3 important stats that could regress for the Commanders in 2022
By Jerry Trotta
The Washington Commanders mandatory minicamp will conclude on Thursday before the highly-anticipated training camp begins in late-July. After camp, the team will break for a month’s-long vacation, though some rookies and players on the roster bubble will be subject to stick around in Ashburn to improve their craft.
While the absence of Terry McLaurin has dominated headlines, Washington appears to be in good spirits from a team perspective. That can be attributed to how Ron Rivera and team leaders like Jonathan Allen have navigated the off-field controversy surrounding defensive coordinator Jack Del Rio and owner Dan Snyder.
While most of the Commanders’ core is returning for 2022, the expectation is the club will implement a different approach on both offense and defense after they finished with a combined 14 wins over the last two seasons.
With that in mind, we picked out three key statistics that could regress for the Commanders next campaign. Let’s dive right in!
These 3 Commanders stats could experience regression in 2022
3. Field Goals Attempted Per Game
The most infuriating part of Washington’s offense last season was their failure to execute in the red zone. In terms of touchdown percentage, Ron Rivera’s group ranked 26th by finding the end zone on just 52 percent of their red zone trips.
In turn, that resulted in the kicking unit being deployed much more frequently than fans would’ve liked. In fact, the team finished 12th with 1.9 field goals attempted per game in 2021. For context, the Bengals ranked second with 2.3 field goal attempts, so not much separated the Commanders from cracking the top five.
That 1.9 average should regress in a big way next season following the acquisition of Carson Wentz, who should be more deadly in the red area than Taylor Heinicke. Additionally, the returns of Logan Thomas and Curtis Samuel and draft selections of Jahan Dotson, bruising running back Brian Robinson Jr. and 6-foot-6 tight end Cole Turner should pay huge dividends in scoring more touchdowns.
While there’s nothing wrong with settling for three points, if everything goes according to plan the Commanders will rank near the bottom half of the league in field goals attempted per game (maybe 1.6 or lower) next season.