The Washington Commanders‘ Week 2 preseason game against the Kansas City Chiefs was the definition of a snooze fest. Well, the first half had some highlights, but they largely featured Patrick Mahomes buying himself time in the pocket before eventually locating a wide open receiver in the secondary.
Nobody cares that Washington lost the game. The big bummer is the performance was so lackluster that there wasn’t much to feel good about. The starting offense only got a couple drives and didn’t make any big plays. The starting defense, meanwhile, gave up big play after big play while Mahomes was in.
There wasn’t much to learn from the Saturday afternoon game at Arrowhead, but these lessons stood out and feel pertinent moving forward.
3 things we learned from Commanders loss to the Chiefs
3. Taylor Heinicke Is Still QB2
Most Commanders fans are enamored with Sam Howell, who single-handedly brought Washington back from the dead against Carolina with 145 passing yards and two rushing touchdowns.That led to some buzz that Howell took reps with the first-team offense in practice this week, but ESPN’s John Keim threw cold water on those rumors.
As much as we love the idea of Howell leapfrogging Heinicke on the depth chart, the fifth-round pick has a lot of developing to do. There’s no reason to expedite that process and Heinicke reminded the Howell Hive (is that a thing?) he’s still the backup by slicing up the Chiefs’ second-team defense.
That doesn’t mean Howell doesn’t have the higher ceiling or superior arm talent, but Heinicke is one of the league’s top backups and one week of preseason was never going to see him supplanted by a fifth-round rookie.
Let’s put this conversation on ice for the time being.
2. Third-Down Defense Could Be Jack Del Rio’s Undoing
We hate to keep beating a dead horse, but we’ll stop doing that when the Commanders’ defense start showing some fight on third down.
You know the story. Washington finished 31st in opponent conversion rate on third down last season at 48.47 percent. Last week, they allowed Carolina to complete 61.1 percent (11-of-18) of their third down attempts.
On Saturday, Kansas City converted its first three third downs. A third and six resulted in a 14-yard completion. A third and 10 resulted in a pass interference penalty, albeit a questionable one. And a third and 10 resulted in a 40-yard completion.
We know Patrick Mahomes is a human cheat code at quarterback, but Washington allowed Baker Mayfield, Sam Darnold and PJ Walker to do the same thing last week. Sure, they offered more resistance relative to Mahomes, but the struggles on third down were eerily similar and fans are right to be worried.
Fact of the matter is Washington didn’t muster a third down stop until Kansas City took out its starters. Through a decent chunk of the second quarter, the Chiefs were 6-for-6 on third down. That cannot happen, but it still is.
The Commanders’ defense has loads of talent, but they’ll get steamrolled — even against lesser competition than KC — if they can’t get off the field on third down. Through two preseason games, it looks as though they haven’t made any improvements from last season. Not a great start for Jack Del Rio.
1. Brian Robinson is RB1
Commanders fans were itching with anticipation to see which running back would start the game. That became evident after Antonio Gibson fielded the opening kickoff. From there, Robinson took the first carry of the game with the starters.
Gibson did feature on the opening drive, but it was only to relieve Robinson, who got plenty of touches early. It’s clear the rookie third-round pick is first on the depth chart after Gibson fumbled against the Panthers and Ron Rivera criticized his running style, saying he should focus on running straight instead of sideways.
Much like Week 1, Robinson looked strong in the opening series. He averaged 4.7 yards on three carries and picked up tough yards along the way. He’s always generating positive yardage by falling forward and running with a purpose.
If the Alabama product continues running like this, he just might keep hold of the starting job once the regular season rolls around. There wasn’t much to feel good about from this game, but Robinson was a clear bright spot … again.