- 2 days ago
Ben Standig from Substack joins G&D to detail his observations from the first day of Commanders' OTAs.
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00:00First, let's go out to Ashburn and our buddy Ben Standig.
00:02You know him from his sub-stack where he covers the Commander's standing room only.
00:07Joining us now, hello Benjamin, how are you?
00:12Fellas, I'm doing great.
00:15Football season is not really back, but kind of back, so it was good to be out there.
00:19So I always wonder about these OTAs, and whether or not there's value in them,
00:24because unequivocally there is, just to go out and see guys in person
00:27and put bodies and movements with names and rosters and whatever,
00:31but what matters and what doesn't.
00:33When you went out there today, what was your plan of attack covering this thing
00:37for your followers over at Last Man Standing?
00:42Yeah, I mean, it's kind of the basics.
00:45Like, you know, take attendance.
00:46Who's there was kind of surprising to me that Laramie Tunsil was actually there today
00:51after he skipped all the OTAs last year.
00:53And from what I could tell, it looked like everybody was there except for a few guys
00:57who were still recovering from injuries from last year.
01:00That's always a positive sign.
01:02But, you know, that's been the norm around here, so that was good to see.
01:06You know, you try to get a sense of – I don't love all the time in season
01:12when questions are being asked about what's the mood, what's the culture here
01:16during the season because that's whatever.
01:20But now it does kind of matter.
01:22What is the tone after last year's miserable season?
01:26Is there more intensity happening in these drills?
01:30These are, you know, non-contact drills for the most part.
01:32But still, like, what are guys – do guys seem to be going through this
01:37with a little more juice than we saw a year ago?
01:40And I would say the answer to that is yes,
01:42and some of the players suggested that as well.
01:46You know, you also want to see for some guys, you know, do they look any different physically?
01:50And, you know, there is a little bit to who's being used where and when,
01:55but obviously it's – that part is a little bit less interesting right now
01:59because it's a lot of mixing and matching and so on.
02:01So I think those are sort of the main components.
02:04And obviously for this team in particular, you've got Jayden Daniels, the quarterback,
02:07and not that I was expecting anything less than the high level of player
02:12that we've seen in his first two years.
02:14But still, you know, what's he up to coming off that, you know, injury-plagued season?
02:18So I saw that Tunsell was there, and that's kind of the first thing that made me turn my head,
02:22Ben,
02:22just to your point.
02:23Not only did that come last year, that wasn't his M.O.
02:26or that was his M.O. in every other place he's been pretty much.
02:29It was like, nope, I work out on my own.
02:30I'm not bothering with that.
02:31And he shows up and plays well, so you don't really care as much.
02:34But that's a sea change.
02:35I think that's actually pretty cool that he decided to post.
02:38Let's go into that a little bit more.
02:40What do you think the impetus was?
02:41Was it just, as you said, the bad taste in his mouth?
02:43Was it the new contract?
02:44Was it like an expanded role maybe for leadership?
02:46What do you think?
02:49Yeah, honestly, I think it's probably a lot of those things.
02:52Now, my understanding is we should not necessarily expect him to be there.
02:56The other OTAs that we're going to see, now, we only get to go out there one day a week.
03:01The team is on the field for three days.
03:03So, I don't know what's going to happen necessarily on the days that we're not there.
03:06He works out in Alabama often during the offseason.
03:10That's one of his bases of operations.
03:12So, he may be back and forth between Alabama and here.
03:15But, like you said, I think he really liked – he obviously hated the season, as they all did.
03:23But he really felt comfortable coming here after things kind of soured with Houston.
03:27And I think, you know, he's taken a mentor role with Josh Connerly and Brandon Coleman.
03:32And, you know, I think all that kind of comes into play.
03:35So, yeah, he, I guess, wanted to be around the guys, be part of it.
03:37Now, he also, to be clear, he did the individual work, but he did not participate in, like, 11-on
03:46-11s that other guys are out there.
03:49So, he didn't do that much.
03:51But, again, this is a guy, like you said, throughout his career, he's kind of done his own thing.
03:55And he's a five-time Pro Bowler, arguably could have been a 6-1 last year.
03:59So, he knows what he's doing.
04:01I don't think anybody has an issue, but it was good to see him, I'm sure, for all the players,
04:05to see him out there for this first OTA.
04:07At Ben Standing on Twitter, you asked a great question to Jaden Daniels about Brandon Ayuk.
04:13It was the first time that I'd heard him publicly talk about the possibility of him coming in.
04:17I'm sure you had to couch it based on the fact that Ayuk's currently on a roster.
04:22But I found his answer interesting.
04:24He essentially had a chance to endorse the possibility of bringing him in if he becomes available.
04:29Didn't necessarily do that.
04:31On the flip side, didn't say, hey, we got the guys we need in the building, we don't need them.
04:34I thought he answered it very, very well.
04:36But what did you make of what he had to say about Ayuk?
04:41Yeah, I mean, I left the question just more broadly.
04:45Because, obviously, and this is the reality, forget whether Ayuk would eventually land here once San Francisco decides to release
04:51him,
04:52or however that situation ends, where is Brandon Ayuk with playing football?
04:56There's been, like, seemingly no communication with anybody in the football world when it comes to what he is up
05:03to.
05:03He has not played since 2024.
05:05He's coming off a knee injury.
05:06He left the 49ers last year.
05:09We heard, you know, Kyle Shanahan and others there say, hey, we don't really know what's going on, but we've
05:14moved on from him.
05:16But Gaten Daniels is one of his good friends.
05:19Players can talk to players.
05:21It's just that, like, Adam Peters and Dan Quinn and the staff can't talk to him.
05:25So the question was, essentially, what is your sense of his football future?
05:28And he just said, hey, look, I don't, you know, I really don't know, which is interesting as well.
05:34I maybe, you know, there was no other questions about it from myself or anyone else.
05:38And it would have been, maybe I should have said, hey, I didn't talk to him recently, but regardless, you
05:43know, he, you know, he said, hey, I don't know what's going on with that,
05:47which I think in and of itself is sort of interesting, right, because that's kind of where we've been with
05:51most answers when it comes to Brandon Ayuk.
05:54I will say that, like, I tweeted out the video of Jaden answering my question, and it was all completely
06:01fine and reasonable.
06:02The amount of people who think it was a ridiculous question blows my mind.
06:06I'm so stunned that anybody would think you don't want this question.
06:10Who's saying that?
06:11What do you mean?
06:11Who said that?
06:13Well, go look at, go look at the responses to my tweet.
06:15I know.
06:16You know better than to look at Twitter comments.
06:19Are you kidding me?
06:20But I mean, look, I'm a man of the people, Grant.
06:23I like to know what people are thinking and saying.
06:25I'm just stunned that people like that.
06:27How would you ask that question?
06:29I'm like, what are you talking about?
06:29This is like the one guy, Jaden Daniels, in the entire football world who actually seems to be friends with
06:35this guy who might know.
06:37So, to me, it was a completely obvious question, and I argue that there should have been other ones.
06:41But, yeah, I think Jaden handled it fine.
06:43The question was completely reasonable and necessary, considering all the Ayuk talk, not just about Washington, but about, you know,
06:50his future in general.
06:51Well, the entire assumption is that he's advocating for Brandon Ayuk behind the scenes because they're friends, and we haven't
06:58heard him talk about it yet.
06:59It's a perfect question.
07:01Yeah, 100%.
07:02I mean, yeah, that is the assumption that he's going to eventually land here because of his relationship with Daniels
07:09and also to a degree with Peters.
07:10So, yes, it's not like asking about, I didn't ask about Stephon Diggs.
07:15I didn't ask about, you know, A.J. Brown or anybody else.
07:18It was this one guy.
07:19So, completely reasonable.
07:20Some people, I don't get it.
07:22But, again, that's my fault.
07:23Don't look at the comments.
07:24I understand.
07:25Let me just finish deleting my comment.
07:26Ben standing with us here on GND.
07:30So, I know at the risk of angering for the Twitter commenters, where do you think it stands at this
07:35point?
07:35Is it a, I mean, obviously, from the team perspective, they're going to do the thing where we can't talk
07:39about it, et cetera.
07:40Everyone's kind of said the right thing.
07:42But is this still a matter of time, as a lot of folks believe?
07:49I mean, there's no other rumors out there in terms of if Iyuk is going to play, it seems like
07:56it will be here.
07:56There is no other, you know, no other teams that ever get mentioned.
07:59There's no even, like, vague reports of, hey, the such-and-such might be interested in Iyuk if he's available.
08:05Or maybe they would even trade a seventh-round pick or something.
08:08So, it seems like it's Washington or bust.
08:10But the question is, where is Iyuk's head at on all this?
08:15This is the one time I would like to see a player work out video.
08:19But normally, I don't care what they're all doing in the offseason.
08:22They're just showing themselves, you know, running sprints or listing or whatever.
08:26This is a time I'm like, show us, Brandon Iyuk, that you're actually getting ready for this.
08:30Because we heard at various points in the offseason from his wide receiver coach, T.J. Hushmanzada, that he had
08:35not talked to Iyuk in some time.
08:37We've had no reports of him doing much of anything.
08:41You know, who knows?
08:42So, it's hard to say we're watching into that.
08:45I mean, to me, if they're going to go down this route and add another guy, I think Stephon Diggs
08:50makes more sense.
08:51He's been productive every year of his career.
08:53And even if you think there's some questions about his, you know, that he wears out his welcome, and it
08:59doesn't seem like that happened in New England, yet they also decided to go in different directions.
09:03That even if all that's the case, if you're going to bring in something of a risk with Iyuk, why
09:07not go for the guy who just last year had over 1,000 yards on a team that made the
09:11Super Bowl?
09:12So, that would be my view.
09:14But maybe they're just locked in on Iyuk and they're just waiting out the 49ers.
09:17That's still, it's hard to say at this point.
09:20Substack, Ben Standing, it's last man standing.
09:23Go check it out.
09:24Subscribe for quality Commanders coverage.
09:26What about Daniels on being under center and the offensive changes that loom?
09:32I said to Danny earlier today, I found a lot of what he had to say reassuring.
09:36He certainly projects a ton of confidence in the fact that he's trained for this and is prepared for this.
09:43Even if we haven't seen it in games, it sounds like it's been part of his repertoire for a long
09:47time.
09:49Yeah, I mean, obviously, when he was thriving at LSU, he was also largely in shotgun, as it was here
09:56the first two years under Cliff Kingsbury.
09:58But, yeah, he's played in that system in general.
10:01I guess for most quarterbacks, right, it is, I don't want to say it's part of the DNA, but, you
10:06know, that that is, you know, for enough guys, that is part of how they, you know, grow up playing
10:12the game and things like that.
10:14So, yeah, he seems to be pretty comfortable with this, you know.
10:18Do you think it's going to be a little deal or a big deal?
10:21Like the amount of under center, the moving around, you know, bootlegging, just the difference in the asks for him.
10:28Speed bump or kind of a legit obstacle?
10:33I mean, I would probably just say speed bump.
10:35I mean, I expect them to do that a fair amount, and I don't expect him to struggle with it
10:41in any real noticeable way.
10:44It is a new system under David Blau with new, you know, pass patterns, and obviously some of the personnel
10:50is different.
10:51And the biggest thing is, like, if you're going to do more play action, which does give you that opportunity,
10:56you're turning your back to the defense as you make the fake handoff and then turn around.
11:01So, there may be some getting used to that for sure, but, you know, whether it's using the VR or
11:07just practicing as he has been doing, I'm sure he did a ton of that with his personal coaches during
11:13the offseason.
11:13I'm sure he'll be more than fine once the season comes around.
11:19Man, let's go to the defensive side of things at the risk of that question that drives me crazy.
11:23Vibe seemed pretty good today, right, with some of the new defenders, and Javon Kinlaw felt free to drop a
11:28couple expletives telling you about how good everybody feels.
11:30But, yeah, it's a bit of a page turn from running it back for a bad defense that they did
11:36last year.
11:37You know, the 24 defense wasn't good.
11:39It was way worse than 25, and there's a lot of new faces, a lot of changes there up front,
11:44first-round pick, a whole bunch of free agents, et cetera.
11:46What did we see there?
11:49You know, the depth was such a concern here, right, the first two years.
11:53Like, any time they had one or two injuries, it felt like, oh, boy, that position group is going to
11:57fall apart.
11:57And here, you didn't have Dorrance Armstrong, you didn't have Dietrich Wise or Tim Settle, all guys who ended last
12:05year on IR,
12:06and they're still working their way back to some degree for training camp.
12:10And yet, you still had out there, along with Daron Payne and Javon Kinlaw, now you have Owe and Chason,
12:17guys, you know, coming off of the edge,
12:19not to mention Sonny Stiles, the first-round pick, Leo Chennault, at linebacker, Charles Amenta, who another free agent signed,
12:27and they had him, who's a guy that can play all over the line.
12:29And seeing all these different guys, again, not to say you don't want all the pieces you possibly can have,
12:34but, like, you're like, oh, okay, that's a group right now that could go out and play if they had
12:38to,
12:39and you probably would feel pretty reasonable about it, all things considered.
12:43I didn't mention, you know, Johnny Newton's still here as well.
12:46So, you know, every guy I just basically said is, you know, under 30, fast, you know, this event is
12:55much younger,
12:55much faster than it was a year ago, you know, to your point of Kinlaw dropping some expletives.
13:01It was essentially to the point of saying, what does it mean to have all these guys?
13:05And he said he didn't really care so much about the youth,
13:08but in terms of, like, the, you know, the speed and the ability to make plays,
13:12yes, that was where the bleep kick comes into play.
13:16And it's hard to argue with him.
13:18I wouldn't say we know for sure they're going to be a top half of the league defense or anything
13:22like that,
13:23but there is an opportunity to be a much better defense, to be more aggressive,
13:27to make more plays, generate more turnovers, just simply based on the new pieces that they added.
13:31Yeah, he said, excuse my language after his F-bomb, and then proceeded to curse 11 more times in his
13:39answer.
13:40Which, like, people think it's hilarious when players, like, curse.
13:43I didn't think it was that funny, but I will say, it's legitimately and certifiably funny
13:48when you go, excuse my language, and then curse 11 more times.
13:52It's almost like you feel like you said, no disrespect, and then you can say whatever you want after that.
13:58Respectfully, and then you insult somebody.
14:00Darius took 90 minutes before the show and bleeped everything out, so here's the cut that we're talking about.
14:05What do you think about the new pieces they added defensively, you know, on the D-line, O-Way, several
14:11guys.
14:11Yeah, they, yeah, we got some more, now.
14:14Excuse my language, but, yeah, O-Way, he can go.
14:18Charles and Manny, you can go.
14:19K. LeVon can go.
14:21Tim Settle, he can go.
14:23Who else am I missing?
14:24Then we got D-wise back.
14:25You already know he can go.
14:26We got D-A coming back.
14:28He can go.
14:29Jerzon can go.
14:30I mean, D-Pain can go.
14:32You know, it's going to be exciting, bro.
14:33It's going to be super exciting to play with these guys, for sure.
14:38A lot of talent, bro.
14:39I'm just excited, bro.
14:41I'm super excited.
14:42It's not a Jimmy Kimmel bit where you just blur out words so that it sounds like he's cursing.
14:46The random swearing, yeah.
14:47It was 11 bleeps after Excuse My Language.
14:52Legends.
14:53I mean, yes, you're right.
14:55It is, like, it's not as great as it always sounds to be, but right, in that context.
14:59And also sort of like, you know, the first day of school.
15:03You know, sure, if that's how he wants to express his excitement, go ahead.
15:08It's better than stonewalling us and offering up.
15:11But, yeah, no big deal.
15:12We'll be fine.
15:14No, okay.
15:14He's expressing his excitement, and he chose to do it in a very colorful way.
15:18So, why not?
15:19He was sneaky, one of the more disappointing players last year.
15:23I know his role is not to get 20 sacks.
15:25That's not who he is.
15:26But just not much disruption.
15:28It's sort of like if you're going to pay a guy like they paid him to do more than he's
15:31done in previous stops, you know, you'd find a bunch of guys to be smart cars to play on first
15:37down.
15:37He didn't really do much of anything when you kind of look at last year.
15:40Ben, how much more do you expect from Kinlaw?
15:44Yeah, you know, look, I think the reality is he's not the kind of guy who by himself is going
15:50to dominate.
15:52There were some times where he made some wow plays because he is that crazy athletic, and his physical stature
15:58is pretty impressive.
15:59But, you know, they only had really one defensive end last year in Dorrance Armstrong.
16:03They lose the other starter, Dietrich Wise, in Week 2.
16:05And from that point on, you know, once Armstrong went out in Week 7, there was no reason for the
16:11other teams to focus on the edges so they could just say, hey, Jaron Payne, Javon Kinlaw, you're not going
16:17to beat us.
16:18Now, obviously, with Owe and Chason in particular, not to mention Tim Settle, you know, they have far more options.
16:25So if he gets more one-on-one opportunities, I think we'll see more production out of him.
16:30You know, again, the money last year, you're right, it was a surprising contract.
16:34And then because there wasn't a ton of other notable moves, I was kind of one of the biggest one
16:39almost, then it's like, okay, this is the big move.
16:42Well, let's see it.
16:43And then he really isn't that guy at this stage.
16:46So I think there's more to him.
16:48There's a good upside because of the athleticism and size and versatility.
16:52And now, again, with other guys who are going to demand double teams or just got to pay more attention
16:58to what they're up to, and also the linebackers as well, that should free him up for more production this
17:03year, I think.
17:03Last man standing on Substack, Ben Standing out in Ashburn.
17:07Thank you, buddy.
17:08We appreciate it.
17:11By the way, Grant, somebody today said to me, I should start introducing myself as Substack Standing because they like
17:16you when you do that.
17:17Oh, I get size for that.
17:18Just know that.
17:19I'm in.
17:21Substack Standing.
17:21It's part of the brand.
17:22Embrace it.
17:23That should be your Substack.
17:24Maybe next time I'm out of the bar, I'll throw that in there and see what happens.
17:30It will only lead to good things, I can tell you that.
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