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How important is it the Commanders take the preseason more serious this season, especially given the opening schedule of games.
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00:00At home at Northwest Stadium, about four and a half hours from right now,
00:05they'll kick off.
00:06Dolphins in town taking on the Commanders.
00:09The question for you guys, who are you most excited to watch play tonight,
00:14and what are you most excited to zero in on?
00:17800-636-1067.
00:21800-636-1067.
00:23Touched on this at the top of the show, but to me it's line play.
00:26Now, I understand on the defensive side, for example,
00:29we're probably not going to see Kinlaw, Adafi Owe, some of the new toys,
00:34some of the exciting pass rushers,
00:35but there are absolutely guys that are going to play this year in that front seven.
00:40To me, it's much harder to evaluate corners and things.
00:44Maybe you'll have some guys in some man-to-man spots just to maybe see if they can do that,
00:48but this is not schemed up.
00:50This is not here to maximize necessarily against the given opponent.
00:54It's a who can do what, and that's kind of what we're trying to figure out.
00:57So to me, the easiest thing to follow is the left tackle against the defensive end,
01:01and I'll talk about that on offense in a second.
01:03The left guard against the defensive tackle at the center.
01:06Guys that are going to play this year on the line, whether they're starters or otherwise,
01:10contributors.
01:11I need to see what they do, and that to me is the most important thing.
01:13It's what I'll be focused on on both sides of the football.
01:16So really, I know it sounds like 1980s, hat on a hat, Oklahoma drill, tough guy stuff,
01:21but to me, that's the easiest thing to evaluate in the preseason where we're not scheming things
01:26up.
01:26We're not doing all the different games and the stunts and the full Durante Jones bag
01:30on defense, maybe the full David Blau bag on offense.
01:33It's a, can you win one-on-one?
01:36And I'm going to try to put you in some of those spots, and I want to see.
01:39Yeah, I think that if you get one-on-one matchups, that's a great call because those are replicable
01:45and sustainable, and that's going to happen, and any kind of game situation that carries
01:50over into the regular season, I think it matters for the eval.
01:56That's why I wouldn't just sit a bunch of guys tonight.
02:00They're probably going to, and I'm okay with the real legitimate established veterans after
02:06a joint practice on Thursday not going.
02:09I don't know that there's really value for a Terry McLaurin or a Stephon Diggs going out
02:14there tonight.
02:15Jaden Daniels is a different conversation and a new offense after the year he had last
02:19year with the injuries and the lack of time on the grass and the lack of practice work,
02:23and we'll talk about that later in the show.
02:26But there is no reason Brandon Coleman shouldn't play tonight, and I think, hopefully, he will
02:32because he just got elevated to the starting job, and he probably needs the reps.
02:36He hasn't played a lot of tackle.
02:38He's been playing guard a bunch.
02:39A guy like Josh Connerly, to me, and we'll see if he plays or he doesn't, but he has not
02:44earned the, hey, man, you just go stand over there with the visor on and laugh during the
02:48preseason game until somebody comes over to interview you in the third quarter.
02:52He's got some work to do.
02:53Yeah, this isn't camo hat with a towel over your shoulder time.
02:56You know what I mean?
02:56Like, let's play.
02:57And so I guess if you're going to have like four, if I'm going to have four of the starters
03:01out there, I'd probably just go up to Sam Cosby and I'm like, hey, man, I hate to do
03:04this to you.
03:05You probably have earned not being out here, but we're going to be out here as a
03:09unit because we're trying to figure this thing out.
03:11And you know what he would say?
03:12Cool.
03:12I like playing football.
03:14Let's drop it up.
03:14No problem.
03:15And to really make him happy, I'd say, and by the way, the emphasis tonight is to try
03:19to get a run game going because we haven't really been able to do it in practice.
03:21And now Sam Cosby's all kinds of steamed up.
03:24But yeah, you tell me you're slamming the ball into the line of scrimmage behind him with
03:28a K-Tron fat man Allen and at the offensive line can't get excited to be out there for
03:33a couple of drives.
03:33I think they absolutely could go in mid nineties, big 10 on this thing.
03:36Let's have some fun.
03:37I'm also curious.
03:38This is less a player.
03:39I've given you some of the names of the players, Antonio Williams, K-Tron Allen, Sonny
03:43Stiles, Drew Stevens, the kicker Coleman.
03:46I throw Colson Yankoff in there who's been maybe my best player at camp in terms of the
03:51down roster guys.
03:53The thing I'm most excited to see, I don't anticipate they're going to empty their playbook,
03:57obviously.
03:59But if they run even remotely as close to some of the stuff that they did against the
04:05Dolphins, I think people are going to see how different this offense looks.
04:10Go into that.
04:10What does that mean?
04:11Well, I think you're going to, first off, you're going to see a lot of under center.
04:14You're going to see a lot of play action bootlegs.
04:16And you're going to see a ton of like the middle of the field layered throws over top
04:22of zoning linebackers and DBs that you see in West Coast offenses that you see in that
04:28Ben Johnson variation or the Kyle Shanahan offense.
04:31You think about like Brock Purdy on a play action, looks like a stretch run now planning
04:36in the back end of the pocket and making that throw over the linebackers trying to get depth
04:41and Traylon Burks is running an over route or whatever.
04:44They ran a lot of that in the practice.
04:45Dan Quinn did say we're going to run some stuff out here and Miami is going to run some
04:49stuff out here that we may not run in games, but there's nothing you're not giving away
04:54that the answer key there that that's very normal, just basic principled stuff in this
04:58offense, but it's going to look different.
05:00People are going to go, oh, wow, that's not Cliff Kingsbury.
05:03I hope you get to see some of that.
05:05And while Durante Jones is not going to show off any of the good stuff, I do hope we see
05:10some some, you know, you're not going to see a lot of blitzes or anything, but some
05:14of the six man fronts and, you know, a guy coming free because there's not enough blockers
05:18there for the defensive lineman.
05:19I just hope people get their first glimpse at these new schemes and the capabilities they're
05:24in.
05:25Just a taste though, right?
05:27Because as you said, it's a fine line between not getting ready and not giving anything away.
05:31Show four pages of the playbook.
05:32But it's still, I'm saying visually what they run looks different than it did.
05:37And I'm hoping people get a view of that.
05:39Yeah, me too.
05:40And the to be able to again, it's it's your what you're always doing with an offense is
05:45there are there are different faders, right?
05:47And what you're emphasizing.
05:48You've had players in the past that could maybe do certain things that that wasn't the
05:52priority because the priority was was something else.
05:54Now, maybe the priorities might shift here.
05:56We might get a feel for why they were so excited to go get Chigakonkwo, even though even
05:59if he's not playing tonight, you go, oh, here's how they can feature the tight end.
06:03Here's this, you know, 12 personnel look or here's what they can sort of do off of this
06:08and really smart people like Logan Paulson come Monday will break it down for us and
06:11tell us, you know, all the different options that this is creating.
06:14And again, it's all it's all tradeoffs, right?
06:16Where you're in the shotgun, you don't have to turn your back to the defense.
06:19Well, you also lose the advantage of this kind of play action and and these sorts of
06:22bootlegs and this sorts of manipulation linebackers.
06:25So there's always, again, kind of kind of a push pull, but it will be a different philosophy,
06:28I think.
06:29And I'm, I'm excited to kind of end the speculation and see some of it.
06:34Also, the safety position.
06:36Nick Cross is the obvious number one safety on this team right now.
06:40He's going to be out there every down that the defense is this year if he's healthy.
06:45I don't know who the other starting safety is, but I would say based on practices.
06:51That guy's Jeremy Reeves is cross playing tonight.
06:56Probably not.
06:57I don't think Reeves is entrenched enough as a starter that he wouldn't play, but that
07:01would be interesting.
07:02And then you go down the depth chart a little bit.
07:05So the next guy is like Kwon Martin.
07:07I feel like he has to have a good game.
07:10Where's Will Harris been in all of this?
07:12Will Harris a year ago.
07:13Look, I've not heard his name at all.
07:15I've barely noticed him and I'm out there at every practice.
07:18Will Harris a year ago at this time was one of the talks of camp and he had the injury
07:22last year and was actually really, really liked by the team.
07:26I mean, they wanted to bring him back and thought he'd be the starter and maybe he is
07:29going to be the starter.
07:29Like if we find out he doesn't play tonight, it just tells you they view him in that light.
07:33But my point is down that safety depth chart, all these guys can play special teams.
07:38Percy Butler flies on special teams.
07:40Tyler Owens, people forget about him, but he could be their best player on special teams
07:45in a world where if Reeves is going to start at safety, he's not doing as much on teams.
07:49So that's a really, really good position.
07:51Do you keep one fewer corner and keep all those safeties that I'm naming?
07:54Does somebody get cut?
07:55I think there's a legit competition there though.
07:58So remember in Kansas City, I think that was the game where this happened the most.
08:02Tyler Owens was when they're, you know, they're watching personnel groupings for the offense
08:06for Kansas City.
08:07And so Owens would be like a quarter of the way on the field along with somebody else.
08:10And if Kansas City went jumbo, he would come off.
08:13Or if they went something else, he would come on.
08:15He's enormous and looks like a linebacker that got lost on the way to the safety meeting.
08:19Like he, I'm not saying he's Sonny Stiles just because they make one of those guys, but
08:23it's that same profile.
08:25Someone that's probably too big to play safety and too fast to play linebacker.
08:28He's kind of a hybrid in between.
08:29I would love to find a good use for that guy.
08:31But I think, you know, as this season progresses, that's a nice luxury to have to have someone
08:36like that in your, in kind of your back pocket.
08:38Are you more fired up to watch the offense or the defense?
08:41Offense.
08:41I think there's going to be more guys that interest people playing on offense.
08:46Probably just because of the O-line being in flux.
08:49It's mostly because of that for me.
08:51Yeah.
08:51Right.
08:51Where I'm going, the, it's probably, it's probably because I just gave kind of a reflexive
08:57answer, but just trying to think about why I feel that way.
08:59It's mostly because of what, of what happened to Lermy Tunsil.
09:02It's mostly because of how in flux this offensive line is.
09:05And even if Connelly doesn't play, even if Cosme doesn't play, I keep hammering this.
09:09What was the, how many years ago was it where they went through five starting centers at
09:13one point?
09:14Like for whatever reason, like this is going to happen.
09:16They moved on from, from Biotrish as if we got it.
09:20It's no problem.
09:21Already one week into camp.
09:22And there's a little bit of an issue.
09:23Alegrady's hurt.
09:24This dude, a good Jones is going to play.
09:26I need to know if that's okay.
09:27It's possible.
09:28I guess we turn on the TV and they're playing way more starters than we're expecting.
09:32I'm basing all of this on what I saw at practice.
09:35And in the past other teams and this team have kind of said, no, that practice
09:39went that way because we weren't going to play in the game.
09:41So if they did both, that would be a real indicator that Dan Quinn means a little more
09:45business this time around.
09:47Yes, it would.
09:47You know, like they have, oh, we had the joint practice.
09:50We didn't really need to get all those guys work.
09:52Now, if they sit 18 guys, it's kind of more of the same.
09:55But if you're playing, it's not going to be all of them.
09:57But let's say you sit seven guys and it's just the, the dudes that would get the veteran
10:01day, the digs, the McLaurin types, like the really, really important guys that have
10:05no real benefit without Daniels out there to being on the field.
10:08I feel like that would be a whole different conversation about the way they're approaching
10:12the preseason.
10:13Seems to me like right now we're driving along at a pretty good clip in the easy pass lane
10:17toward one game where anybody of note plays.
10:21And it's Detroit on the road next week.
10:23And it's a couple of drives.
10:25And that's like your entire August, which doesn't mean they, they wouldn't get up to
10:29speed or be ready.
10:30But you and I have harped on being more prepared to start the season because of the absolute
10:35murderer's row of the schedule.
10:36It just puts that much more pressure on the practices and what they're doing in Ashburn.
10:41If you're still going to, let's call it what it is, like not take advantage of 12 quarters
10:47of preseason football.
10:48Yeah.
10:48And, and remember with this new three preseason game schedule, there's a two week gap between
10:54the final preseason game and the regular season.
10:56Now that's by design to rest any nagging injuries, smaller injuries, bigger stuff, two weeks,
11:02six weeks, it doesn't matter, but like, you know, you're on IR or pop or whatever, but
11:06there's a designed two week recovery period from the last game.
11:09So really you look at August 22nd on Saturday against the lions is the dress rehearsal.
11:14Then it's nearly a month until they play the Eagles.
11:17So the, so the only meaningful preseason action for a lot of, a lot of guys, that's a lot of
11:21eggs in one basket, I guess is a long way of, of getting to.
11:23So you're, you're going nearly a month without really putting the guys that are going to
11:28be impactful for you in theory to the test.
11:29Coming up at three o'clock, a three o'clock, Matt Moscona, who works at ESPN Baton Rouge.
11:37He had the report yesterday that Jaden Daniels and his team want LSU to no longer show off
11:43his Heisman trophy in and around campus.
11:46So we'll talk to him about that coming up in 20 minutes.
11:49Right now though, we're focusing on preseason game one tonight, 800-636-1067 is the number.
11:55That's 800-636-1067.
11:58You're going to the game.
11:59We want to hear from you next on the fan.
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