Washington Commanders head coach Ron Rivera spoke with JP Finlay of NBC Sports Washington Tuesday after the team traded cornerback William Jackson III to the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Rivera was honest, admitting the team’s mistake in its evaluation of Jackson last offseason.
“I think the biggest thing is, more so than anything else, is we looked at what we tried to do with William, and it didn’t work,” Rivera said.
“So, along the lines of our evaluation process, we were wrong.”
Much was made of Jackson’s prowess in man coverage before Washington awarded him a three-year, $40.5 million contract in March 2021. The Commanders were primarily a zone coverage team, and the match came with question marks.
Jackson ended up playing in only 16 games for the Commanders, committing 11 penalties and intercepting just two passes. He earned a cool $24 million for those 16 games.
While that’s a tough pill to swallow, Rivera deserves credit for publicly admitting his mistake. Remember, Rivera is Washington’s chief decision-maker on the football side.
Have you ever heard of the sunk-cost fallacy? Essentially, that means holding onto something you’ve invested in even when it’s clear it was a bad investment. Jackson was a bad investment for Washington, so keeping him on the roster made no sense just because you’ve already paid him his guaranteed money. He wasn’t getting better. Washington had signed corners off the street who were playing ahead of Jackson.
So, instead of keeping Jackson and thinking things would get better, Rivera decided in a Week 5 loss to Tennessee it was time for both sides to move on.
Sure, Rivera deserves criticism for even signing Jackson in the first place. But at the time, many considered him the top free-agent cornerback available. And the price wasn’t exorbitant compared to other players of similar talent. The hope was that Jackson would thrive playing with Washington’s defensive line. It never happened for a variety of reasons.
However, instead of entirely blaming Washington here, Jackson also deserves some blame. The Commanders weren’t playing zone coverage 100% of the time. Washington played man coverage, too. Jackson still didn’t thrive. He needed to play better.
Regardless, Jackson has a new home. And he will be motivated to prove he can still play at a high level. His legacy in Washington will be of yet another failed free-agent signing.
Kudos to Rivera for publicly admitting the mistake. It’s not often that leaders of this franchise have acknowledged their mistakes.
