3 critical factors behind Commanders GM Adam Peters' franchise regeneration

In the waning days of Dan Snyder’s inglorious tenure as owner of the Washington Commanders, virtually everything about the proud franchise was crumbling. If it wasn’t scandal in the front office, it was incompetence on the field. The team had become a laughingstock.

Josh Harris began making some changes from the moment he assumed ownership, but he wisely waited until the end of the season to begin a drastic overhaul. Like all smart leaders, he surrounded himself with good advisors, conducted a thorough review of the landscape, and then took decisive action.

His first, and most important, decision was to hire Adam Peters as general manager. That move has paid off better than anyone could have expected during his first year in charge of the football operation.

The task that confronted the new arrival was massive. He needed to replenish one of the thinnest rosters in the league. He needed to rebuild a disheveled front office.

It is easy in hindsight to roast Martin Mayhew and Ron Rivera, but we will never really understand just how impossible a position they were in. After all, they were working for an owner who seemed more concerned with preserving his bank account and avoiding the very real threat of legal jeopardy than in doing anything to help his team win football games.

Be that as it may, Peters realized he needed to clean house. He was not merely finding better players and coaches. He was rebuilding an entire culture — restoring a sense of order to a business run amok.

Peters made a lot of decisions on multiple fronts. If they haven’t all been home runs, it is astonishing how much he has gotten right.

Let’s begin with the way he retooled the Commanders front office.

How GM Adam Peters has revitalized the Commanders in 2024

Front office decisions

It was hard at times to know who was in charge of the Washington Commanders over the past few seasons.

Bruce Allen’s failed tenure as team president ended in 2019. Jason Wright stepped into the breach as team president and seemed to spend his entire tenure putting out one fire after another. That led to embarrassing moments like the Sean Taylor statue debacle of 2022.

Martin Mayhew joined a year later as general manager. It was never entirely clear whether he or Ron Rivera was making roster decisions.

The first thing Adam Peters did was to bring in a trusted lieutenant, Lance Newmark, to serve as his assistant. He lured him away from the Detroit Lions, a team with one of the most talented rosters in the NFL. He was instrumental in helping Lions’ general manager Brad Holmes assemble those players.

Peters also raided Detroit for Brandon Sosna, one of the most impressive young executives in the league.

Sosna, still in his early 30s, came on board to handle contracts and analytics. The very fact that the Commanders are heavily invested in analytics is a testament to Josh Harris’ ownership. He got the ball rolling by hiring Eugene Shen, who was almost certainly involved in the wise decision to begin trading off assets like Chase Young and Montez Sweat last season.

Sosna has stepped into Shen’s role. He is now providing the Commanders with top-flight analytics.

Peters snatched veteran scout David Blackburn from the Baltimore Ravens to take over player personnel. The Ravens, like the Lions, have a history of outstanding scouting which has led to consistent on-field success. It became obvious early on that one of Peters’ main strategies was to pluck the best talent he could find from the best franchises in the league.

He also looked outside the box, prying Dave Gardi away from the league office and placing him in the newly created role of vice president of football initiatives. At the same time, he attempted to maintain some continuity by retaining executives like Mayhew and Doug Williams in advisory roles.

Peters may not have been directly involved in the recent decision to bring in Mark Clouse as the new team president in place of Wright. But it is hard to imagine Harris did not at least consult him.

Clouse’s success remains to be seen. At the very least, it appears that the Commanders have a logically-organized front office, filled with competent men and women. That has not been the case for many years.