Commanders’ Ron Rivera’s postgame quote shows troubling lack of urgency

The Washington Commanders got their doors blown off by the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday. With the Eagles looking like a surefire contender, this was a litmus test game for Ron Rivera’s squad and they failed with flying colors.

You’d honestly be hard-pressed finding any positives from the game.

Benjamin St-Juste was a menace in coverage, Antonio Gibson ran hard and Daron Payne accounted for Washington’s first two points by blowing up a running play in the end zone. Of course, that came after the Commanders failed to score on 4th and goal from the one-yard line, so fans could hardly even celebrate the play.

In a nutshell, the Commanders laid an egg for the second straight week. Surely there was no way they could play as bad of a first half as they did in Detroit, right? Somehow, they managed to upstage that disaster seven days later.

With two straight dud performances, Rivera is starting draw the ire of fans. While he acknowledged the team has to play better, one postgame comment encapsulated a troubling lack of urgency for a head coach in Year 3 of a rebuild.

Commanders head coach Ron Rivera’s lack of urgency is concerning.

Someone frame that tweet and send it to the Commanders facility, please.

Fans have been outraged by Washington’s approach to fill depth at key positions. When Phidarian Mathis went down with a season-ending knee injury, they signed undrafted free agent Donovan Jeter and former UDFA Benning Potoa’e, who played 26 NFL snaps before signing to the practice squad last week.

The Commanders also claimed Cowboys fifth-round pick John Ridgeway. On Sunday, Potoa’e and Ridgeway combined to play 29 snaps. Neither player was on the active roster this time last week. If you throw William Bradley-King into the mix, the number jumps to 53 combined snaps. Bradley-King wasn’t active the first two games.

We’re all for signing young players, but you’re asking players who have minimal NFL experience to play significant snaps in important games. Why not bring in a veteran like Sheldon Richardson, Linval Joseph or Ndamukong Suh? You don’t think Jonathan Allen and Daron Payne would benefit from having another proven lineman in the rotation?

Finally, we get to the cornerback position. Rachad Wildgoose had one career defensive snap before Sunday. He played 48 snaps vs the Eagles and looked over his head, getting flagged for two pass interference penalties in the first half.

Again, Rivera is in Year 3 of a “rebuild” or culture facelift and coming off consecutive losing seasons and is out here asking guys who have one career snap on their resume to contend with Jalen Hurts, AJ Brown, DeVonta Smith and Dallas Goedert.

Where is the urgency? Go look at the list of available cornerbacks, but bring a bucket because it might make you nauseous.

Kendall Fuller, William Jackson III and Benjamin St-Juste is a solid starting trio on paper. But the former two have been underwhelming (to say the least) in 2022 and there’s zero depth behind them. The Commanders would be screwed if one of them suffered an injury. Lo and behold, Jackson missed Sunday with a back ailment and the secondary had zero answers for Hurts after the first quarter.

Does that happen if Washington has NFL-caliber depth at corner? Maybe, but we’ll never know and that’s part of the problem.

We’re just struggling to understand Rivera’s endgame. Is winning his ultimate objective? Giving opportunities to young players in huge rivalry games? He’s acting as if he just walked through the doors in Ashburn yesterday.