5 difficult decisions facing Commanders GM Adam Peters in 2024

Commanders scouting/coaching conundrum

We’ll talk about four specific players after this. But we’re going to begin with a crucial crime-scene reconstruction task.

NFL people generally don’t like to assign blame for past mistakes. Right now, it is essential to understand what went wrong during the Ron Rivera years.

No Washington Commanders player was in contention for any post-season honors or all-star teams. Only one had what could be considered an elite Pro Football Focus grade - Sam Cosmi. Across the board, this team did not have a lot of talent.

Did Rivera, along with Martin Mayhew, Marty Hurney, and the scouts. simply do a poor job in evaluating talent? Or did the front office bring in talented players only to see the coaching staff do a poor job of developing them?

This is a very important distinction that may have a major impact on a group of young players who have underperformed thus far. Players like Saahdiq Charles, Phidarian Mathis, Percy Butler, and Cole Turner could be seen as building blocks for the future if Adam Peters decides they could thrive with better coaching.

For the record, I made my position on this pretty clear when I recently graded the coaching staff for the past season. Except for running backs coach Randy Jordan, safeties coach Richard Rodgers, and perhaps new quarterbacks coach Tavita Pritchard, the Commanders coaches have not adequately developed a single young player brought to the team during the Rivera years, apart from Cosmi, who was drafted to be an offensive tackle.

I believe a lot of the recent failure has been caused by poor coaching.