Ranking every starting quarterback for the Washington Commanders throughout Dan Snyder's turbulent reign as owner.
The Washington Commanders have had 27 different quarterbacks start at least one game during Dan Snyder’s 24 years of ownership. You don’t need me to tell you that is not a good statistic. It speaks to the constant state of turmoil and confusion that has plagued the franchise since 1999.
Of those 27 players, only seven managed to have double-digit wins as starters, and only six have career-winning records. That includes Sam Howell and his 1-0 record as a starter.
Only three players have had both – double-digit wins and a career starting record above .500. If you are looking for any glimmer of a silver lining in these abysmal numbers, you can take some solace in the fact that two of those players – Alex Smith and Taylor Heinicke – played during the Ron Rivera regime.
Both are now gone. But at least it suggests that Rivera has managed to foster some semblance of stability as head coach.
What follows is a ranking of each of those 27 signal-callers. The rankings only consider the player’s time with Washington. That matters because, under Snyder, the Commanders brought in six established veterans who had varying degrees of success elsewhere.
The intention was that these quarterbacks would stabilize the position. Two had modest success while the other four proved catastrophic.
I’m going to put them in tiers. Since I have been a teacher at various points in my life, those tiers will be the classic A, B, C, D, F, and I (for incomplete). We’ll begin at the bottom, and work our way up.
I - as in INCOMPLETE
These three quarterbacks started just one game.
Garrett Gilbert - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 0-1
The now-Washington Commanders signed Garrett Gilbert off the New England Patriots practice squad in December 2021 when both Taylor Heinicke and Kyle Allen were in the NFL's COVID-19 protocol. It was the eighth team he had played for in his journeyman career and did not play badly.
Washington was actually tied with the Philadelphia Eagles and their young quarterback Jalen Hurts at halftime. But, as you might expect, it was a simplified offense that didn’t really ever threaten the defense. Heinicke was back the next week and Gilbert would soon be with his ninth NFL team.
Ryan Fitzpatrick - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 0-1
You all know what happened to Ryan Fitzpatrick. The veteran was hurt before he ever got a chance to show anything.
I don’t think he would have been especially good in Washington. But he certainly would have provided some excitement. Sadly, we’ll never know.
Sam Howell - Commanders QB
- Record: 1-0
Sam Howell is the future. I think it’s pointless to try and place active players in any kind of historical perspective. So I’ll only say that every Commanders fan is hoping that whoever writes this article twenty years from now has the former fifth-round selection at the top of the list.
F – as in FAILURE
Jeff George - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 1-6
You can argue that the next three quarterbacks on the list were worse than Jeff George. They were clearly less talented. Then again, most who have ever taken a snap in the NFL were less talented than the former No. 1 overall pick out of Illinois.
He was a member of seven different franchises and though his career numbers are respectable, he managed just three winning seasons. I rank George dead last because of what he meant to the franchise.
Washington had an above-average quarterback in Brad Johnson, but new owner Dan Snyder wanted the flashier name. He forced him onto Norv Turner and then tried to do the same with Marty Schottenheimer the following season.
Marty’s response? He cut George after two games of the 2001 season. Think of how bad you have to be for the coach to cut you – not bench you – but simply cut you after just two games. That’s how bad George was.
Mark Sanchez - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 0-2
Speaking of getting benched, Mark Sanchez was brought in as an emergency replacement when both Alex Smith and Colt McCoy suffered season-ending injuries a couple of weeks apart in 2018. It was an odd choice, and he was truly awful.
Jay Gruden benched him at halftime of his second game, with Washington trailing the 5-8 New York Giants at home 34-0. At that point, Sanchez had thrown for 38 yards, with two picks and had five sacks. He was not heard from in the NFL again.
John Beck - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 0-3
If Mike Shanahan had not proclaimed John Beck the top quarterback coming out of college in 2007, his flameout as a short-time starter four years later would be little more than a footnote. Actually, it’s still just a footnote.
Only with a little dig at Shanny along the way. As with the two preceding names, Washington would be Beck’s final stop on his NFL ride.
Tim Hasselbeck - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 1-4
His 6-foot-4 brother Matt would play 16 years, earn three Pro Bowls and play in a Super Bowl. The 6-foot-1 Tim Hasselbeck would go on to have a pretty good career as a sports journalist.
At least Washington wasn’t his final NFL stop, though it was the only place he ever actually threw a pass.
Donovan McNabb - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 5-8
If you’re an easy grader and want to give Donovan McNabb a D, go ahead. I won’t argue.
I’m giving him an F because he tortured us for years as the Philadelphia Eagles quarterback. Then, when he came to D.C., he didn’t seem to want to be here.
Like George, he had a negative influence on the team that goes beyond his numbers. The fact that we gave up a second and fourth-round pick to get him just adds insult to misery.
Carson Wentz - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 2-5
The Commanders repeated the McNabb folly with Carson Wentz. They wasted a couple of draft picks on a once-promising player who could no longer play.
You could make the case that McNabb should be rated ahead of Wentz, but you’re splitting some tiny hairs there. I have Wentz at the top of the Fs because he proved to be a bland non-entity whereas McNabb was downright surly.
D – as in DISMAL
Danny Wuerffel - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 2-2
Danny Wuerffel was the lesser of the two Florida Gators Steve Spurrier brought with him in 2002. He was good in college. That’s all I’ll say about that.
Dwayne Haskins - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 3-10
I feel bad about ranking Dwayne Haskins this low, and it is only partly due to the tragedy that took his life at 24 years old. As much as anyone on this list, he suffered from the mismanagement of a dysfunctional franchise.
His coach didn’t want him, and instead of encouraging him to go out and make plays – mistakes be damned – he put a leash on him and had him playing more and more tentatively as time went on. It got so bad that the former first-round pick was cut before the end of his second season with the team.
Haskins has to bear a lot of the blame as well. He never seemed mature enough to take on the role of an NFL starter, and he never got the chance to disprove that perception.
Case Keenum - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 1-7
Case Keenum was a career backup who parlayed one great season with the Minnesota Vikings into a couple of decent contracts. His numbers were not all that bad. He simply wasn’t an explosive playmaker.
Keenum remains in the league as a backup, which is where he should be.
Josh Johnson - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 1-2
Josh Johnson has played with 14 different NFL teams and has been a member of the San Francisco 49ers on four separate occasions. He has played in the XFL and in the UFL.
Johnson is the NFL’s definitive journeyman. And he’s also better than Mark Sanchez, the man he replaced as a starter at the end of the catastrophic 2018 season.
Remember that game Sanchez was trailing 34-0 at halftime? Johnson came in and averted the shutout with two fourth-quarter touchdowns. He even converted both two-point tries.
Yep – with Johnson at quarterback, Washington won the second half of that game 16-7.
Rex Grossman - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 6-10
By the time he came to Washington - again, at the end of his career - Rex Grossman was largely a punchline. As in “Knock knock – Who’s there? – A terrible quarterback – Oh, hi, Rex Grossman.”
Like Keenum, Grossman was also a career backup who had one miraculous season. Truth be told, he wasn’t as bad as some would have you believe. But he sure wasn’t very good either.
Colt McCoy - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 1-6
Colt McCoy also was a career backup but followed a different path from Keenum and Grossman. He entered the league as a starter but when he proved unsuccessful, he settled into the backup role rather well.
McCoy actually is one of the better backups Washington has had, but simply could not stay healthy whenever he did get the chance to start.
Shane Matthews - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 3-4
Shane Matthews was the better of the two Florida Gators that coach Spurrier brought in. He wasn’t good either, but he was better than Danny Wuerffel. Faint praise.
C – as in COMMONPLACE
Kyle Allen - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 1-3
I realize I may be the only one who believes this, but I think that if Kyle Allen didn’t get hurt on a Julius Peppers sack late in the first quarter of the now-Washington Commanders' game against the New York Giants midway through the 2020 season, he could have taken the team to the playoffs instead of Alex Smith.
Allen had played pretty well the previous two weeks, and though he started the Giants game miserably, he was just seeming to warm up when the injury occurred. The player showed flashes as a starter for the Houston Texans , but he was wildly inconsistent.
Still, I think he looked good in Scott Turner’s offense, and could have essentially been Taylor Heinicke with a bigger arm.
Todd Collins - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 3-0
Todd Collins’ bubble burst on January 5, 2008, at Qwest Field in Seattle. He had somehow rallied from a 13-0 deficit in the fourth quarter to take a lead in the Wildcard round of the playoffs. But it came crashing down with two subsequent pick-sixes that left Washington as a 35-14 loser.
Prior to that game, Collins had been on a miracle run. He took over from an injured Jason Campbell and led the team to road victories over New York and Minnesota, before stomping Dallas at home to secure a playoff berth.
Collins wasn’t the main reason for the run. The defense played inspired football in the final month of the season, and the entire team seemed to be on a mission in the wake of Sean Taylor’s murder, but the signal-caller was there, and he deserves some credit for that.
Patrick Ramsey - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 10-14
Patrick Ramsey’s career was not unlike that of Dwayne Haskins. He was a first-round draft pick playing for a coach who didn’t want him.
Ramsey split time with the Florida Gators duo in his rookie year, and despite the circuslike atmosphere that surrounded Steve Spurrier’s second and final season, he showed some improvement.
He was still very inconsistent and needed a lot of work, but the talent was obvious. Unfortunately, Joe Gibbs showed little interest in developing the erratic youngster. He preferred a veteran and Ramsey’s improvement hit a wall.
Mark Brunell - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 15-18
Mark Brunell was the veteran that Gibbs wanted. He was well past his prime when he came to Washington, and he was truly atrocious in his first season, sharing starts with Ramsey.
Brunell rebounded in his second year. Though he was not particularly special, he did get the team into the playoffs, and managed to win the Wildcard game – Washington’s last playoff victory to date.
In that postseason win against the Seattle Seahawks, Brunell threw for 41 yards (yes – you read that right}, an interception and no touchdowns. Lavar Arrington, Sean Taylor, and the rest of Washington’s defense won that game. But Brunell did what Coach Gibbs wanted, and it worked better than most things in the Dan Snyder era.
Brunell would continue his mediocre play into the following season before giving way to Jason Campbell.
Jason Campbell - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 20-32
Jason Campbell had one major flaw as a quarterback. He took too many sacks.
Whether that’s because he didn’t process fast enough, or because he was unwilling to give up on a play, it doesn’t really matter. Campbell just took too many sacks.
His defenders will point out that Campbell played his Washington career for one coach who was largely worn out (Gibbs) and another who was woefully overmatched (Jim Zorn). He got sacked so much because he played for some very bad teams.
I think Campbell was a decent player and I give him a lot of credit for staying healthy. He is one of just two quarterbacks in the Snyder era who started every game in consecutive seasons.
B – as in BETTER
Tony Banks - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 8-6
Tony Banks is the forgotten quarterback in recent Washington history. He wasn’t flashy. He wasn’t especially accurate. But there’s an interesting stat associated with Banks.
After flaming out in St. Louis at the beginning of his career, Banks started games over four more years with three different teams. And in those, he never posted a losing record as a starter.
Somehow, he just managed to win. Banks was the quarterback Marty Schottenheimer turned to after ditching Jeff George, who wasn’t the only veteran the coach jettisoned.
The team was going through a major transition and it showed early on. But somehow, Schottenheimer and Banks kept plugging away and ended up going 8-3 over the final 11 weeks of the season.
Still, Snyder fired Marty, and new coach Steve Spurrier thought his Florida Gator stars were better than Banks. They weren’t.
Alex Smith - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 11-5
Alex Smith’s 2020 return from a life-threatening injury is one of the few inspiring stories from the Dan Snyder ownership era. He had proven to be a solid game manager in 2018 before his injury and then missed the entire 2019 season.
When he did take over from Dwayne Haskins and Kyle Allen in 2020, he was largely an immobile, one-legged quarterback. Yet somehow, he still produced wins, and despite deteriorating health which would lead to his retirement, he managed to drag Washington into the playoffs.
Taylor Heinicke - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 12-11
Smith wasn’t healthy enough to suit up for those playoffs. Thus the legend of Taylor Heinicke was born.
I’ll freely admit I was never sold on Heinicke. He has a subpar NFL arm and constantly either missed throws or else endangered his receivers with high floaters. However, there’s no denying that the Washington Commanders played better when he was under center than they did when high-profile guys like Dwayne Haskins or Carson Wentz were there.
At the beginning of this list, I said I may have devalued Jeff George too much due to the expectation that accompanied him. I may be doing the reverse with Heinicke.
Maybe he should be a few spots lower. But Heinicke had no business starting a playoff game against Tom Brady, and he came very close to winning it.
Washington has always loved its longshot backup quarterbacks – whether it’s Babe Laufenberg or Colt Brennan. But those guys never get a real chance to play beyond the pre-season. Heinicke is the longshot backup who actually got a chance to play – and he did pretty well for himself.
Robert Griffin III - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 14-21
Robert Griffin III is the most skilled starting quarterback Washington has had dating back to at least the days of Joe Theismann. His 2012 rookie season ranks with Mark Rypien’s 1991 year and a handful of Sammy Baugh seasons as the best ever for a signal-caller.
Like others on this list, he was sabotaged by the subpar management system that failed to protect his interests. And like others on this list, he must bear some of the blame for what happened.
Griffin insisted on doing things he should not have been allowed to do. He was also never able to transition to the role of pocket passer once his legs were damaged.
The former first-round pick remains one of the great 'what might have been' players in franchise history. He was never very good after his rookie season. But that rookie season – oh my. That’s something longtime Commanders fans will never forget.
A - as in AS GOOD AS IT GETS
Brad Johnson - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 17-10
Brad Johnson was the quarterback when Dan Snyder took ownership of the team. And the owner didn’t want him.
Despite starting every game of the 1999 season and taking the team to the playoffs, Snyder brought in Jeff George the following year. When Johnson stumbled a bit in 2000, the controversial switch arrived.
The fact Johnson went 7-4 as a starter in 2000 and George went 1-4 didn’t seem to matter to the owner. He wanted the big name.
Johnson is the only quarterback on this list to win a Super Bowl. Unfortunately, he did it for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2002, two years after Washington sent him packing in favor of George.
Kirk Cousins - Former Commanders QB
- Record: 26-30-1
The fact that the best-starting quarterback during Dan Snyder's era has a losing record is one more bad sign. You can make those numbers look a bit better if you drop his first three seasons when Kirk Cousins was an occasional spot starter and had a poor record.
Once he took over as the full-time starter, he did have a winning record, but barely. Cousins started every game for three straight campaigns and gave desperately needed stability to the most important position on the field.
He played with largely inferior talent – I defy you to name the team’s leading rusher in each of Cousins’ three starting seasons. He played with some quality pass catchers, but there was a noticeable lack of speed on the outside. Still, the player produced.
When healthy, RGIII was better. Brad Johnson was probably better. Over the course of their long careers, Donovan McNabb and Mark Brunell were better. But as a starter for the team now known as the Washington Commanders, Cousins was the best and most consistent quarterback they had throughout the Snyder years.
BTW – the team leaders in rushing during the Cousins’ years were Alfred Morris, Rob Kelley, and Samaje Perine. Combined, they ran for eight touchdowns in those three years.