2025 Washington Commanders- All Things Defense

Of all the descriptive words for Whitt's new function, he is "assessing". I thought that's what he has been doing
 
At least DQ pulled the trigger on a move, he had to make some sort of a change whetheer he received pressure from above him or not.
 
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If this defense all of a sudden starts playing like an NFL defense I'm going to have some questions.
 
Poor coaching, poor scheme. Let's hope DQ can get that side of the ball playing better. Can't play any worse, right? Whitt was a disaster, but I suppose he had to bring his guy along with him. Sometimes that's not the best decision. This time, it most certainly was not.
 
Conn said:
For the people wanting Quinn to step in…we aren’t going to improve drastically if Quinn calls the defensive plays, either imo. Better? Probably, he’s been good before. But I don’t think he’s some special schemer or playcaller, he’s someone who I think is likely a better HC than DC, if he has good coordinators under him. I don’t think he’s secretly retaining all the cures to our ills in his mind right now. Our gameplan and defensive decision-making has his input already, he’s just not literally calling the plays.

Whitt needs to go, and maybe Quinn needs a stretch of the season calling the plays again to really get in tune with how much the defensive personnel sucks going into the offseason, but Quinn is not some un-utilized cure-all to our defensive issues now or in the future. He literally sold himself as the HC candidate who had learned the most from his past mistakes—those mistakes being calling the plays and dividing his attention. He will sink or swim as a CEO style HC because that’s what he sold to AP. Him taking over play calling would just be a temporary thing if Whitt has lost so much respect with the players that you just can’t have him in the building anymore. Outcomes won’t improve much.
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Stand by this, with the change actually happening. I like it as a “Dan Quinn learns his lesson and hires better this January” situation but I doubt we see much improvement this year, if any. He already had his hands and ideas all over this D, I doubt the actual rhythm of the play calls is going to turn out to be the problem.

But without the Whitt shield, if this D continues to play this poorly with Quinn now in the line of fire, I foresee one of his Commanders subreddit nicknames “Sgt. Slogan” becoming more popular around the internet as he becomes an unpopular figure. Hopefully for his sake we at least see SOME defensive improvement the next few weeks.

I suspect Mike McDaniel is about to take his lunch money in a really embarrassing way, though.

If we do improve, it’ll likely come due to personnel changes and philosophy changes (younger faster guys on the field and benching Wagner, using Luvu differently, aggressive with blitzes, etc.) which will just lead people to rightfully ask why the HC with the defensive background didn’t mandate these changes before when he had his input on the game plans
 
CuredFromBatteredFanSyndrome said:
Broken fibula.
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We really, really, might not win another game.

Discobob said:
Whitt's out as play caller
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Hopefully we won’t look so poorly coached. But we are down out top 2 DE’s, both starting our starting CB’s, and didn’t have a great defensive roster to start. Maybe we can at least get a couple of stops, instead of ZERO, which is what we did against the Lions.

Edit: At least we know we will be moving in next year and not stuck with Whitt.
 
With all the injuries on defense i don't see any coach righting the ship this year. Might see some improvements but what we are going to be able to put on the field defensively on Sunday is not good.
 
Curious to see if DQ plays some of the younger guys more. Like McGee. As DC im assuming Witt had control over who got playing time. But again, with all the injuries I dont know how much choice he has. I can see shoring up one element such as run D, run blitzes etc, at the expense of the passing game.
 
Well Conn - to your point about McDaniel - he hasn't seen whatever Quinn is cooking. It may be very different from what Whitt was and wasn't doing.
There may be a lot more creativity.

I'm not convinced McDaniel stomps them with 0 tape to go on. I get that personnel is an issue.
CuredFromBatteredFanSyndrome said:
I hope we lose by 1, 7 more times.

Wishful thinking.
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Just to be clear, this may be a wish for a new HC and structure next year. I am not sharing an opinion on that here, but if they lose by 1, 7 more times, that is what it "may" mean. It also may mean they roll with this structure given the injuries. Do you have a position on maintaining the HC?
 
I know a lot of Dolphins fans, being in Florida. They want McDaniel gone as much if not more than we want Whitt gone so lol I thought from that angle the matchup would be interesting. But its now going to be Quinn coordinating this.

Dolphins though their record as bad as Washington -- they are coming off their best win of the year.

Their offense is ranked 25th, this isn't like facing Seattle and the Lions. But don't get me wrong Waddle and Achane are speed demons and the type of players that give this team nightmares so it could be tough.

But my point is its winnable.

As for Quinn changing this defense. I think its possible they can improve but you'd think it would take time. Am surprised he's doing this now versus during the bye week where they'd have more time to dissect the issues and prepare. Be tougher to do it now without Amos and Payne (Payne for a game).

So in short, I don't expect much improvement if any this Sunday. But I do think the defense will likely improve a peg afterwards. JP Finlay in his podcast strongly hinted that players aren't happy with Whitt. So heck if the idea is purely to please Quinn, we might see them at their best. But this current defensive lineup has no talent. Too many guys out.

I think the issues with the defense likely was generated way back in training camp. Some of Whitt's defenders and he has some vocal ones in the media, they like to say what do you want from him, he plays zone and if that doesn't work he plays man and vice versa, when one doesn't work than he tries the other. So he's always trying. And is trying everything. I cringe when i hear that.

So the idea is a good coordinator is simply about knowing when to play zone and when to play man and have the flexibility to switch one for the other if the other isn't working. It's silly IMO. Obviously there is an art to playing zone well among other things factoring where players are positioned based on down distance among other things and how they are trained to anticipate the opponents playbook on and on. As for man, inside leverage, outside leverage, where is the deep safety, are they bracketing this guy or that guy? How does your opponent likely try to exploit man or zone and how to counter punch on and on.

So when I hear Whitt played zoned and it didn't work. Played man and it didn't work. So what do you want from him. He's trying everything. Cringe-gag nauseating point IMO.

But bringing this back to Quinn, to teach this unit how he'd like them to play zone, man, among other things etc I gather is going to take time. It's not i am guessing so much of when to call what. But how to play the scheme. On the D line, what gaps to fill and how to work as a unit. It seems like a tall order to reconigure all of that within days
 
There’s years worth of tape of whatever Quinn is going to cook up. I’m sure he can do better than Whitt but I still expect McDaniel to wreck us and Tua to look like a pro bowl QB
 
Dlts20 said:
I honestly don't think that DQ takes over if he didn't see Dan Campbell do it last week for an already great offense
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I think this is pretty simplistic and had nothing to do with it
 
A few weeks ago Quinn said he's got an ear piece in during games, and can hear the Whitt's calls and whatnot. If he really though Whitt was doing a terrible job, we'd have seen more changes happen already. Feels like DQ taking over playcalling is just to try and quiet the boiling frustration more than anything else.

I doubt there's much he can do anyway. We have a severe lack of healthy talent on both sides of the ball. Quinn can't make fillet mignon out of rancid hot dog meat.
 
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