Let me pose this hypothetical question for Washington Commanders fans. Who would you rather have on the roster today — wide receiver Jaylin Noel and safety Treydan Stukes or … nobody?
Noel and Stukes were two of the players the Commanders selected with draft picks they traded to acquire wide receiver Deebo Samuel Sr. and left tackle Laremy Tunsil before the 2025 season.
A year later, Houston’s Noel has more receiving yards than any current Commanders wideout, while the Las Vegas Raiders seem convinced that Stukes is a budding star.
Meanwhile, in Washington, Samuel is long gone, and Tunsil is injured.
This is a pretty accurate microcosm of why the Commanders have won just six of their last 23 games since the start of the 2025 season. Bad luck with injuries and poor personnel decisions have turned one of the league's most exciting teams in 2024 into an afterthought in 2026.
Commanders' catastrophic 2025 season threatens to leave them mired for years to come
We recently profiled the opposite directions the Commanders and Chicago Bears appear to be headed as the season nears its halfway point. Two years ago, both teams were in very different places.
Washington was on their way to the NFC title game. The Bears were in free fall. Why have things changed so dramatically, seemingly in the blink of an eye?
While Washington traded away five draft picks — two on Day 2 and three more on Day 3 — Bears general manager Ryan Poles also traded for two veterans. He dealt a pair of Day 3 picks to acquire offensive linemen Jonah Jackson and Joe Thuney.
Jackson and Thuney have played over 2,300 snaps for the Bears in the last two seasons — virtually every offensive play they have run.
Thuney graded out in the top 10 amongst all guards in 2025. Jackson is currently in the top 10 this season. That’s pretty good return for a couple of Day 3 selections.
Commanders general manager Adam Peters' moves in the 2025 offseason were uniformly disastrous.
Commanders went all-in after NFC title game appearance, and Adam Peters lost
Tunsil was the only veteran who performed as expected that year. In addition to Samuel, the Commanders invested significant free agent money in Javon Kinlaw, Will Harris, Von Miller, Jonathan Jones, and Matt Gay. Those players cost roughly $45 million in 2025.
Kinlaw is the only one who remains with the team this season.
Bringing in older players — and re-signing their own older free agents like Zach Ertz and Bobby Wagner — didn’t merely result in a 5-12 season. It seriously delayed the progress of the younger players Peters was theoretically building his roster around.
Several of the club’s 2024 draft picks likely would have flamed out if given prominent roles in 2025, but we really won’t know. Peters apparently didn’t trust any of his selections aside from Jayden Daniels and Mike Sainristil enough to give them a chance.
Kinlaw took snaps from Jer’Zhan Newton. Ertz from Ben Sinnott. Tunsil relegated Brandon Coleman to the bench, and Samuel did the same for Luke McCaffrey.
Wagner was supposed to mentor Jordan Magee. Instead, he kept the second-year player off the field. Javontae Jean-Baptiste got hurt in Week 4, but he probably wasn't going to play ahead of Miller.
The Bears didn’t exactly hit home runs with a couple of defensive free agents. But at least Dayo Odeyingbo and Grady Jarrett filled rotational spots, and neither obviously hindered the development of younger players. Both are still starting in their second year.
On offense, they completed their line rebuild with center Drew Dalman. He had a very good year in 2025, but then surprisingly retired from football in the offseason at 27.
The Bears responded by trading a fifth-round pick for veteran Garrett Bradbury. He hasn't been a world beater, but he's provided steady play at center this season.
Compare that to what Peters did at center this year.
Commanders' botched center strategy put Jayden Daniels at risk
He didn't face the sudden retirement of a young starter. Peters willingly parted with Tyler Biadasz. He played 1,900 snaps for Washington in 2024 and 2025 and had a year remaining on his deal. He was unceremoniously released early in the offseason.
No reason was given. We may never know what prompted the move.
What became clear, though, was that Peters had no viable plan for replacing him. We can speculate on whether he thought Pro Bowler Tyler Linderbaum was locked up. But when everything settled, he did not.
While Chicago invested in an offensive line to protect its young quarterback, Caleb Williams, Peters simply tossed out one of the two most important protectors for Daniels.
The other key protector was Tunsil, and that was simply bad luck. The Ole Miss product got hurt. He was not particularly old, but he had dealt with injuries during his time in the NFL.
You can't blame Peters for this, though it tends to happen as teams get older.
Had Tunsil been the only major injury over the last two seasons, the Commanders would have won more games. The fact that both Daniels and Terry McLaurin missed significant time in 2025 — and have both been hurt again in 2026 — has been devastating.
Terry McLaurin was never the same after Commanders' contract holdout
These are Washington’s best offensive players. Few teams could survive losses like that.
The McLaurin hold-in during the 2025 offseason will require a more detailed discussion later. It does seem as though that was the beginning of the unraveling. He was essential to the club’s success in 2024 and never seemed the same afterward. Could Peters have handled it better? That’s a complicated question.
Here’s what we can say, though. Until he signed Stefon Diggs two months ago, he never found a complementary receiver for McLaurin, which made his diminished play and eventual injuries all the more devastating.
Jaylin Lane, Treylon Burks, Chris Moore, Dyami Brown (for a second stint) — these are the receivers who have played major roles for the Commanders over the past two seasons. Antonio Williams looks very promising and hopefully will become a key part of Washington’s offense going forward. He has to.
McLaurin’s future is very much in doubt, and Diggs turns 33 this month.
What have the Bears done? They provided Williams with Luther Burden III in last year’s draft and signed Kalif Raymond to man the slot this year. They joined Rome Odunze to form a solid young receiving corps.
The Bears also have a two-tight end set: Colston Loveland (2025 draft pick) and Cole Kmet. Last year, they combined for more than 1,000 receiving yards and eight touchdowns while Washington’s top two tight ends — both acquired by Peters — had 618 yards and five scores.
Like the Commanders, the Bears lost their starting left tackle Braxton Jones earlier this year. He was developing into a first-rate edge protector before injuries slowed him last season. Knowing his history, Poles chose Ozzy Trapilo in the second round of the 2025 draft.
Bears have simply built a more sustainable product, while the Commanders are treading water
This year, Trapilo has been unavailable, recovering from a serious injury suffered in last year’s playoffs. So the Bears have been using undrafted free agent Theo Benedet since Jones went out. And they have hardly missed a beat.
If you place any stock in Pro Football Focus grades, it is hard to get past this item. Benedet — the Bears' third-string UDFA left tackle — has a higher grade this season than both Josh Conerly Jr. and Brandon Coleman. Peters drafted these tackles in the first and third rounds, respectively.
Chicago has clearly done a better job building a quality offense. They also clearly have a better offensive-minded head coach. That's a story for another day. But their defense has lagged.
Unfortunately, that was true of the Commanders in 2025, despite having a respected defensive-minded coach like Dan Quinn at the helm.
Both Peters and Poles have remade their defenses since taking over. In Chicago, only one Bears starter remains in a prominent role who predated the front-office leader's arrival in 2022.
The Commanders’ defense has witnessed similar turnover in Peters’ two-plus seasons.
Commanders have hard work ahead as the Bears move right to the cusp of contending
It has essentially turned over twice. He inherited a sinkhole in 2024 and built a middle-of-the-pack unit in his first season. Since then, their play has deteriorated.
In 2025, they ranked dead last in total defense, forcing another radical rebuild. This year, they boast six new starters. The results have been a modest improvement in yards allowed. But they are actually surrendering more points than in 2025 and rank near the bottom in most important categories.
Several of Peters’ new acquisitions are playing reasonably well for the Commanders, but apart from Sonny Styles, are there any young players around whom the team can reliably build?
The Bears have a similar emerging young star in safety Dillon Thieneman along with more young starters. Their defense is not exceptional, but they currently far outpace Washington in points allowed and total yards.
And they just traded for defensive lineman Jeffrey Simmons, an elite interior force who should elevate the entire unit.
We’ll see how that will work out. There are no guarantees. Just ask the Los Angeles Rams. But Chicago is in position to make such a move because they have a legitimate shot at the title this year.
They built a quality roster and then made a big trade to hopefully serve as the final piece.
The Commanders have not done any of that.
Things are clearly better than they were under previous ownership, but there are still too many personnel misfires. Combined with some very bad luck on the injury front, that has left Washington treading water while Chicago ascends.
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