know, from a body perspective, he's, you know, in shape right now.
21:25Like that, Amos has not, you know, done anything more or less since week 10
21:28except for two days of practice, one of which he suffered an ankle injury.
21:32You know, so you put all that together, you know, again,
21:37it could come down to where do they need the most help this week
21:41because of guys being out.
21:43But if they can get Trey Amos back, I would suspect they would.
21:47Did – I forget the answer to this.
21:50Did Quinn ever talk to Raheem?
21:52He didn't, right?
21:53Raheem was always headed to San Francisco to reunite with Kyle
21:58versus reuniting with Quinn.
21:59Do I have that right?
22:00I believe that's accurate.
22:02I don't think they ever – you know, they did talk to Brian Flores.
22:05That was like the one sort of bigger name.
22:08They talked to Jonathan Gannon, but I don't remember.
22:10Raheem Moore.
22:11Denard Wilson they talked to.
22:12They interviewed.
22:13Yeah.
22:14Graham they interviewed.
22:15Yeah.
22:15Yeah.
22:15But they never interviewed Raheem.
22:18Right.
22:19And I do think, you know, again, you go back to that time.
22:21I know people are probably thrilled right now that they didn't get Mike McDaniel,
22:24but, like, that was another one where you're like, hey, you know,
22:27why aren't you talking to this guy?
22:28Both, you know, all these guys have some ties to Dan Quinn.
22:32And, you know, in real time, my thought was it's interesting that they are not
22:36getting more of these conversations because what does that suggest?
22:40And I do think there was some wonder of, hey, is Dan Quinn potentially in trouble
22:44this year?
22:44Is he potentially a lame duck coach?
22:46And I don't want to go someplace where I'm going only for one year.
22:48I never thought for one second Brian Flores was coming to Washington as a
22:52defensive coordinator, but I'm sure from his perspective, hey, I'll talk to
22:55anybody who wants to talk to me about anything because, you know,
22:58trying to get a head coaching job.
22:59Well, there was some discussion in Minnesota there, remember,
23:04when the season ended as to whether or not he was going to stay.
23:07So that was the one shot.
23:10Yeah.
23:10Yeah.
23:11I mean, from his perspective, but having conversations is leverage.
23:13And then eventually, I never really thought it was actually going to occur.
23:20So, yeah, I mean, just the fact that they weren't, you know,
23:23they ended up on two first-year coaches.
23:25They both might turn out to be great,
23:26but that's not something you're really typically doing when you're in the
23:30situation they're in coming off a 5-12 season looking to reboot.
23:33You don't go that hard with two guys like that.
23:36So I think it did say something about their options or lack thereof.
23:39But, you know, obviously none of that matters at this point.
23:43What's your prediction?
23:46I mean, I don't know how they win unless, again, like Seattle game,
23:51the turnovers just heavily fall in their favor.
23:56You know, I am paying attention to the line.
23:59And being out here, you know,
24:00there's this casual conversation with, like, some random folks.
24:05You know, people meet out and battle or wait or things like that.
24:09And, like, I think there's some sense of, like,
24:11the 49ers' luck can't continue, right?
24:13Like, you know, they've had a ton of injuries.
24:15Things have gone their way.
24:16But things go their way because Kyle Shanahan is really good at what he does
24:19and they have a lot of studs everywhere.
24:20So I'm going to go something along the lines of 27-20.
24:26You know, they keep it interesting.
24:28Jayden Daniels does his thing.
24:30They cover.
24:31But, you know, ultimately, I think the 49ers kind of big brother them
24:34ultimately too much and, you know, win the game.
24:37All right.
24:37Talk to you.
24:38We'll figure it out this week.
24:40Thanks.
24:41Deal.
24:41Yep.
24:42Ben Standing, everybody.
24:43Ben Standing, everybody.