3 things we learned from Washington’s crushing loss to Eagles

2. Kamren Curl needs more recognition

Don’t think of us highlighting Kam Curl’s absence as a slight to Kendall Fuller.

Everybody recognizes how good Fuller has been over the last two months. He probably gets overlooked to an extent in the national cornerback conversation, but his importance to Washington’s defense is universally understood.

On Tuesday night, though, fans were dealt a swift reminder of how just immense Curl is to Washington’s defense, because the group had no answers for Goedert, who terrorized the second level of the defense all game long.

Blessed with elite coverage instincts, closing speed and tackling ability, Curl is generally tasked with guarding opponent’s tight ends every week. To say he’s done an outstanding job in that regard would almost be understating it.

Try to remember the last time a TE popped off against Washington. You’re probably talking about Travis Kelce all the way back in Week 6.

It also felt like Curl’s presence defending the run was missed. Coming into Tuesday, he owned the fifth-most run stops (24) on the defense and the fourth-lowest missed tackle percentage (4.9%) of any defender in the NFL.

We’re not saying Washington wins this game if Curl was in the lineup, but there’s no way Goedert erupts for 135 yards if he was available. Unfortunately, we’ll never know how Jalen Hurts would’ve coped if his 6-foot-5, 256-pound security blanket wasn’t finding gaping pockets of space all night long.

We could go on a tangent about what Curl means to the defense, but we’ll leave you with this: when does he get start getting mentioned in contract extension conversations? Might be time to revist those.