Commanders’ magical season ends, but the foundation for long-term success is in place

PHILADELPHIA — Dan Marino came to mind Sunday amid the raucous celebration at the Linc.

The Miami Dolphins’ Hall of Fame quarterback was as good a passer as pro football has ever produced. During his second NFL season, in 1984, the then-23-year-old became the first quarterback in league history to throw for more than 5,000 yards (5,084) in a season. He threw 48 touchdowns and completed 362 passes. Each of these stats led the league. He was named MVP and Offensive Player of the Year and took the Dolphins to Super Bowl XIX, where Miami played against Joe Montana and the San Francisco 49ers.

Marino and Miami, though, were dominated by San Francisco 38-16, spoiling the historic season. But, Marino was 23 years old, you know?

“After the game, I was disappointed, down about the game,” Marino told the Miami Herald in 2015. “But I was like, ‘You know what, I’m going to be back and we’re going to win one of these. I’m going to be back more than once. Maybe twice, you never know.’ And it never happened.”

Marino never got back to the title game. He only reached two more AFC championships, losing both. And his final playoff game, at age 38 during the 1999 season, turned into a 62-7 pantsing at the hands of the Jacksonville Jaguars.

And that’s the burr under the saddle as we contemplate Jayden Daniels, the Washington Commanders and what seems like a limitless future — both for the 24-year-old quarterback and his team.

Nothing is promised, including another trip to the NFC Championship Game.

Washington’s magical season was obliterated by the Eagles on Sunday 55-23, sending Philadelphia to New Orleans for Super Bowl LIX in two weeks, and sending the Commanders home after a 14-6 season that saw them get further than they had in three decades. The lesson here isn’t that the Eagles are four-plus touchdowns better than the Commanders. They are not. They’re the best team in the division and they’re better than Washington right now, but not 32 points better.

However, the Commanders have more work to do. This was Year 1 of what coach Dan Quinn called a recalibration. It’s still, no matter the incredible success this season, a rebuild, for Quinn and general manager Adam Peters. Sunday showed why.

“It’s hard, especially when you go out like that,” Pro Bowl receiver Terry McLaurin said. “We feel like we were better than that. But at the end of the day, they made the plays to win the game. It’s just tough because this is a really close locker room. Guys really care about one another. We put our heads down and worked our butts off all season. And when we fall short, it’s really hard. And you know this locker room’s not going to be the same next year.”

Sunday was a final, savage injury to Washington’s defense. The Eagles annihilated the Commanders on the ground, gaining 229 yards. Philly’s offensive line blew open massive holes for Saquon Barkley, and Jalen Hurts, and Dallas Goedert, and Will Shipley, and Brian Westbrook, and Shady McCoy, and Wilbert Montgomery and anyone else in green and white.

Barkley took the Eagles’ first offensive snap 60 yards to the house for a touchdown, blasting through tackle attempts by each of Washington’s starting safeties, Jeremy Chinn and Quan Martin. All week, Washington pledged that it not only had to maintain gap discipline to keep Barkley from killing the defense on the back side, but it had to have the discipline to get him on the ground if he got to the second level. That discipline unraveled in one play.

And when the Eagles needed to pass, Hurts, wideouts A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith, and tight end Dallas Goedert killed the Commanders’ secondary. In particular, they hunted Marshon Lattimore.

Peters took a chance on Lattimore, trading three picks to the New Orleans Saints for the four-time Pro Bowl cornerback at the trade deadline. At his best, Lattimore is certainly the best corner Washington’s got and a top corner in the league. But his play, with hamstring injuries through the end of the regular season and into the playoffs, was underwhelming, to put it mildly.

The game turned on a fourth-and-5 from the Washington 45 late in the second quarter, with the Eagles up 14-12. Washington had just closed within two on a 36-yard touchdown pass from Daniels to McLaurin. If the Commanders held, they’d turn the ball back over to their offense with a chance to drive a short field for points that would have put them ahead.

But Brown shredded Lattimore, playing in press coverage, beating him down the sideline. And Hurts dropped a 31-yard completion in the bucket to his star receiver. Three plays later, on third-and-13 from the Washington 17, Lattimore committed a pass interference penalty in the end zone, giving Philly first-and-goal at the 1. Hurts Tush-Pushed it in from there.

Maybe Lattimore’s hamstring, problematic for the last couple of years, still isn’t up to par and he can’t run the way he’s accustomed to. But if not … whoa.

The Eagles won the turnover battle 4-0. They won the physical battles along both lines of scrimmage. They won everything, including the George Halas Trophy.

“The only way to get into the plus (on turnovers) is you’ve got to create some, too,” Quinn said. “So, give Philadelphia credit. They caused them. It wasn’t a fumbled snap or something that was reckless, in that way. They caused them. I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out that that was a good job.”

This in no way is a diminution of Washington’s 2024 season. It was remarkable, breathtaking and exhilarating, re-animating a team and fan base that had been beaten down over 30 years. The franchise was one of the worst in North America, run by a thin-skinned bully who emulated Jerry Jones without any of the oilman’s ability to sell or charm, and who allowed, if not encouraged, horrendous behavior by his employees in his place of business. (Wonder how things are going in Snyder World these days. Oh.)

It just is a notion that the work has just begun.

The Commanders took a monster step forward this season. But they know, in their heart of hearts, that getting within a game of the Super Bowl was a step, maybe two steps, ahead of their existing talent. They need an edge rusher and another cornerback. They need to get better on the offensive line. They probably need another receiver. They would surely love to bring back defensive players Chinn and Bobby Wagner, Zach Ertz and John Bates from the tight end room, backup quarterback Marcus Mariota, and punter Tress Way — all free agents after this season, ultimate glue guys and veterans who are respected and to whom the young guys listen to.

But, they’re all free agents. They’ll decide where they play in 2025, and for how much.

Even if a few of them leave, the foundation for long-term success is in place. Washington has nailed all the important organizational chart positions in the last two years.

Josh Harris, no matter what they think of him in Philadelphia, certainly is an owner upgrade in Washington. His ownership group is well-heeled and star-powered. Who would you rather have in the draft room than Peters, assistant general manager Lance Newmark and their staff to fill in the obvious holes remaining, either through the draft or free agency? Who would you rather have than Quinn being intentional in creating an atmosphere — yes, a culture — where the players not only came together on the field but off it as well?

“It all starts with the brotherhood, and the chemistry within one another, as a human,” center Tyler Biadasz said. “You build chemistry on and off the field, and you put that into a setting of pure-ass attitude football. We thrive in that. But also, our ability too. As DQ said, we haven’t found our ceiling. We can carry that into next year as well. It’s not a seven-game series. But we know what we can look like. This wasn’t our best outing, for sure. That’s football. You’ve got to play the game Sunday at 3 o’clock.”

And who would you rather have under center — all right, out of the shotgun — for the next decade, than Daniels?

You can say picking Daniels at No. 2 was easy. (That would ignore a loud and vocal group that insisted Washington go for Drake Maye at that spot instead of the Heisman Trophy winner from LSU, but let’s not relitigate everything in the past.) But the Commanders got Johnny Newton and Mike Sainristil in the second round, and Brandon Coleman in the third. All three have been major contributors since early in the season, each answering a significant personnel question going forward. Tight end Ben Sinnott, also taken in the second round, didn’t get on the field much — though he showed his potential by catching Way’s fake punt in the first quarter Sunday for 23 yards. And the Commanders have high hopes for linebacker Jordan Magee, who did well on special teams through hamstring injuries.

But, Daniels is the headliner. He is the show. He is the hope. And he plays in Washington.

“The culture that DQ and Adam set here, we know the standard,” Daniels said. “The locker room next year, we’ll probably have new guys come in here and stuff like that. We’ve got to teach them the standard and uphold them to that.”

No, there is no guarantee Washington will get here again next season. Or to another Super Bowl. But how can you not believe that the near future of pro football in the District (and, maybe in the District) won’t make all of us forget the recent, awful past of this franchise? How can you not believe that Harris and his group, and Bob Myers, and Peters, Newmark and Quinn (and, probably at least for another year, Kliff Kingsbury), and Jayden Freaking Daniels, aren’t going to be back here, on this stage, real soon?

(Photo of Jayden Daniels: Emilee Chinn / Getty Images)