In the first 10 years of Daniel Snyder’s ownership of the Washington NFL franchise, the now-Commanders were always considered among the league’s offseason winners. A term often used to describe Washington in that area was “offseason champions.”
That all changed when Snyder hired Bruce Allen as team president and general manager in 2010. While Washington would still make splashy moves, it was rarely a big spender in free agency. Even when Snyder fired Allen and hired Ron Rivera in 2020, Washington has often looked more for bargains in free agency rather than players signing record contracts.
One exception to that rule is safety Landon Collins. The Commanders are still paying for that horrible contract signed in 2019.
Washington had some money to spend this offseason, but an impending ownership change had many wondering how active the Commanders would be in free agency. Washington shocked everyone by agreeing to a record contract extension with defensive tackle Daron Payne just before free agency opened.
Re-signing Payne allowed Washington to open up additional cap space since he would not play under the franchise tag in 2023.
Football Outsiders recently evaluated all 32 NFL teams, handing out free-agency grades. They broke the grades down into four categories. Here’s FO’s assessment of Washington’s free agency:
- Improved Roster: B-
- Used Resources Well: C-
- Coherent Plan: C
- Overall Grade: C+
When I start writing articles like this that go team by team, I paste in all the team names and then where I’m going to write text, I just enter the words “blah blah blah.” I almost left that as a description of Washington’s free agency moves.
Signing Daron Payne to a long-term contract off the franchise tag was a good move. He’s not just a hog molly, he’s a pass-rusher, ranking 12th last year among defensive tackles in ESPN’s Pass Rush Win Rate. The other really good move was bringing in Jacoby Brissett as the failsafe backup behind Sam Howell. Brissett was really, really good for Cleveland last year. He ended up seventh in pass DVOA and 13th in pass DYAR. The problem is that it was by far his best year, and I don’t know if you can trust him to be that good again. But he should be better than Howell and better than the veteran quarterbacks he replaces, Carson Wentz and Taylor Heinicke.
Other moves are less exciting. Cody Barton is a one-for-one replacement for Cole Holcomb. I don’t know if I trust how good Andrew Wylie can be away from Patrick Mahomes and Andy Reid, even if Eric Bienemy is his offensive coordinator. Cam Dantzler ranked 75th out of 80 qualifying cornerbacks last year in coverage success rate at 40%.
I’m docking the Commanders a little extra in “Used Resources Well” for not going after Lamar Jackson. Now that would have been a real improvement at the quarterback position.
FO’s assessment of Washington’s offseason is a fair one. However, when some criticize the Commanders for not pursuing Jackson don’t quite understand the entire story. First, the Baltimore Ravens were never letting Jackson go to Washington. Losing their star player to the team less than one hour away would never happen.
Secondly, Washington’s ownership situation. With Snyder in the middle of selling the team, he was never making this type of move. But yes, Jackson would’ve dramatically changed Washington’s offseason.
