Week 6 Reality Checks: Washington Football Team vs Kansas City

4. The Reality Is, Rivera doesn’t hold veterans accountable for poor play.

You can’t just talk about doing things the “right way” and “the best player will play” and various other coach-speak platitudes. You have to prove it with your depth-chart and playing-time decisions. So far this season, Rivera has held rookies and young players accountable for their poor play by taking away playing time or limiting their situational exposure. But he has not done so for any veterans playing poorly.

Bostic played almost 100% of defensive snaps prior to injury in spite of being one of the lowest-ranked linebackers in the league. Collins has played nearly 100% of defensive snaps while consistently blowing coverages and missing tackles. Same for Bobby McCain and Kendall Fuller and William Jackson III. Those players couldn’t even manage to jump to defend a Hail Mary at the end of the half vs. New Orleans. Sure seems like Rivera’s actions are communicating something more like, “if you say the right things in meetings or have a big cap number, you’ll play.” If those key, veteran secondary members continue to receive close to 100% of playing time at the expense of younger or less-tenured players while continuously disappointing with their on-field play, we’ll know that accountability isn’t applied equally in Ashburn.