Category: Latest Washington News

Terry McLaurin, Montez Sweat, Tress Way headline 2021 Pro Bowl snubs in Washington

Both Terry McLaurin and Montez Sweat had a great shot of making the 2021 Pro Bowl, but the two Washington players were snubbed on Monday night.

While both DE Chase Young and RG Brandon Scherff were named to the 2021 NFL Pro Bowl from the Washington Football Team, there has to be a feeling among fans that a few players on the roster were snubbed as well.

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Among the people who deserved to get in, yet didn’t, were DE Montez Sweat, WR Terry McLaurin, P Tress Way, DT Jonathan Allen, and DT Daron Payne. All four players have had standout seasons, and are among the best at their position in the NFL.

Here are the players on the NFC Roster that got in ahead of those Washington players:

Wide Receiver:

  • Davante Adams (Packers)
  • DeAndre Hopkins (Cardinals)
  • DK Metcalf (Seahawks)
  • Justin Jefferson (Vikings)

Defensive End:

  • Cameron Jordan (Saints)
  • Brandon Graham (Eagles)
  • Chase Young (Washington)

Defensive Tackle

  • Aaron Donald (Rams)
  • Fletcher Cox (Eagles)
  • Grady Jarrett (Falcons)

Punter:

  • Jack Fox (Lions)

Both Scherff and Young are extremely deserving of the nomination, with Scherff making it to his fourth Pro Bowl team, and Young being named to his first in his rookie season. As more success comes to Washington down the road, we can expect more players to get the credit that they deserve.

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DE Chase Young, RG Brandon Scherff voted to the 2021 NFL Pro Bowl

Both Chase Young and Brandon Scherff have been named to the 2021 NFL Pro Bowl, making it the fourth time for Scherff and first for Young.

The Washington Football Team has had two players voted to the 2021 NFL Pro Bowl, with both rookie DE Chase Young and RG Brandon Scherff getting the nod on Monday night.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2021 Pro Bowl will be entirely virtual, via Madden NFL 21.

This is the second-straight season that Scherff has been named to the Pro Bowl, with him being named in 2020 but unable to play due to an injury. It is his fourth career Pro Bowl nomination in Washington.

In Young’s first season in the NFL, he was named to the Pro Bowl as a reserve, and he is the youngest player in franchise history to make the cut, according to Washington PR.

There were arguably a number of players in Washington who likely deserved to make the cut, like Terry McLaurin, Montez Sweat, Jonathan Allen, and Daron Payne. Here is a full list of players that made it.

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Washington is signing LB Mychal Kendricks off of Seahawks practice squad

Washington is adding some depth and reinforcements to their roster with the signing of former Seahawks LB Mychal Kendricks, who is likely to be available in Week 16 vs. the Panthers.

The Washington Football Team is adding some depth to their linebacker rotation, signing former Seattle Seahawks linebacker Mychal Kendricks off of the practice squad and adding him to the team.

According to The Washington Post‘s Nicki Jhabvala, Kendricks will fly private to Washington, making it so that he does not have to complete the 6 days of pre-entry COVID testing and is available to play in Week 16 against the Carolina Panthers.

This is a big signing for Washington, and one that we were hoping they would make over the offseason, and it comes at an important time too, with several of their linebackers banged up or injured. Washington will have a chance to clinch the NFC East division on Sunday with a win against the Panthers, and the defense will need reinforcements to get it done.

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Washington’s next potential GM just became available, but Kyle Smith still makes too much sense

Former Carolina Panthers GM Marty Hurney became available for Washington to poach on Monday, but there are reasons to still want to go with Kyle Smith instead.

Early on Monday morning, the Carolina Panthers made the expected move of firing general manager Marty Hurney, who has been with the team for a total of 13 years in two stints over the past two decades. With a new coach now in Carolina and goals for a new stint of success, it became clear that they needed some new blood at the top following three consecutive losing seasons.

So what does this matter for Washington fans? Well, Washington has a vacancy at the GM position, and Hurney is a guy who’s named may people have floated to take that position, with him having worked closely with Ron Rivera for several years.

Good news, right? Well, that depends on your outlook on the situation, and what you think of the potential promotion of Kyle Smith, who is the VP of Player Personnel in Washington. Smith has been outstanding over the past few years building a young and talented roster through the draft, and a lot of people are penciling him in as the de facto GM. The Athletic’s Mark Bullock noted on Monday morning that Smith might still make more sense than Hurley, based on what he’s built so far in Washington.

There is also a fear in Washington that if you make somebody other than Smith the GM, he will go elsewhere in the NFL and build a Super Bowl-caliber roster, which we’ve seen before when it comes to coaches like Sean McVay or Kyle Shanahan.

Rivera briefly touched on the firing of Hurney in his media session on Monday but said for the most part that he won’t talk about the GM position until after the season. In the end, it really is his decision to make, and we’ll see what he wants to do. We know that he has an affinity for Hurney, and I’d say that the former Panthers’ guy is the odds-on favorite to be the next GM in Washington, but if you’re a fan of the team, you might think twice about passing on Smith. Losing him could have huge ramifications.

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Washington can’t get off to a fast start in games, and Daron Payne doesn’t know why

For the 11th time this season Washington was trailing at the half, and Daron Payne says the team still doesn’t know why that is.

We’ve said it time and again this season, but if you’re going to contribute any of Washington’s struggles this year on a single thing, it’s their inability to get off to a hot start, and a propensity to always be playing from behind.

Washington is the only team left in the NFL that is yet to score any points on their opening possession in the game, and they constantly are behind the 8-ball when it comes to the scoreboard. In 14 games this season, Washington has been trailing at halftime in 11 of them, and they’ve been down by 10 points or more at the break in 9 of those 11. That is not a recipe for success in the NFL.

It happened again on Sunday, with the Seattle Seahawks building a 13-3 lead at the break, and stretching that lead to 17 points with a 50-yard touchdown run from Carlos Hyde early in the third quarter. Luckily, Washington has a defense that is good enough to make up for these mishaps, continually finding a groove in the final two quarters and allowing the offense to get back in the game. However, this is not a crutch that you want to get used to if you have any hopes of making a run in the postseason, and it’s not a habit that you want to create.

After the game on Sunday, on the Washington Talk Podcast, NBC Sports Washington’s Mitch Tischler had a theory as to what might be the reason for the slow starts, and the solution going forward…

Today, Seattle flew across country for a game on the east coast. At 11 o’clock, Russell Wilson was out there with Geno Smith and the entire receiving corps, throwing passes; you had the entire O-lines and D-lines out there warming up together in their shorts and T-shirts. Nary a Washington Football Team player to be seen, minus the guys who were testing out to see if they were going to be active or not. And just throughout the day, you saw Seattle warming up for the football game. Along the way — shirts, and then pads — they were out there 20 minutes before Washington was ever to warm up for the game with their pads on. It was just one of those things where I was watching warmups, and you could see the difference between the two football teams. I don’t know if that’s the difference between starting out ready to go and what we’ve seen from Washington, but, I don’t know, maybe they’ve got to change something in their warmups; maybe something in their arrival times. I don’t know what exactly it is that needs to change, but you can’t continue to be as inept as they are in the first half and try and win football games.

Whether it’s prep time or simply getting a feel for the rhythm of the game, it’s clear that Washington can’t continue with this trend and hope to be the successful team that they envision. Something’s got to give.

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Major takeaways from Washington’s loss to Seattle, and where they go from here

Washington saw their four-game winning streak come to an end on Sunday, but it was a game they could afford to lose that gave us some answer about who this team is.

If you’re a fan of the Washington Football Team, heading into a Sunday night after watching your team lose is not anything new. What is new, however, is witnessing a loss from your team, one in which they had a chance to win right before the final whistle, and treating it with a sense of apathy.

Washington lost to the Seahawks on Sunday afternoon by five points, 20-15, and they almost were able to pull off an improbable comeback victory after the offense woke up in the fourth quarter and mounted a couple of scoring drives. In the end, the game didn’t mean much, though. With the New York Giants still left to play on Sunday night against the Cleveland Browns (Editor’s Note: The Giants lost) Washington still held on to the top spot in the NFC East, and their chances at the playoffs remain strong. The loss didn’t do much to change anything, other than maybe sway fans either one way or the other when it comes to the future of Dwayne Haskins, or show that this team actually has a chance to beat some good teams if they’re disciplined enough to stop getting off to slow starts.

Regardless of how you feel, we can say that we learned some things about the team on Sunday, while we remain just as indecisive on some other matters as well. Here are our biggest takeaways from the game:

 

Everything that needs to happen for Washington to clinch NFC East next week

With a win next week, and a couple of losses from fellow NFC East teams, Washington can clinch their spot in the playoffs vs. the Panthers.

Despite the loss to the Seattle Seahawks on Sunday that ended Washington’s 4-game winning streak, there is still a reasonable path forward for them to win the NFC East and make the playoffs. Assuming that they can win their next two games and get a little bit of help along the way, Washington’s postseason hopes are still very much alive.

The biggest thing that needs to happen comes on Sunday night when the New York Giants take on the Cleveland Browns. If the Giants can find a way to win without their starting quarterback Daniel Jones playing, then they will move back into a tie for first place in the NFC East, while holding the tiebreaker over Washington.

If the Giants lose on Sunday night, things get a bit easier.

Had Washington beat the Seahawks on Sunday, they would have picked up a little bit of wiggle room over the final two weeks of the season. Now that they sit will a 6-8 record, the next two games vs. the Carolina Panthers and Philadelphia Eagles are pretty much must-win games. Should the Giants drop both of their next two games, Washington might not have to win out, but if they can continue to win, there’s nobody that can get in their way.

Washington is in the driver’s seat, and they could clinch their first spot in the postseason since 2015 next week against the team that fired Ron Rivera a year ago.

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Rivera: Washington looking forward to getting Antonio Gibson back soon; Alex Smith remains QB1

While Dwayne Haskins had a decent game against the Seahawks, Rivera notes that Alex Smith is still the starting QB, and he’s looking forward to having Antonio Gibson return soon.

After a game in which Washington was forced to almost play with one hand tied behind their backs, missing starters like Alex Smith, Antonio Gibson, Deshazor Everett, Cole Holcomb, and Kevin Pierre-Louis, the team is understandably looking forward to getting back to a sense of normalcy next week, hopefully…

That normalcy could mean that Smith will be healthy enough to play after dealing with a calf strain this week, and Rivera confirmed that he would be the starting QB if he was ready to play. Rivera also noted that Washington was hopeful to get Gibson back on the field, after he’s missed the past the past two games with a turf toe injury that he suffered early on against the Pittsburgh Steelers.

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What did we learn about Dwayne Haskins on Sunday in loss to Seahawks?

Dwayne Haskins made some nice plays down the stretch, but it’s hard to say that he did enough to warrant a roster spot in Washington next year.

Coming into Washington’s week 15 game against the Seattle Seahawks, the number one thing on every fan’s mind was how QB Dwayne Haskins would fair in his first start since Week 4. Going up against a Seattle defense that could be had, it would be interesting to see if the former No. 15 pick could do enough to secure a spot on Washington’s roster for the future.

We got a bit of a mixed result. The first half was frustrating at times, with the team only scoring 3 points and Haskins struggling to move the ball down the field. That frustration peaked in the third quarter when Haskins threw his second INT of the day. However, Haskins was able to settle in down the stretch, and he put together a couple of nice drives in the fourth quarter that allowed Washington to get back into the game. In the end, a last-ditch effort to take the lead fell short in the endzone with less than two minutes left, but two sacks allowed by the offensive line are to blame, and it’s tough to pin that on Dwayne.

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So what did we learn? Well, you can choose to look at Haskins’ showing whichever way you’d like. Yes, he made a number of mistakes that brought what could have been promising drives crumbling to the ground, usually in the form of telegraphed interceptions. On the other hand, he found a way to keep a short memory and continued to make plays down the stretch. He ended the day going 38-for-55 for 295 yards, 1 TD, and 2 INT. He also added 28 yards on the ground as well. His high moments looked a bit better than they did earlier in the season, but there were still just as many lows after a couple of months sitting on the bench.

It’s hard to say that we learned too much about Haskins on Sunday. He may have done enough to earn more playing time should Washington not be in a position where they are making a playoff push, but that’s not the case. Washington needs Alex Smith back as soon as possible, and it will likely mean that Dwayne’s time in D.C. is coming to a close.

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LB Shaun Dion Hamilton ruled out with elbow injury vs. Seattle

Shaun Dion Hamilton has been ruled out with an elbow injury, now leaving Washington’s defense in dire straights at the LB position.

The Washington Football Team was already incredibly thin at the linebacker position coming into this game, with both Cole Holcomb and Kevin Pierre-Louis ruled out with injuries on Friday, but now they’re in even more dire straights, with Shaun Dion Hamilton being ruled out as well.

In SDH’s place, expect rookie Khaleke Hudson to step up more, as he has a bit already in this game. Washington trails big with the Seahawks able to do what they want in the running game. Washington is going to need to play some perfect football in order to get back into this one.

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