Instant reactions to Commanders’ embarrassing loss to the Lions

Defense

The Good 

• Daron Payne built off his incredible performance against the Jaguars, with a sack and multiple pressures today. He took full advantage of a depleted Detroit defensive front.
• Benjamin St-Juste had a solid performance for the game. He seemed to be the only one that could stand in the way of Amon Ra St. Brown today. He dropped an interception that you’d love him to corral, overall though it was a solid second game for him at nickel corner.
• Jamin Davis looked like he belonged today. He had a few impressive run fits and kept pace with D’Andre Swift at points. He still made mistakes and remains a project but today was a good step in the right direction.

The Bad

• Everything else for the defense was bad today. So really, an overarching theme may be that Jack Del Rio may need to be shown the door. The team is consistently miscommunicating, the pressure is never consistent, they consistently allow huge plays, and the Lions converted whenever they needed to. And it looked way too easy. Maybe the Lions are just that good on offense that year (they scored 35 against Philly last week), but odds are this is a Del Rio problem.
• The linebackers get the attention and a ton of blame. However, the secondary is consistently the most underwhelming aspect of the defense. They are out of place, slow, and give up far too many big plays. And it isn’t as if it is a unit devoid of talent. Kendall Fuller and William Jackson III should be a good duo, yet it is not. Bobby McCain is a solid safety, yet that seem to not matter. Yeah, the unit is missing Kam Curl but it is very perplexing how poorly that unit consistently plays.
• Other than Daron Payne, the front four struggled to generate pressure. Montez Sweat rarely got to the quarterback and lost containment on St. Brown’s huge rush. Jon Allen got some push but wasn’t his usual dominant force. And the player opposite Sweat, whether that was Smith-Williams, Toohill, or anyone else failed to produce anything.
• Not only is the Commanders’ defense consistently gashed, but they are also the antithesis of opportunistic.
• Why did the Commanders think it was a good idea to make zero changes to a defense that finished 26th in Defensive DVOA? Well, the only changes they did make was reshuffling the interior defensive line depth. And after Mathis’ injury, Rivera is now calling the depth “a concern” along the defensive line. I wonder why. The Commanders’ defense is shaping up to be poor this year if schematically things do not change or the defense starts to create opportunistic turnovers.