How many wins the rest of the way? Redux (POLL)

[Chris]

As far as the rest of the 2024 season goes, the 7-5 Commanders have home games remaining vs. the Titans, the Eagles, and the Falcons, and road matchups at the Saints and at Dallas, and of course, the Bye Week in 2 weeks.

How many wins will Washington earn the rest of the way?

 

[Hail Raiser]

I think we'll beat the Titans and the Cowboys, but that's it and I have no confidence in that.

I had us at 10 wins to start the year, but that just doesn't feel possible this morning.

 

[DieselPwr44]

They are not better than anyone left on their schedule.

Slowly regressing to the mean.

 

[Boone]

'Better'? Brother, you've been watching the NFL a long time. Dallas isn't better than Washington. They won yesterday. It's a week to week league.

 

[Chris]

DP’s a big boy so I won’t pretend to make his argument for him. I will, however, say that I don’t think he is wrong.

Dallas is a shell of what they could be. They are a literal MASH unit and were playing on the road, on a short week, vs a team intent on correcting it’s course, and outplayed them.

Now I’m not saying Washington can’t win any remaining games, in fact I voted 2, but I don’t believe that they are necessarily ‘better’ than any of their remaining opponents.

 

[Boone]

Better is 100% subjective. 'Slowly regressing to the mean' says it all - because they have been better than average for most of this season. But even if we could agree on what defines 'better', it is irrelevant. Bad teams win every NFL weekend. Really bad teams beat really good teams. Teams that aren't great go on runs. Great teams hit a wall or get hit with the injury bug. This is all standard NFL stuff.

We all know this.

We may not win another game. It's also possible we don't lose another one. Even during the Snyder era crazier things happened.

Rooting for them to outperform expectations is not 'delusional'. It's being a fan.

 

[Chris]

I’m pretty sure that nearly everyone here hopes that they outperform expectations. I’m also pretty sure that nearly everyone here is a fan.

The positive is that it will be easier to outperform expectations now.

 

[mcdonaldrw]

4 weeks ago I would have had us winning at least 4 of the final games, now I think we beat Dallas and the Titans. Hope I am wrong and we pull more but that's what my gut says

 

[heisenberg]

This is a firm "who the hell knows" for me.

This team was more than the sum of its parts early in the season and now it's less than the sum of it's parts.

Lack of talent be damned we are currently playing sloppy, lifeless, uncreative football and if it continues it's possible we won't win another game.

If the coaches can somehow pull the airplane out of it's flat spin we could go on a run.

I have zero expectations for the rest of the season it's all up to this team and how badly it wants to make the playoffs because if they can't rediscover the magic that had them playing above itself earlier in the year the rest of the year could be ugly.

Don't gaslight yourselves into thinking we lost yesterday because we lack talent or because of injuries or any other excuse.

We lost yesterday to a team that was rife with controversy, a team that had owners stabbing players in the back and players stabbing coaches in the back, a team that had lost 5 in a row and mostly in embarrassing fashion to some less than spectacular competition, a team without it's starting quarterback, without 2 of it's interior offensive lineman, without it's starting tight end, without a starting reciever etc, at home as 10.5 point favorites and not only did we lose we got manhandled on both lines of scrimmage.

It's ironic that quinn kept talking about not buying a ticket to the roller coaster and yet this team is the epitome of a "roller coaster" team and right now we couldn't possibly be any lower.

It's not about talent, although I admit talent is certainly a factor but its not the root cause of the problem that has been getting progressively worse over the last 4 or 5 weeks.

We beat the ever lovin shit out of the Panthers a month ago with our backup quarterback and basically the same cast of characters we had on the field yesterday but I have very little doubt if we played them tomorrow with jayden we'd stand a good chance of losing.
Canales has them playing much better football than they were when the season started and the roster hasn't changed.

This game is as psychological as it is physical and right now our heads aren't in the right place and we're playing terrible football.

It's a very common thing in the league, the falcons are dealing with the same problem right now, the Saints looked like world beaters for two weeks then looked like they couldn't beat the little sisters of faith auxiliary football club and now they don't look half bad again. The eagles last year started 10-0 then came completely unglued and their talent didn't change.

We lost our MOJO, whether or not we can salvage this season depends solely on if we can find it again.

 

[Warhead36]

Smells like 9-8. We'll beat someone else along the way and probably win a meaningless game in the finale in Dallas. We're not gonna finish with 8 losses in a row, even Jim Zorn after a 6-2 start still managed 2 more wins.

9-8 finish and we're out of the playoffs because Tampa has the tiebreaker(and probably finishes with 10 wins anyway).

 

[SkinsOrlando]

I'm going with three but with the health of our o line a mess, Brob hurting, not sure that's achievable unless we really start working the short passing game, which I begged for yesterday and it was for not. This team is banged up, whether they overshot projections or we're healthy plays a big role into where we are at the moment.

 

[Skinsfan1311]

I voted 3.....

 

[Neophyte]

The only game left on the schedule that should be on anyone's "likely lost" list is the game with the Eagles, and they might have the most talent on the field of any team in the league.

Dallas can't seem to win at home. The Titans are the Titans.

The Falcons and Saints are two of the most Jekyll/Hyde teams I've ever seen. We could win both games or we could get blown out of both games.

 

[Xameil]

I'm staying optimistic....5 WINS!!!!!

And no, I'm not drunk....I don't think

 

[Solitary Man]

8-9. Please retire Austin Ekeler. Stay healthy.

 

[tomwvr]

I chose 0 - why
Ron oops I mean Dan lost his mojo, got to 7 wins and went all conservative in operations and I dont see the team going back to that
Kliff is awful the second half of the season and refuses to admit it and wont change because he is too stubborn
The defense cant stop the run at all. The Oline is beat to hell and there seems to be only 4 people playing great football on the team and the coaches are afraid to play the rookies to see if they are better in areas we are struggling (wr/te)

 

[Boone]

I chose 0 - why

Lol.

 

[Canadian Hog]

Let's take a look at the 5 losses for a second...

a. Tampa - season opener on the road with a brand new staff, rookie QB making his NFL debut, basically a roster that is 60 percent brand new playing in their first game together against a Bucs team that when healthy is a top 15 NFL roster. Not much of a chance there.

b. Baltimore - lose by 7 on the road vs. a top five NFL roster. No shame there.

c. Pittsburgh - lose by a point to what is shaping up to be a contender in the AFC. While we had them on the ropes and let them climb back into the game, there is no denying that a questionable red spot call at the end of the game on a fourth down likely prevented us from earning the victory.

d. Philly - while playing our worst offensive game of the year, we held a lead into the fourth quarter on the road vs. what is now arguably one of the four best teams currently in the NFL. With five minute to go, a questionable decision on the part of Dan Quinn to go for it on 4th and short likely prevented us from retaking the lead with a very makeable FG.

e. Dallas - this was the ONLY loss this season where you can basically say throw away the tape and let's move on. It was real bad - complementary football, yes, but complementary in the worst of ways. I spelled it right, Boone!

My point here is there has been literally one bad loss in 12 weeks. Even while not playing our best football during a three game skid, an opportunity to defeat two NFL upper echelon teams was right there to be had.

If anything, the Dallas game will serve as a wake up call that anything less than 100 percent attention to detail is not good enough. It should serve as a reminder to the players that this team is not good enough yet talent wise to be able to squeak by and win games when they are going through the motions the majority of the game. KC or Philly might be able to do that, we can't yet. We learned a hard lesson yesterday hopefully.

The Dallas loss will be a blessing in disguise. I am calling a 4-1 finish. Call me crazy, but I think we mature on the fly as a result of yesterday's bitter pill.

 

[Bulldog]

If I am the owner and I don’t see this team bounce back and beat a very bad Titans team at home it’s something I note and put under my hat.

It’s not a cause to remove the coach or other at present but it is a gauge on how the staff prepares a gameplan to beat what is essentially a backup qb in Will Levis leading a team in a lost season where players are looking forward to being elsewhere in 2025 at 3-8.

So there better be a win on Sunday.

After that I don’t see Washington beating the Eagles who may be just behind the Lions in the NFC.

The team should be competitive to win games against the Saints and Cowboys, especially the latter for reasons we have discussed elsewhere.

These teams are going nowhere and look to be making changes in the offseason. At some point guys start looking not to get hurt on clubs where new coaches are expected to make roster changes moving forward.

Atlanta is a Jekyll and Hyde team. I could see a close loss here if Atlanta is still in the division /playoff mix and if Cousins reverts to early season form.

 

[Boone]

I have no idea what to expect the rest of the way. My gut says we’ll find a way to win 3 of th last 5 but who really knows?

The Dallas loss sucked. As CH said, it’s really the first time in 2024 I felt letdown by this team. On the other hand even bad teams have some pride and Dallas heard all week long they would get embarrassed. So kudos to their coaches and players for shutting up all of the pundits.

As long as this team continues to fight and compete I will feel optimistic no matter what happens the rest of the way and heading into 2024. As fans, we pay lip service to having subpar talent at some pretty critical spots, but then when we see the results of lacking that talent we want to storm the castle with pitchforks and torches.

I think the smart thing for this fanbase to do is take a deep breath and realize this is a process that will take time.