November 24, 2025 • 34 mins
Future Hall of Fame Linebacker London Fletcher is joined by 10-Year NFL Tight End Logan Paulsen and Bram Weinstein to give reactions to the Washington Commanders bye week.
Hosts: London Fletcher, Logan Paulsen, Bram Weinstein
Producer: Jason Johnson
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Location: BigBear.ai Command Center Studio
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Coming up on The Booth Review, London, we got a
mid season review.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
Yeah, and looking forward to seeing if the defense can
build on the performance they had in Madrid.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (00:09):
And I'm also excited about this offense, like what they
look like if they get healthy.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
That's next on the Booth Review. Welcome into the post
bye week edition of The Booth Review podcast. I'm Bram
Weinstein with Logan Paulsen and London Fletcher. Were brought to
you by Microsoft Surface Copilot plus PREC. Logan and I
are in the Big Bear AI Command Center studio lovely
in deck out for the Thanksgiving holiday. Hic Right, London's
(00:33):
down the line celebrating Thanksgiving with his family. Nice to
see you, London.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Oh yeah, I'm in the big Fletch at home. Ya
all right.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
So normally for bye week I go away, but because
we were just in Spain, I decided to sit at home.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
What'd you do? Just show? Yeah? What did I do?
Speaker 4 (00:51):
I hockey tournaments, soccer tournaments. You know, my kids are
eight to eleven, so that's when you're away. As much
as if we've been away this year, it's good to
kind of catch up, built some equity back with the family.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
You know what I mean, What did international fletch do week.
Speaker 5 (01:06):
Man, International fletch.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
I I stayed at home all pretty much the entire
week except my son and his a high school football team,
Providence Day School down here in Charlotte. They want to
state championship there. We got out to them when thirteen
and zero. We want to state championship on Thursday night,
I mean on Friday, and I'm sorry. And then the
rest of the weekend, man, I I literally didn't leave
(01:29):
my couch much, just sat there, watched a lot of
college football on Saturday, then a lot of pro football
on Sunday.
Speaker 5 (01:36):
Logan, did you guys play on Friday? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (01:38):
We did play on Friday. We won forty one zero, yep.
Speaker 4 (01:42):
And now we got kind of our big game this
week a week against River Bend, which is like for
the region, and then next week is Semis and the
following we would be States. So we got a couple
more games to go, but hopefully we make some waves.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
We're going to get a contingent out there in Virginia
to see you hopefully. All right, all right, very good,
because we did not play obviously this weekend, We're gonna
do so it's kind of not a mid season review
two thirds of a season review by week review, and
why don't we just kind of start from the beginning
and to kind of get us to where we are,
which is I think we're all hoping after what happened
(02:13):
in Spain that there's gonna be kind of a reset,
specifically on the defensive side of the ball. Hopefully some
people return so we get a better look at what
this offense could be moving forward. But why don't we
kind of go through what got us to this point?
Because the record is clearly not what anybody had hoped
it would be. There's a lot of reasons for that.
Why don't we start on offense a little bit here?
(02:33):
Where I think the story of the season is the
group that we thought would be the starting unit never
practice together at any point in time from day one
of training camp, which I think has a lot to
do with where they are right now.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
Yeah, I mean I totally feel the same way.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
Obviously, injuries are a big part of the NFL, and
like Fletch could test that, like everyone's got to kind
of play banged up. But this is a different type
of animal, you know, like when you're missing some of
these key pieces is Terry Noah, obviously, Austin Eckler, and
then kind of the musical chairs, especially early in the
season on the offensive line. It just doesn't lead to
a good product, you know, because so much of what
(03:11):
this game is, and again, like Fletchnow's is been anybody
is like your ability to kind of have non verbal
communication with your teammates, understand route depths, understand different coverages.
If you're a receiver offensive line, we're passing off twists,
we're passing off stunts in the past game, but it's
also run game. How do we fit double teams? Where
are we targeting these things? How do we communicate these
kind of last second looks. So I do think that,
(03:33):
like you said that, the fact that they haven't really
practiced together at all shows up at times this year,
and I do think you're starting to feel them come
out of it a little bit offensively. But I do
think like some of the offensive woes and issues were.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
Largely due to injury.
Speaker 5 (03:48):
Yeah, I've always felt like it's a lot harder to.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Play offense produce offensively if you're not geling, you're not
getting that rhythm together, whether it's the quarterback getting his
time and career kind of timed up with the with
the receiving Corps offensive line. As you mentioned, those guys
they have to really playing unison. They have to spend
a ton of time together, you know, just Cosmey he
(04:15):
missed a you know, first, I don't know how many
ball games he ended up missing.
Speaker 5 (04:19):
We first four or five, six games.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
So you know, now that unit is starting to starting
to look good, especially you know, the last couple of games.
But just the injuries. Jayden has missed what six games,
five games? Terry has only played in four games, knowing
just two games played. And it adds up to a
product that you've seen on the football field. Austin Eckler,
(04:42):
who we really haven't talked to. I don't think we've
talked enough about the loss of Eckler and what he
brings to the offense and his dynamic playmaking seals not
just as a runner but also as a as a
pass catching back out of the backfield, and his ability
to pick up blitzes, all the different things that he
he to the table. So you know, it's there is
(05:03):
a reason why we're sitting where we are from our
offensive standpoint, and really as a team standpoint, because you know,
if you can't score many points, it's gonna be tough,
tough to win games.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Yeah, the difficulty from camp was and a lot of
this is it's been negotiated out through the cbas that
there's only so much practice you're even allowed to have anymore.
There's only so much practice in pads that you're even
allowed to have anymore. And then when you're missing people
like left and right as what did Cliff call it,
(05:34):
like time on task, get on the grass, and it
just never happened throughout the course of the summer, and
we saw an offense that was kind of struggling to
find itself throughout the summer, and it was I thought,
a lack of cohesiveness that was out there, and I
was kind of hoping that it would turn after they
had some time together. But then the injury started piling
(05:55):
up and it just it cascaded on them in a
certain way, at least on that side of the ball.
That's kind of how I view what happened at least
early in the season to them.
Speaker 4 (06:03):
Yeah, I mean, I think you're still seeing ripple effects
like earlier, not like you're still seeing ripple effects of that, Like,
I think Cliffs kind of had to change his entire
offensive approach. You know, it went from this spread, let's
get into three by ones, let's find our isolations, let's
run from spread looks, Let's let the quarterback kind of
be the master at the line of scrimmage. And when
you lose some of the horses on the perimeter, that
just becomes much more challenging to do. So I think
(06:23):
when you look at like kind of the first case study,
which is the Giants game to the most recent, like
the offense is I don't want to say completely different,
but it feels like a like drastically different than what
they came into the season expecting. Like I remember going
to training camp practices with you guys and watching and
being like, man, this is what they want to be doing.
And now it's kind of a total departure. It's a
much more of like slow the pace of the game down.
(06:44):
We're going to be in our hurry up, no huddle stuff,
but we're going to run the football a little bit.
We're going to be a little bit more conservative with
our shots down the field. We had insight the offensive line,
So I do think it's been a complete overhaul from
a multitude of perspectives. But again it's I think you're
still feeling like feeling that ripple all the way through
earlier in the season.
Speaker 5 (07:01):
Yeah, No, you're You're right. You know, there's been big games.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
We think about the man the game a couple of
weeks ago where we had to receives maybe three or
four receivers just active for the ball game, and you're
going to the game, you got you're playing a bunch
of three tight end looks and just to try to
to manufacture plays manufactured yards. That wasn't the idea or
(07:26):
the vision of this offense coming into the season where
and I love tight ends, but Cliff, in this offense,
it was not the vision to have, you know, three
tightens in the game a lot a ton of times.
Speaker 5 (07:38):
But you're like, hey, these is what we got, this
is what we got. These are the guys we got.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Let's figure out ways to make plays manufactured yards. From
the office standpoint, it seems like, as you mentioned, we're
starting to turn the corner. Maybe from the health standpoint,
I know that you know, opening the twenty one day
window for Noel Brown, so hopefully he's able to get
back on the football field.
Speaker 5 (08:00):
Terry.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
Hopefully he's able to come back. You know, we need
those added guys down a stretch. Hopefully Jayden is able
to come and play and play soon. So let's see
what that offense looks like with those guys on a
football field together, and hopefully we can get multiple games
with these guys on the football field.
Speaker 4 (08:19):
Yeah, And I think it's also interesting too, fledged Like,
in some ways, I think having to explore these different
avenues of the offense has been good. I know it
doesn't feel good, but I think kind of learning different
ways to kind of insulate personnel, I think that's been
good to see. So, like all of a sudden, when
you bring Terry and Noah butt back and we're in
a little bit more heavy personnel groupings, like the play
(08:39):
action pass game is going to be a little bit
more effective, those vertical shots are going to be more
effective because the offensive line is going to be more comfortable.
So I do like that they were kind of forced
to play left handed here a little bit because I
think it's shown them a different side of what they
can get to and what they can be, which, again,
like I'm glass half full here, a little bit, But
like I think that is with the injuries, you've kind
of had to figure out again what young players can do,
(09:01):
what this offense can be. So I think there are
some positive speed.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
Yeah, like back in the summer, so no Brown was injured,
Terry was injured, plus the contractual situation, and remember they
were running out younger receivers outside and they were open
about these are not the positions we expected them to
be in, and the hope was all along, well, these
guys are going to come back and they'll go back
into the slots that they're supposed to be and it
(09:25):
just because of injuries never materialized. And it's these two spots.
So we'll gets to the defense in a minute. The
defensive end spot that got ravaged by injuries and the
wide receiver spot that got ravaged by injuries, where all
of a sudden there was kind of a depth challenge,
which I think forced both sides to try to figure out, Okay,
what do we do to try to mask a lot
(09:45):
of this. I never would have envisioned Trent Scott playing
as much as he did in the role that he
did early in the season, but they had to adjust
to it, which is recently turned into Brandon Coleman playing
in a similar spot here. So they've played with an
interesting hand I think throughout the year and they've tried
to navigate it and unfortunately, welcome to the NFL, where
if you have deficiencies, there are going to be other
(10:08):
teams that to try to take advantage of that against you.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
Yeah, and I think, like Fletch, and we've talked about
this a ton like just the again, when you don't
have when offenses don't have certain elements to them like
vertical passing attack, Fletch, like, I just think about you
as a defensive player, like, it just opens up the
whole book for you.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
You know what I'm saying. At least that's my understanding
of it.
Speaker 4 (10:25):
Right, So I'd say, like, if you don't have any
kind of elite perimeter pieces, and again that's not to
smirch or indict any of the ays that are playing,
but when you don't have a Terry McLaurin, it allows you, defensively,
I'm assuming fledge to play different cover structures and put
yourselves in better.
Speaker 5 (10:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Absolutely, I've been on plenty of defenses where we.
Speaker 5 (10:44):
We said, hey, this is what we're going to do.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
We don't feel like the outside guys could consistently beat
us playing and play out down the field, or it
might be the quarterback. There's times we may not have
felt like the quarterback was going to really feel comfortable
throwing and throwing the deep shots and and doing certain things.
Speaker 3 (11:04):
Who are you thinking about?
Speaker 4 (11:05):
What do you talking about that, fletch, who's the quarterback
like Chad Pennington's style or what.
Speaker 5 (11:09):
Like I.
Speaker 3 (11:14):
Was like, I'm not saying he's not a good player, like.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
He's quarterbacks in the in the NFL, but we didn't
we Chad didn't take a lot of deep shots.
Speaker 3 (11:23):
So we play the percentages, right.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
The percentages we're going to play only a certain certain
part of the field, defends certain parts of the field.
But just from ah as you mentioned, as far as
if you don't feel like, hey, they're not gonna take
a bunch of shots deep or these guys can't consistently
beat man and man coverages, we can.
Speaker 5 (11:42):
We know they're gonna lean heavily on the run game.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
So we're gonna put a lot of stack the box,
bring blitzes against the rum, force those guys to play
left handed, like you said, make them make make some
guys beat you that aren't used to playing making big
plays in critical situations. And that's what a lot of
teams did. And I think it started really if you
go back, it was probably the I want to say
(12:05):
the Cowboys day, know the Bears game, that first Bears
game where they were the ones that all of a
sudden they changed up what they were, what they were
doing against us, what they had done against other teams.
They were a high zone team. Didn't really bless it
up coming to our game. A lot of man and man,
a lot of pressures, and then teams is just consistently
kind of stuck with that game plan.
Speaker 4 (12:26):
And do you remember the Dallas game too, like that one?
That one was when they shocked me. H. I know
you called that like two days ahead of time that
they're going to play more man, but I was like,
they they've never done zone. They've never done like heavy man,
heavy pressure stuff. It's all been zone cover three, keep
it in front. And they were like a total departure
And you don't take those big departure shifts if you
think that, if you if you aren't not worried about
(12:51):
what they're bringing offensively in terms of wide receiver positions.
So I think that you felt the rip. And again
there's more elements to that. I think the offensive line, yeah,
of course this season, but I think that is like
the story like talking about like positions of injury. Yeah,
the receiver specifically you look at and you say, man
like it really had a cascading effect for probably I
don't know, like trying to think about their game schedule
here in terms of like which games were really impacted,
(13:12):
but I think it did start obviously, like you felt
it in the Packers game. You felt it in the
Falcons game to a certain extent.
Speaker 5 (13:17):
Yep.
Speaker 3 (13:18):
And then those are the games, excuse me, for the season.
Speaker 5 (13:21):
So yeah, I thought to go ahead, Uh.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
I thought that the Falcons game, the offense were able
to do enough. I thought Cliff did a nice job
of scheming up some some shots down the field. Defensively
kind of you know, didn't hold up there into the bargain.
But definitely the game that stands out the most to
me was that that that Bears game where they came
in there and really you know, just just said, hey,
(13:47):
we're gonna play a ton of man and man and
and and bring pressure and see can they can they
deal with that? And it kind of went from there.
At Kansas City, I mean, Kansas City did what they
wanted to, did what they normally do. But Chicago Seattle
just you know, a bunch of different games where where
we weren't able to consistently get production out of that
(14:09):
core because of as you mentioned, just the injuries and
guys being forced into roles that they weren't necessarily view
viewed the play coming into the season.
Speaker 1 (14:19):
Yeah, so Austin Eckler gets injured, that became a big
deal I think for their run game and their passing
game for that matter. And that wide receiver corps gets
hit by a glut of injuries and then all of
a sudden, teams are playing them differently saying we dare
you right to try to beat us at this position?
On defense, Dietrich wise represents both of those things to
(14:39):
me that he was brought in alongside a number of
the other position players to help with a rush defense
that needed improvement from a year ago, and in the
first couple of weeks you saw it in real time.
The second he got hurt, all of a sudden, that
became a big deal. And then not unlike the wide
receiver position. They got hit with a glut of injuries
(15:02):
at the exact same spot over and over and over,
and suddenly not only were they without some of their
best defensive lineman Drdan's Armstrong namely that comes to mind there,
but they had lost the depth of it. And that,
to me is the story of the beginning of the
issues that the defense had was upfront at one position
where they could kind of not afford to lose certain
(15:24):
people like Wise and Armstrong, and they did.
Speaker 4 (15:27):
Yeah, but I don't know how you saw it, but
like to me, it was kind of like one of
these things where they came into the season with a
roadmap or a plan of what they wanted to do defensively,
and it was like, we're going to get bigger in
the defensive front. We're going to be better on first
and second down. We're going to kind of tip that
statistical variance in our favor on first second down because
we'll be better. It will be in more third downs,
will win more third downs. And again, like when that
(15:49):
piece left, when Dorrin' Armstrong got hurt, obviously they weren't
that defense anymore. And I felt like that was a
huge part of it, But I also felt like there
was kind of this I don't know, like this mental
lapse that kind of started right after the Bears game.
That kind of again like it's a personnel thing, but
there was also like an execution thing that popped up
for me when I was watching a little bit, and
I was just you know, I'd defer to you and
(16:10):
a lot of this stuff if you felt the same.
Speaker 5 (16:11):
I'll say this, the Wise injury was big.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
That was huge because of his his versatility, not just
as a he's a bigger defensive end and being able
to stop the run set hard edges, which you know,
we've had a lot We've had a lot of trouble
with the perimeter runs, whether it's outside zon toss plays,
things like that, anything that there're any ways that they're
attacking me the perimeter. So that was a huge and
(16:39):
us winning a lot of first and second downs. I
thought also you mentioned Doris, Also I thought Javonte John
Baptiste was also going to take a step forward. I
thought he would benefit greatly from having a guy like
von Miller in the room to kind of help him
really help with his past rush. And that was another
(17:00):
guy that we lost and then obviously Drince who was
who was our best pass rusher. So from the pass
rush standpoint, but also from the stop and a run standpoint,
all those things hurt. You mentioned there was some definitely
some communication issues on the back end, some some busted coverages,
some you know, just I think also some confidence had
(17:20):
uh some guys that lost some confidence too, and it's
hard to to get your confidence back during the season.
Speaker 5 (17:28):
You can, you have to continue to.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
Have like really good games, build those games up and
it's hopefully this pass ball game that we had Madrid
guys that are able to really build upon that moving forward.
But it just from a confidence standpoint on the back
end we had, we had some issues there and some
coverage things that that crept up and got to be
able to put pressure on the quarterback get get get
(17:52):
a pass rush.
Speaker 4 (17:53):
Fletch, Have you ever been a part of a team
that's kind of seen this confidence up. I know you've
mentioned some time in Saint Louis before and maybe, but
like could you talk about like the process of what
that feels like for the player, maybe because I know
offensively it feels a very specific way, but defensively, what's
that like?
Speaker 2 (18:09):
Yeah, it's it's the same where say, I'll talk about
it from a unit standpoint, where when I was in
Saint Louis, we had ninety ninety nine won a Super Bowl,
and I just I just happened to check this yesterday.
We're the number one ranked run defense in the NFC,
I think fourth and points allowed. I think we're tied
(18:32):
for first in sacks. We had a lot of top five,
top ten rankings. The next year, I mean we were
at the bottom, bottom third and sometimes thirty plus ranked
thirty or worse, and some of the key key metrics
points being one of them, and it will be a
situation where we'd have, you know, really good good halves,
(18:54):
good quarters, and then we give up a big play
and then it was like, oh shoot, here it goes again.
And you know, guys that at a tire year, we
just were never able to collectively get our confidence back
and be the same unit. And this was with us
pretty much. We brought back maybe ten starters on that
defense and drafted some other good defensive players, but for
(19:15):
one reason or another, we were not able to get
our confidence back going because you know, you'd have some
good plays and then you give up one player and
be like, oh shoot, here we go again, and it
was just that rip on snowball effect.
Speaker 4 (19:28):
I think that's another thing too that we haven't really
talked about, maybe as much as I'd like, is that
I think this team this offseason was designed as like
an offensive led football team.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Correct, right, And they went and acquired Laramie Tumseel, they
went and acquired Deebo Samuel. They were going all in
to have an offensive oriented team.
Speaker 4 (19:43):
Yeah yeah, And so like when you have a team
like that, again, it insulates the defense. You possess the
football longer, you score more points, you play with the lead,
you kind of let the defense. You force the other
team's offense to play a very specific way that the
defense can now make sure that they're covering and handling.
And I think that that the whole thing changed, right
when obviously with jay Nails injury, Terry's injury, Norge practice together,
(20:06):
they never practiced.
Speaker 3 (20:07):
Back the same thing.
Speaker 4 (20:08):
But like the fact that the offensive unit never got
to where they were, I think it showed a lot
of the defensive wards. And it was interesting here and
you talked about Saint Louis, like with that really good
offense and how again, that helps, That helps you defensively.
Speaker 5 (20:19):
Yeah, yeah, we won. We were winning gays, but the
offense was scoring.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
We were winning games thirty five thirty, you know, thirty
thirty eight thirty one, where because we had a margin
for error error because of the offense being able to
put up the type of points that they they were
able to put up. But it's just unprecedented where where
you had two positions ravished by injuries. You know, it
(20:45):
would be one thing if we got hey we lose
one receiver, leave one defensive man, you lose one defensive back,
and you know, kind of spread it out throughout the
football team in different position groups. But it's been the
off it's been the receivers, and it's been a defensive hands.
Speaker 5 (21:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
And the big difference this year, and I think we
knew this was going to be different, was the schedule.
And a lot of times it's not who you play,
it's when you play them. Frankly, had the Commanders played
in Miami three four weeks ago amid what was going
on with them, that could have been a very different
They could have won anyway, but like that could have
been a very different outcome. At the same time, you
could say, like they played the Giants in Week one,
(21:24):
the Giants are a very different team. Now you get
a very different performance out of them. But think about
the people that they lost, especially on defense, and the
opponents that they played A Chan Jamier Gibbs, Bijon Robinson,
Josh Jacobs, Like they caught a lot of the wrong
teams at the wrong time. This was a much more
difficult schedule than they had a year ago, and they
had all of these things that were compounding it, and
(21:46):
they're catching what were in what it was week after week.
We were catching top seven offenses with strong running backs
as a focal point of their offense. That was trouble.
Speaker 4 (21:56):
Yeah, but I mean I think that's something that like,
you know, we like we I know, I talk with
Flex about this offseason, Like when you play, strength of
schedule increase, right, So you're gonna play better offenses, you're
gonna play better quarterbacks. And people talk, oh, you don't
know where the team is going to be. It I
the one metric that's pretty consistent is like quarterback. If
that if that's a good player, it's going to be tough. So,
like we knew the schedule was going to be tough.
They knew they were going to stretch, Like, regardless about
(22:18):
healthy the team was, they were going to get stressed,
regardless by the quarterback play by the teams. You mentioned
running backs, but I look at you know, Jared Golf,
Pat Mahone, Darnold, patri Mahomes, all these guys that are
playing good football at the moment, and like when you
when you are a good rising team, like you're going
to see more of those quarterbacks. You got to rise
to the occasion, no doubt. But I think that's another
thing that needs to be considered here too, is like
(22:39):
this team was not at their best. They didn't prepare
at their best, not because of people not wanting to
but because of injuries and injuries those things. Yeah, and
you're playing better opponents. So like, to me, it just
makes sense that there's going to be a little bit
of a struggle this year in terms of performance.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
Yeah, this needs to be asked to. Like the whole
offseason was about expectations, all of it. Go look at
the way the schedule was set up, like all of
the night games, all the standalone games, and then there
was a ramped up pressure on this team off of
the way that they performed a year ago, and here
they are with all of these injuries, critical spots where
depth is truly tested. They never really practiced together on
(23:16):
a certain side of the ball. Their quarterback gets injured
a couple of times, and it all kind of feels
like it was closing the walls in on them a
little bit.
Speaker 4 (23:23):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, I think that's another thing to
talk about too, is like I think about this is
a little bit different, Fletch, but like the expectations of
twenty twelve going into twenty thirteen, and again there's a
million other factors that go into that year for US,
But I do think that's something that players, especially young players,
maybe players who haven't been in these situations a lot,
they have to negotiate that too, you know. So it's
(23:45):
like it's the injuries, it's the expectation. It's a tougher schedule,
and I think people talk about opponent toughness, but I
think like this for US, I know, traveling with the team,
like this schedule has been tough. Man late night games,
early mornings, back, kind of shorter bridged weeks, Like it's
a different ballgame when you win a lot of football
games and I think you feel all of those things.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
There's a lot of adversity.
Speaker 4 (24:08):
They didn't set themselves up in the best position to
be successful with the university, and then all those variables come.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
Togein, you know, real quick. I talked to somebody and
they put it this way. It was said to me like,
in the case of a situation like this, a win
feels like a relief and a loss feels like three losses.
And that's partially the expectations just kind of like bearing
down on you. Meantime, they're not even putting out their
as semblance of what they thought their team was going
(24:34):
to look like when they started the season.
Speaker 5 (24:37):
Yeah, I'll say this too.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
Not only expectations from obviously the national media, the fans, expectations,
and expectations within the building.
Speaker 5 (24:48):
There's also the element of you got a bulls eye
on your back too.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Now, so you're a twelve win team, you went two
playoff two role playoff games, make it to the NFC
championsh Game. Now teams aren't going to overlook you. Teams
are gonna hey, circle, Hey, we're playing the Washington Commanders.
They got this high, high powered offense, they got Jade
and Daddy's office, a Rookie of the Year, expectation for
(25:13):
him to make another step. The expectation is we're going
to be definitely a playoff team. So these these teams,
as they're competing against us, they're like, hey, we're gonna
knock them off. We uh you know that's that's that's
part of it too. You you're no longer a hunter.
You're being hunted. So you have to have that mindset
(25:35):
and it has to take place in your and your
preparation during the off season too, realizing, hey, people are
going to be gunning for us now too. If we
don't take the proper mindset and realize that teams are
gonna ramp up when they play against us. You have
some games where you're like, man, how do we find
ourselves in a battle against this team, or how do
(25:56):
we lose this ball game? And whether it's a better team,
you know, tougher schedule. Now, you have to understand that
teams are going to come and play against you, and
you got to be ready for that challenge.
Speaker 1 (26:08):
On the other side of the bye, I felt this
way watching Miami like playing them, you know, in Madrid
a couple of weeks ago, they went through the worst
of it about three weeks earlier, they fired their GM,
they traded away one of their star players on defense.
Clearly the record was what it was. There's a lot
of discussion about, well, what's coming down the road, and
maybe things just kind of opened up for them a
(26:29):
little bit and they've been more competitive. They've won three
or four, you know, off of that beat the Bills,
one in Madrid against Washington. I'm hoping and I think
that after what I saw in Madrid, that we're behind
what is probably the hardest part of this whole season.
I thought the defense kind of level set itself a
little bit there, like, and I'm hoping we're going to see,
as London alluded to earlier, some of our star players
may come back in the next couple of weeks, maybe sooner,
(26:52):
where we get a chance to see what this team
could look like moving forward. So I'm hoping we're kind
of through part of that. So on the other side
of this, I think you may see a very different team,
a level set on defense. Hopefully Jaden and Terry are
playing sooner rather than later, and we get a little
bit more of as semblance of the team we thought
we had in the summer as opposed to the one
that we had the first couple of months.
Speaker 4 (27:12):
Yeah, I think the big thing for me is just
the level set defensively, Like it was, they went through
a couple weeks there, it was kind of rough, and yeah,
I think everyone was disappointed. But I think after watching
them in Madrid, watching them versus Miami, and again, Miami's
not a top shelf offense by any stretch of the imagination,
but they have dynamic playmakers. I thought the tackling was better.
I thought the runfits were better. I thought the coverage
responsibilities were better. And again it's are are they going
(27:35):
to be the best defense in the NFL? No, Like
you know, Dan Quinn on the game plan last week
was like, we need to turn the football over still,
we need to set better edges in the run. All
those things are still true, but at least there was
a the floor was raised. And so if you can
just play games like that again versus the Broncos offense,
which is kind of middling, the Minnesota offense, which is
kind of middling at the moment, you kind of say,
(27:56):
if they can just keep us in it and we're
not losing by twenty points in the third court or
this this team has a shot, especially with I think
the way that Cliff is now calling games, So I
think of all the things. Health obviously is important, but
kind of finding something defensively to hang your hat on
and say this is our standard, this is what we
can look too moving forward. I think that may be
(28:16):
the biggest thing coming out of Madrid.
Speaker 2 (28:18):
They were they were they were more connected. You saw
just a more cohesive defense. Was it perfect? No, it
was not perfect, And as a as you mentioned, DQ
talked about some of the run things, some of the
run fits, stuff like that, and I'm sure that that
would be the big takeaway. Like, man, we still could
be much better at our run fits where we allowed
(28:40):
them to get get some of those, uh, some of
those explosive runs. So you still still need to improve.
There didn't really they have maybe one pass play over
twenty yards that was you know, aighted by mistackle. But
just they looked much better as a defense you're able
to I thought the the confidence, the physicality you saw
(29:01):
some guys. I saw some guys flying around playing really
good football. The linebackers as a as a core, I
thought that was their best Game of the season. McGee
made some outstanding plays in space, Frankie had some nice plays.
Bobby you know, did make some nice plays, had that
had that excellent pass breakup in the end zone to
prevent a touchdown on the fourth down. So there's a
(29:22):
lot of stuff you can build on. And I think
even within that, there'll be even more things to kind
of add to the defense. And we saw a couple
of different types of pressures or simulated pressures. Maybe you
add you add some things off of those things off
of those what you saw showed last week gets dumphin.
So moving forward, you mentioned that the Broncos offense, Let's
(29:45):
see if we can take advantage of an offense that
that has had some struggles at time, and and and
and add some turnovers, like you said.
Speaker 4 (29:52):
Yeah, and again, like that's a group that's okay being
in a close game, and like that's awesome because like
they're trusting their defense and they're being conservative offense. But
when you're in a one score game, it can go
either way. And I think like if they kind of
capture some of that explosive play magic, they really need
to make sure that they are that that is a
building piece the Miami stuff that it's not just kind
(30:13):
of a flash in the pan like NFL to me,
is about being consistent. It's it's about coaching consistency, it's
about player consistency, it's about consistent execution, and so like,
can you take that performance and then parlay it into
something down the road here where you say, like, these
are some pieces that are that we can build around,
that are growing. And I think again, like, that's what
I'm really excited about coming out of the buy is
(30:34):
all the stuff the defense did.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
Yeah, and these are interesting opponents for what I think
is now the set group of the offensive line moving forward.
There's been a lot of changes here. Josh Connerly is now,
you know, eleven games into his career. Sam Cosmy, we
were waiting for him to get his sea legs back.
He's played a few games. He's out there, Chris Paul
is settled in here, Brandon Coleman's being used as the
(30:55):
big tight end, the sixth offensive lineman. Tuntle is as
good as advertised, And all of a sudden, you're going
to get Denver, who as of a couple of weeks
ago led the league in sacks. You're going to get Minnesota,
who's incredibly talented upfront and very exotic in the way
that they bring their defense. You're going to get the
Giants front. I know they just fired their defensive coordinator,
but that there's not a lack of talent upfront on
(31:16):
that group. I'm interested to see that. And then I'm
hoping Jade and Terry Deebo, Noah Ertz, Bill, let's see
what this looks like. You know, I'm hoping they all
could come out play together. Let's get a look at
what this is.
Speaker 3 (31:29):
Yeah, I'm one hundred percent with that.
Speaker 4 (31:30):
I think, yeah, man, And I think the thing that again,
I go back to that point that I made earlier
Fletch basically saying that I kind of like that they
had to play a little bit left handed here for
the last couple of weeks, because I do think Cliff,
like Connolly is playing better. And one of the reasons
he's playing better is because Cliff is calling a game
that is more supportive of the offensive line in pass
(31:51):
protection and on first and second down. And so I think,
like bringing that knowledge with you into games like this
versus teams that have high sack production, you say, hey,
now our offensive line is not only playing better, but
we're putting them in better positions because we had to
earlier in the season. Let's keep doing that because if
that group's playing well, we have a shot to win
the game. We have a shot to elevate skill position
players on the perimeter. So I think in some ways
(32:13):
that's really good for that group to kind of have
that elevation schematically.
Speaker 2 (32:16):
Also, oh yeah, absolutely, Denver is the number one they
still league the league at sacks. Bro the forty nine sacks.
And the key is, don't be a third long situation.
Let's try to run the football. And we ran a
thirty three times I think it thirty two or thirty
three times against the Dolphins, and see if we can
(32:37):
get that.
Speaker 5 (32:37):
Number up even high. You know, Logan, I love to run.
Speaker 2 (32:39):
The football, especially I guess teams are teams like that
who want to rush the passer.
Speaker 5 (32:45):
They want to get out of the quarterback. Just continue
to lead.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
On those guys, man, Let the batter around a continue
to do a thing. Let Bill Cross get married, get
going to you know you mentioned we've added elements to
our office that you know, hey, wasn't there at the
begin of the year, and that's been a good thing.
(33:10):
You've seen some guys start to establish roles for their sales,
bigger roles too.
Speaker 5 (33:15):
You know.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
Less thy real quick here before we go. So we
had the bye week. I'm watching the Cowboys play the Eagles.
I watched the Eagles blow this big lead and Dallas
beats them. And this is one of those it feels
like season defining type of moments where things could turn
for Philadelphia after losing who knows right, And I'm sitting
there going, had Washington just won that Miami game, held
onto the ball one that Chicago game, they'd be five
(33:35):
and six, all things being equally, you would and with
two shots at Philadelphia. That was the what if for
me watching that happen going if those two games went
the other way, we would be having a very different
conversation about what the second half of the season is
for this team.
Speaker 3 (33:51):
I mean one million percent.
Speaker 4 (33:53):
I think about it all the time, Like five and
six feels great at this point, you know, with all
this ahead of you, with all these divisional games in
front of you. Obviously you're still not Mathema eliminated, but
it does feel very different on things that were totally
within your control.
Speaker 1 (34:05):
That's right.
Speaker 5 (34:06):
Yeah, absolutely, yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:07):
You I mean, man, that's just football as football play here,
playing there, and you know you're riding a thick of things.
Speaker 1 (34:16):
Yep. I'm excited for Sunday night though. Denver. That'll be fun.
Great duo of defensive ends. They're gonna have to deal
with Benito and Cooper and bo Nicks. We'll get another
profile game of a prominent quarterbacks from the twenty twenty
four class. Jayde Well hopefully Jane Days, we'll see see
you later this week. But bon Nick's coming to town too.
It should be a good one. All right, guys, we'll
(34:36):
do this after the Denver game next week. See all
next time on the Booth Review. Booth Review was filmed
at the Big Bear AI Command Center Studio. Big Bear
AI offers mission ready AI for a rapidly evolving world,
proudly protecting the Washington Commanders and its fans.
Coming up on The Booth Review, London, we got a
mid season review.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
Yeah, and looking forward to seeing if the defense can
build on the performance they had in Madrid.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (00:09):
And I'm also excited about this offense, like what they
look like if they get healthy.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
That's next on the Booth Review. Welcome into the post
bye week edition of The Booth Review podcast. I'm Bram
Weinstein with Logan Paulsen and London Fletcher. Were brought to
you by Microsoft Surface Copilot plus PREC. Logan and I
are in the Big Bear AI Command Center studio lovely
in deck out for the Thanksgiving holiday. Hic Right, London's
(00:33):
down the line celebrating Thanksgiving with his family. Nice to
see you, London.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Oh yeah, I'm in the big Fletch at home. Ya
all right.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
So normally for bye week I go away, but because
we were just in Spain, I decided to sit at home.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
What'd you do? Just show? Yeah? What did I do?
Speaker 4 (00:51):
I hockey tournaments, soccer tournaments. You know, my kids are
eight to eleven, so that's when you're away. As much
as if we've been away this year, it's good to
kind of catch up, built some equity back with the family.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
You know what I mean, What did international fletch do week.
Speaker 5 (01:06):
Man, International fletch.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
I I stayed at home all pretty much the entire
week except my son and his a high school football team,
Providence Day School down here in Charlotte. They want to
state championship there. We got out to them when thirteen
and zero. We want to state championship on Thursday night,
I mean on Friday, and I'm sorry. And then the
rest of the weekend, man, I I literally didn't leave
(01:29):
my couch much, just sat there, watched a lot of
college football on Saturday, then a lot of pro football
on Sunday.
Speaker 5 (01:36):
Logan, did you guys play on Friday? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (01:38):
We did play on Friday. We won forty one zero, yep.
Speaker 4 (01:42):
And now we got kind of our big game this
week a week against River Bend, which is like for
the region, and then next week is Semis and the
following we would be States. So we got a couple
more games to go, but hopefully we make some waves.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
We're going to get a contingent out there in Virginia
to see you hopefully. All right, all right, very good,
because we did not play obviously this weekend, We're gonna
do so it's kind of not a mid season review
two thirds of a season review by week review, and
why don't we just kind of start from the beginning
and to kind of get us to where we are,
which is I think we're all hoping after what happened
(02:13):
in Spain that there's gonna be kind of a reset,
specifically on the defensive side of the ball. Hopefully some
people return so we get a better look at what
this offense could be moving forward. But why don't we
kind of go through what got us to this point?
Because the record is clearly not what anybody had hoped
it would be. There's a lot of reasons for that.
Why don't we start on offense a little bit here?
(02:33):
Where I think the story of the season is the
group that we thought would be the starting unit never
practice together at any point in time from day one
of training camp, which I think has a lot to
do with where they are right now.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
Yeah, I mean I totally feel the same way.
Speaker 4 (02:51):
Obviously, injuries are a big part of the NFL, and
like Fletch could test that, like everyone's got to kind
of play banged up. But this is a different type
of animal, you know, like when you're missing some of
these key pieces is Terry Noah, obviously, Austin Eckler, and
then kind of the musical chairs, especially early in the
season on the offensive line. It just doesn't lead to
a good product, you know, because so much of what
(03:11):
this game is, and again, like Fletchnow's is been anybody
is like your ability to kind of have non verbal
communication with your teammates, understand route depths, understand different coverages.
If you're a receiver offensive line, we're passing off twists,
we're passing off stunts in the past game, but it's
also run game. How do we fit double teams? Where
are we targeting these things? How do we communicate these
kind of last second looks. So I do think that,
(03:33):
like you said that, the fact that they haven't really
practiced together at all shows up at times this year,
and I do think you're starting to feel them come
out of it a little bit offensively. But I do
think like some of the offensive woes and issues were.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
Largely due to injury.
Speaker 5 (03:48):
Yeah, I've always felt like it's a lot harder to.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Play offense produce offensively if you're not geling, you're not
getting that rhythm together, whether it's the quarterback getting his
time and career kind of timed up with the with
the receiving Corps offensive line. As you mentioned, those guys
they have to really playing unison. They have to spend
a ton of time together, you know, just Cosmey he
(04:15):
missed a you know, first, I don't know how many
ball games he ended up missing.
Speaker 5 (04:19):
We first four or five, six games.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
So you know, now that unit is starting to starting
to look good, especially you know, the last couple of games.
But just the injuries. Jayden has missed what six games,
five games? Terry has only played in four games, knowing
just two games played. And it adds up to a
product that you've seen on the football field. Austin Eckler,
(04:42):
who we really haven't talked to. I don't think we've
talked enough about the loss of Eckler and what he
brings to the offense and his dynamic playmaking seals not
just as a runner but also as a as a
pass catching back out of the backfield, and his ability
to pick up blitzes, all the different things that he
he to the table. So you know, it's there is
(05:03):
a reason why we're sitting where we are from our
offensive standpoint, and really as a team standpoint, because you know,
if you can't score many points, it's gonna be tough,
tough to win games.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
Yeah, the difficulty from camp was and a lot of
this is it's been negotiated out through the cbas that
there's only so much practice you're even allowed to have anymore.
There's only so much practice in pads that you're even
allowed to have anymore. And then when you're missing people
like left and right as what did Cliff call it,
(05:34):
like time on task, get on the grass, and it
just never happened throughout the course of the summer, and
we saw an offense that was kind of struggling to
find itself throughout the summer, and it was I thought,
a lack of cohesiveness that was out there, and I
was kind of hoping that it would turn after they
had some time together. But then the injury started piling
(05:55):
up and it just it cascaded on them in a
certain way, at least on that side of the ball.
That's kind of how I view what happened at least
early in the season to them.
Speaker 4 (06:03):
Yeah, I mean, I think you're still seeing ripple effects
like earlier, not like you're still seeing ripple effects of that, Like,
I think Cliffs kind of had to change his entire
offensive approach. You know, it went from this spread, let's
get into three by ones, let's find our isolations, let's
run from spread looks, Let's let the quarterback kind of
be the master at the line of scrimmage. And when
you lose some of the horses on the perimeter, that
just becomes much more challenging to do. So I think
(06:23):
when you look at like kind of the first case study,
which is the Giants game to the most recent, like
the offense is I don't want to say completely different,
but it feels like a like drastically different than what
they came into the season expecting. Like I remember going
to training camp practices with you guys and watching and
being like, man, this is what they want to be doing.
And now it's kind of a total departure. It's a
much more of like slow the pace of the game down.
(06:44):
We're going to be in our hurry up, no huddle stuff,
but we're going to run the football a little bit.
We're going to be a little bit more conservative with
our shots down the field. We had insight the offensive line,
So I do think it's been a complete overhaul from
a multitude of perspectives. But again it's I think you're
still feeling like feeling that ripple all the way through
earlier in the season.
Speaker 5 (07:01):
Yeah, No, you're You're right. You know, there's been big games.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
We think about the man the game a couple of
weeks ago where we had to receives maybe three or
four receivers just active for the ball game, and you're
going to the game, you got you're playing a bunch
of three tight end looks and just to try to
to manufacture plays manufactured yards. That wasn't the idea or
(07:26):
the vision of this offense coming into the season where
and I love tight ends, but Cliff, in this offense,
it was not the vision to have, you know, three
tightens in the game a lot a ton of times.
Speaker 5 (07:38):
But you're like, hey, these is what we got, this
is what we got. These are the guys we got.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Let's figure out ways to make plays manufactured yards. From
the office standpoint, it seems like, as you mentioned, we're
starting to turn the corner. Maybe from the health standpoint,
I know that you know, opening the twenty one day
window for Noel Brown, so hopefully he's able to get
back on the football field.
Speaker 5 (08:00):
Terry.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
Hopefully he's able to come back. You know, we need
those added guys down a stretch. Hopefully Jayden is able
to come and play and play soon. So let's see
what that offense looks like with those guys on a
football field together, and hopefully we can get multiple games
with these guys on the football field.
Speaker 4 (08:19):
Yeah, And I think it's also interesting too, fledged Like,
in some ways, I think having to explore these different
avenues of the offense has been good. I know it
doesn't feel good, but I think kind of learning different
ways to kind of insulate personnel, I think that's been
good to see. So, like all of a sudden, when
you bring Terry and Noah butt back and we're in
a little bit more heavy personnel groupings, like the play
(08:39):
action pass game is going to be a little bit
more effective, those vertical shots are going to be more
effective because the offensive line is going to be more comfortable.
So I do like that they were kind of forced
to play left handed here a little bit because I
think it's shown them a different side of what they
can get to and what they can be, which, again,
like I'm glass half full here, a little bit, But
like I think that is with the injuries, you've kind
of had to figure out again what young players can do,
(09:01):
what this offense can be. So I think there are
some positive speed.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
Yeah, like back in the summer, so no Brown was injured,
Terry was injured, plus the contractual situation, and remember they
were running out younger receivers outside and they were open
about these are not the positions we expected them to
be in, and the hope was all along, well, these
guys are going to come back and they'll go back
into the slots that they're supposed to be and it
(09:25):
just because of injuries never materialized. And it's these two spots.
So we'll gets to the defense in a minute. The
defensive end spot that got ravaged by injuries and the
wide receiver spot that got ravaged by injuries, where all
of a sudden there was kind of a depth challenge,
which I think forced both sides to try to figure out, Okay,
what do we do to try to mask a lot
(09:45):
of this. I never would have envisioned Trent Scott playing
as much as he did in the role that he
did early in the season, but they had to adjust
to it, which is recently turned into Brandon Coleman playing
in a similar spot here. So they've played with an
interesting hand I think throughout the year and they've tried
to navigate it and unfortunately, welcome to the NFL, where
if you have deficiencies, there are going to be other
(10:08):
teams that to try to take advantage of that against you.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
Yeah, and I think, like Fletch, and we've talked about
this a ton like just the again, when you don't
have when offenses don't have certain elements to them like
vertical passing attack, Fletch, like, I just think about you
as a defensive player, like, it just opens up the
whole book for you.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
You know what I'm saying. At least that's my understanding
of it.
Speaker 4 (10:25):
Right, So I'd say, like, if you don't have any
kind of elite perimeter pieces, and again that's not to
smirch or indict any of the ays that are playing,
but when you don't have a Terry McLaurin, it allows you, defensively,
I'm assuming fledge to play different cover structures and put
yourselves in better.
Speaker 5 (10:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Absolutely, I've been on plenty of defenses where we.
Speaker 5 (10:44):
We said, hey, this is what we're going to do.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
We don't feel like the outside guys could consistently beat
us playing and play out down the field, or it
might be the quarterback. There's times we may not have
felt like the quarterback was going to really feel comfortable
throwing and throwing the deep shots and and doing certain things.
Speaker 3 (11:04):
Who are you thinking about?
Speaker 4 (11:05):
What do you talking about that, fletch, who's the quarterback
like Chad Pennington's style or what.
Speaker 5 (11:09):
Like I.
Speaker 3 (11:14):
Was like, I'm not saying he's not a good player, like.
Speaker 2 (11:18):
He's quarterbacks in the in the NFL, but we didn't
we Chad didn't take a lot of deep shots.
Speaker 3 (11:23):
So we play the percentages, right.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
The percentages we're going to play only a certain certain
part of the field, defends certain parts of the field.
But just from ah as you mentioned, as far as
if you don't feel like, hey, they're not gonna take
a bunch of shots deep or these guys can't consistently
beat man and man coverages, we can.
Speaker 5 (11:42):
We know they're gonna lean heavily on the run game.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
So we're gonna put a lot of stack the box,
bring blitzes against the rum, force those guys to play
left handed, like you said, make them make make some
guys beat you that aren't used to playing making big
plays in critical situations. And that's what a lot of
teams did. And I think it started really if you
go back, it was probably the I want to say
(12:05):
the Cowboys day, know the Bears game, that first Bears
game where they were the ones that all of a
sudden they changed up what they were, what they were
doing against us, what they had done against other teams.
They were a high zone team. Didn't really bless it
up coming to our game. A lot of man and man,
a lot of pressures, and then teams is just consistently
kind of stuck with that game plan.
Speaker 4 (12:26):
And do you remember the Dallas game too, like that one?
That one was when they shocked me. H. I know
you called that like two days ahead of time that
they're going to play more man, but I was like,
they they've never done zone. They've never done like heavy man,
heavy pressure stuff. It's all been zone cover three, keep
it in front. And they were like a total departure
And you don't take those big departure shifts if you
think that, if you if you aren't not worried about
(12:51):
what they're bringing offensively in terms of wide receiver positions.
So I think that you felt the rip. And again
there's more elements to that. I think the offensive line, yeah,
of course this season, but I think that is like
the story like talking about like positions of injury. Yeah,
the receiver specifically you look at and you say, man
like it really had a cascading effect for probably I
don't know, like trying to think about their game schedule
here in terms of like which games were really impacted,
(13:12):
but I think it did start obviously, like you felt
it in the Packers game. You felt it in the
Falcons game to a certain extent.
Speaker 5 (13:17):
Yep.
Speaker 3 (13:18):
And then those are the games, excuse me, for the season.
Speaker 5 (13:21):
So yeah, I thought to go ahead, Uh.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
I thought that the Falcons game, the offense were able
to do enough. I thought Cliff did a nice job
of scheming up some some shots down the field. Defensively
kind of you know, didn't hold up there into the bargain.
But definitely the game that stands out the most to
me was that that that Bears game where they came
in there and really you know, just just said, hey,
(13:47):
we're gonna play a ton of man and man and
and and bring pressure and see can they can they
deal with that? And it kind of went from there.
At Kansas City, I mean, Kansas City did what they
wanted to, did what they normally do. But Chicago Seattle
just you know, a bunch of different games where where
we weren't able to consistently get production out of that
(14:09):
core because of as you mentioned, just the injuries and
guys being forced into roles that they weren't necessarily view
viewed the play coming into the season.
Speaker 1 (14:19):
Yeah, so Austin Eckler gets injured, that became a big
deal I think for their run game and their passing
game for that matter. And that wide receiver corps gets
hit by a glut of injuries and then all of
a sudden, teams are playing them differently saying we dare
you right to try to beat us at this position?
On defense, Dietrich wise represents both of those things to
(14:39):
me that he was brought in alongside a number of
the other position players to help with a rush defense
that needed improvement from a year ago, and in the
first couple of weeks you saw it in real time.
The second he got hurt, all of a sudden, that
became a big deal. And then not unlike the wide
receiver position. They got hit with a glut of injuries
(15:02):
at the exact same spot over and over and over,
and suddenly not only were they without some of their
best defensive lineman Drdan's Armstrong namely that comes to mind there,
but they had lost the depth of it. And that,
to me is the story of the beginning of the
issues that the defense had was upfront at one position
where they could kind of not afford to lose certain
(15:24):
people like Wise and Armstrong, and they did.
Speaker 4 (15:27):
Yeah, but I don't know how you saw it, but
like to me, it was kind of like one of
these things where they came into the season with a
roadmap or a plan of what they wanted to do defensively,
and it was like, we're going to get bigger in
the defensive front. We're going to be better on first
and second down. We're going to kind of tip that
statistical variance in our favor on first second down because
we'll be better. It will be in more third downs,
will win more third downs. And again, like when that
(15:49):
piece left, when Dorrin' Armstrong got hurt, obviously they weren't
that defense anymore. And I felt like that was a
huge part of it, But I also felt like there
was kind of this I don't know, like this mental
lapse that kind of started right after the Bears game.
That kind of again like it's a personnel thing, but
there was also like an execution thing that popped up
for me when I was watching a little bit, and
I was just you know, I'd defer to you and
(16:10):
a lot of this stuff if you felt the same.
Speaker 5 (16:11):
I'll say this, the Wise injury was big.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
That was huge because of his his versatility, not just
as a he's a bigger defensive end and being able
to stop the run set hard edges, which you know,
we've had a lot We've had a lot of trouble
with the perimeter runs, whether it's outside zon toss plays,
things like that, anything that there're any ways that they're
attacking me the perimeter. So that was a huge and
(16:39):
us winning a lot of first and second downs. I
thought also you mentioned Doris, Also I thought Javonte John
Baptiste was also going to take a step forward. I
thought he would benefit greatly from having a guy like
von Miller in the room to kind of help him
really help with his past rush. And that was another
(17:00):
guy that we lost and then obviously Drince who was
who was our best pass rusher. So from the pass
rush standpoint, but also from the stop and a run standpoint,
all those things hurt. You mentioned there was some definitely
some communication issues on the back end, some some busted coverages,
some you know, just I think also some confidence had
(17:20):
uh some guys that lost some confidence too, and it's
hard to to get your confidence back during the season.
Speaker 5 (17:28):
You can, you have to continue to.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
Have like really good games, build those games up and
it's hopefully this pass ball game that we had Madrid
guys that are able to really build upon that moving forward.
But it just from a confidence standpoint on the back
end we had, we had some issues there and some
coverage things that that crept up and got to be
able to put pressure on the quarterback get get get
(17:52):
a pass rush.
Speaker 4 (17:53):
Fletch, Have you ever been a part of a team
that's kind of seen this confidence up. I know you've
mentioned some time in Saint Louis before and maybe, but
like could you talk about like the process of what
that feels like for the player, maybe because I know
offensively it feels a very specific way, but defensively, what's
that like?
Speaker 2 (18:09):
Yeah, it's it's the same where say, I'll talk about
it from a unit standpoint, where when I was in
Saint Louis, we had ninety ninety nine won a Super Bowl,
and I just I just happened to check this yesterday.
We're the number one ranked run defense in the NFC,
I think fourth and points allowed. I think we're tied
(18:32):
for first in sacks. We had a lot of top five,
top ten rankings. The next year, I mean we were
at the bottom, bottom third and sometimes thirty plus ranked
thirty or worse, and some of the key key metrics
points being one of them, and it will be a
situation where we'd have, you know, really good good halves,
(18:54):
good quarters, and then we give up a big play
and then it was like, oh shoot, here it goes again.
And you know, guys that at a tire year, we
just were never able to collectively get our confidence back
and be the same unit. And this was with us
pretty much. We brought back maybe ten starters on that
defense and drafted some other good defensive players, but for
(19:15):
one reason or another, we were not able to get
our confidence back going because you know, you'd have some
good plays and then you give up one player and
be like, oh shoot, here we go again, and it
was just that rip on snowball effect.
Speaker 4 (19:28):
I think that's another thing too that we haven't really
talked about, maybe as much as I'd like, is that
I think this team this offseason was designed as like
an offensive led football team.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Correct, right, And they went and acquired Laramie Tumseel, they
went and acquired Deebo Samuel. They were going all in
to have an offensive oriented team.
Speaker 4 (19:43):
Yeah yeah, And so like when you have a team
like that, again, it insulates the defense. You possess the
football longer, you score more points, you play with the lead,
you kind of let the defense. You force the other
team's offense to play a very specific way that the
defense can now make sure that they're covering and handling.
And I think that that the whole thing changed, right
when obviously with jay Nails injury, Terry's injury, Norge practice together,
(20:06):
they never practiced.
Speaker 3 (20:07):
Back the same thing.
Speaker 4 (20:08):
But like the fact that the offensive unit never got
to where they were, I think it showed a lot
of the defensive wards. And it was interesting here and
you talked about Saint Louis, like with that really good
offense and how again, that helps, That helps you defensively.
Speaker 5 (20:19):
Yeah, yeah, we won. We were winning gays, but the
offense was scoring.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
We were winning games thirty five thirty, you know, thirty
thirty eight thirty one, where because we had a margin
for error error because of the offense being able to
put up the type of points that they they were
able to put up. But it's just unprecedented where where
you had two positions ravished by injuries. You know, it
(20:45):
would be one thing if we got hey we lose
one receiver, leave one defensive man, you lose one defensive back,
and you know, kind of spread it out throughout the
football team in different position groups. But it's been the
off it's been the receivers, and it's been a defensive hands.
Speaker 5 (21:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
And the big difference this year, and I think we
knew this was going to be different, was the schedule.
And a lot of times it's not who you play,
it's when you play them. Frankly, had the Commanders played
in Miami three four weeks ago amid what was going
on with them, that could have been a very different
They could have won anyway, but like that could have
been a very different outcome. At the same time, you
could say, like they played the Giants in Week one,
(21:24):
the Giants are a very different team. Now you get
a very different performance out of them. But think about
the people that they lost, especially on defense, and the
opponents that they played A Chan Jamier Gibbs, Bijon Robinson,
Josh Jacobs, Like they caught a lot of the wrong
teams at the wrong time. This was a much more
difficult schedule than they had a year ago, and they
had all of these things that were compounding it, and
(21:46):
they're catching what were in what it was week after week.
We were catching top seven offenses with strong running backs
as a focal point of their offense. That was trouble.
Speaker 4 (21:56):
Yeah, but I mean I think that's something that like,
you know, we like we I know, I talk with
Flex about this offseason, Like when you play, strength of
schedule increase, right, So you're gonna play better offenses, you're
gonna play better quarterbacks. And people talk, oh, you don't
know where the team is going to be. It I
the one metric that's pretty consistent is like quarterback. If
that if that's a good player, it's going to be tough. So,
like we knew the schedule was going to be tough.
They knew they were going to stretch, Like, regardless about
(22:18):
healthy the team was, they were going to get stressed,
regardless by the quarterback play by the teams. You mentioned
running backs, but I look at you know, Jared Golf,
Pat Mahone, Darnold, patri Mahomes, all these guys that are
playing good football at the moment, and like when you
when you are a good rising team, like you're going
to see more of those quarterbacks. You got to rise
to the occasion, no doubt. But I think that's another
thing that needs to be considered here too, is like
(22:39):
this team was not at their best. They didn't prepare
at their best, not because of people not wanting to
but because of injuries and injuries those things. Yeah, and
you're playing better opponents. So like, to me, it just
makes sense that there's going to be a little bit
of a struggle this year in terms of performance.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
Yeah, this needs to be asked to. Like the whole
offseason was about expectations, all of it. Go look at
the way the schedule was set up, like all of
the night games, all the standalone games, and then there
was a ramped up pressure on this team off of
the way that they performed a year ago, and here
they are with all of these injuries, critical spots where
depth is truly tested. They never really practiced together on
(23:16):
a certain side of the ball. Their quarterback gets injured
a couple of times, and it all kind of feels
like it was closing the walls in on them a
little bit.
Speaker 4 (23:23):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, I think that's another thing to
talk about too, is like I think about this is
a little bit different, Fletch, but like the expectations of
twenty twelve going into twenty thirteen, and again there's a
million other factors that go into that year for US,
But I do think that's something that players, especially young players,
maybe players who haven't been in these situations a lot,
they have to negotiate that too, you know. So it's
(23:45):
like it's the injuries, it's the expectation. It's a tougher schedule,
and I think people talk about opponent toughness, but I
think like this for US, I know, traveling with the team,
like this schedule has been tough. Man late night games,
early mornings, back, kind of shorter bridged weeks, Like it's
a different ballgame when you win a lot of football
games and I think you feel all of those things.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
There's a lot of adversity.
Speaker 4 (24:08):
They didn't set themselves up in the best position to
be successful with the university, and then all those variables come.
Speaker 1 (24:14):
Togein, you know, real quick. I talked to somebody and
they put it this way. It was said to me like,
in the case of a situation like this, a win
feels like a relief and a loss feels like three losses.
And that's partially the expectations just kind of like bearing
down on you. Meantime, they're not even putting out their
as semblance of what they thought their team was going
(24:34):
to look like when they started the season.
Speaker 5 (24:37):
Yeah, I'll say this too.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
Not only expectations from obviously the national media, the fans, expectations,
and expectations within the building.
Speaker 5 (24:48):
There's also the element of you got a bulls eye
on your back too.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Now, so you're a twelve win team, you went two
playoff two role playoff games, make it to the NFC
championsh Game. Now teams aren't going to overlook you. Teams
are gonna hey, circle, Hey, we're playing the Washington Commanders.
They got this high, high powered offense, they got Jade
and Daddy's office, a Rookie of the Year, expectation for
(25:13):
him to make another step. The expectation is we're going
to be definitely a playoff team. So these these teams,
as they're competing against us, they're like, hey, we're gonna
knock them off. We uh you know that's that's that's
part of it too. You you're no longer a hunter.
You're being hunted. So you have to have that mindset
(25:35):
and it has to take place in your and your
preparation during the off season too, realizing, hey, people are
going to be gunning for us now too. If we
don't take the proper mindset and realize that teams are
gonna ramp up when they play against us. You have
some games where you're like, man, how do we find
ourselves in a battle against this team, or how do
(25:56):
we lose this ball game? And whether it's a better team,
you know, tougher schedule. Now, you have to understand that
teams are going to come and play against you, and
you got to be ready for that challenge.
Speaker 1 (26:08):
On the other side of the bye, I felt this
way watching Miami like playing them, you know, in Madrid
a couple of weeks ago, they went through the worst
of it about three weeks earlier, they fired their GM,
they traded away one of their star players on defense.
Clearly the record was what it was. There's a lot
of discussion about, well, what's coming down the road, and
maybe things just kind of opened up for them a
(26:29):
little bit and they've been more competitive. They've won three
or four, you know, off of that beat the Bills,
one in Madrid against Washington. I'm hoping and I think
that after what I saw in Madrid, that we're behind
what is probably the hardest part of this whole season.
I thought the defense kind of level set itself a
little bit there, like, and I'm hoping we're going to see,
as London alluded to earlier, some of our star players
may come back in the next couple of weeks, maybe sooner,
(26:52):
where we get a chance to see what this team
could look like moving forward. So I'm hoping we're kind
of through part of that. So on the other side
of this, I think you may see a very different team,
a level set on defense. Hopefully Jaden and Terry are
playing sooner rather than later, and we get a little
bit more of as semblance of the team we thought
we had in the summer as opposed to the one
that we had the first couple of months.
Speaker 4 (27:12):
Yeah, I think the big thing for me is just
the level set defensively, Like it was, they went through
a couple weeks there, it was kind of rough, and yeah,
I think everyone was disappointed. But I think after watching
them in Madrid, watching them versus Miami, and again, Miami's
not a top shelf offense by any stretch of the imagination,
but they have dynamic playmakers. I thought the tackling was better.
I thought the runfits were better. I thought the coverage
responsibilities were better. And again it's are are they going
(27:35):
to be the best defense in the NFL? No, Like
you know, Dan Quinn on the game plan last week
was like, we need to turn the football over still,
we need to set better edges in the run. All
those things are still true, but at least there was
a the floor was raised. And so if you can
just play games like that again versus the Broncos offense,
which is kind of middling, the Minnesota offense, which is
kind of middling at the moment, you kind of say,
(27:56):
if they can just keep us in it and we're
not losing by twenty points in the third court or
this this team has a shot, especially with I think
the way that Cliff is now calling games, So I
think of all the things. Health obviously is important, but
kind of finding something defensively to hang your hat on
and say this is our standard, this is what we
can look too moving forward. I think that may be
(28:16):
the biggest thing coming out of Madrid.
Speaker 2 (28:18):
They were they were they were more connected. You saw
just a more cohesive defense. Was it perfect? No, it
was not perfect, And as a as you mentioned, DQ
talked about some of the run things, some of the
run fits, stuff like that, and I'm sure that that
would be the big takeaway. Like, man, we still could
be much better at our run fits where we allowed
(28:40):
them to get get some of those, uh, some of
those explosive runs. So you still still need to improve.
There didn't really they have maybe one pass play over
twenty yards that was you know, aighted by mistackle. But
just they looked much better as a defense you're able
to I thought the the confidence, the physicality you saw
(29:01):
some guys. I saw some guys flying around playing really
good football. The linebackers as a as a core, I
thought that was their best Game of the season. McGee
made some outstanding plays in space, Frankie had some nice plays.
Bobby you know, did make some nice plays, had that
had that excellent pass breakup in the end zone to
prevent a touchdown on the fourth down. So there's a
(29:22):
lot of stuff you can build on. And I think
even within that, there'll be even more things to kind
of add to the defense. And we saw a couple
of different types of pressures or simulated pressures. Maybe you
add you add some things off of those things off
of those what you saw showed last week gets dumphin.
So moving forward, you mentioned that the Broncos offense, Let's
(29:45):
see if we can take advantage of an offense that
that has had some struggles at time, and and and
and add some turnovers, like you said.
Speaker 4 (29:52):
Yeah, and again, like that's a group that's okay being
in a close game, and like that's awesome because like
they're trusting their defense and they're being conservative offense. But
when you're in a one score game, it can go
either way. And I think like if they kind of
capture some of that explosive play magic, they really need
to make sure that they are that that is a
building piece the Miami stuff that it's not just kind
(30:13):
of a flash in the pan like NFL to me,
is about being consistent. It's it's about coaching consistency, it's
about player consistency, it's about consistent execution, and so like,
can you take that performance and then parlay it into
something down the road here where you say, like, these
are some pieces that are that we can build around,
that are growing. And I think again, like, that's what
I'm really excited about coming out of the buy is
(30:34):
all the stuff the defense did.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
Yeah, and these are interesting opponents for what I think
is now the set group of the offensive line moving forward.
There's been a lot of changes here. Josh Connerly is now,
you know, eleven games into his career. Sam Cosmy, we
were waiting for him to get his sea legs back.
He's played a few games. He's out there, Chris Paul
is settled in here, Brandon Coleman's being used as the
(30:55):
big tight end, the sixth offensive lineman. Tuntle is as
good as advertised, And all of a sudden, you're going
to get Denver, who as of a couple of weeks
ago led the league in sacks. You're going to get Minnesota,
who's incredibly talented upfront and very exotic in the way
that they bring their defense. You're going to get the
Giants front. I know they just fired their defensive coordinator,
but that there's not a lack of talent upfront on
(31:16):
that group. I'm interested to see that. And then I'm
hoping Jade and Terry Deebo, Noah Ertz, Bill, let's see
what this looks like. You know, I'm hoping they all
could come out play together. Let's get a look at
what this is.
Speaker 3 (31:29):
Yeah, I'm one hundred percent with that.
Speaker 4 (31:30):
I think, yeah, man, And I think the thing that again,
I go back to that point that I made earlier
Fletch basically saying that I kind of like that they
had to play a little bit left handed here for
the last couple of weeks, because I do think Cliff,
like Connolly is playing better. And one of the reasons
he's playing better is because Cliff is calling a game
that is more supportive of the offensive line in pass
(31:51):
protection and on first and second down. And so I think,
like bringing that knowledge with you into games like this
versus teams that have high sack production, you say, hey,
now our offensive line is not only playing better, but
we're putting them in better positions because we had to
earlier in the season. Let's keep doing that because if
that group's playing well, we have a shot to win
the game. We have a shot to elevate skill position
players on the perimeter. So I think in some ways
(32:13):
that's really good for that group to kind of have
that elevation schematically.
Speaker 2 (32:16):
Also, oh yeah, absolutely, Denver is the number one they
still league the league at sacks. Bro the forty nine sacks.
And the key is, don't be a third long situation.
Let's try to run the football. And we ran a
thirty three times I think it thirty two or thirty
three times against the Dolphins, and see if we can
(32:37):
get that.
Speaker 5 (32:37):
Number up even high. You know, Logan, I love to run.
Speaker 2 (32:39):
The football, especially I guess teams are teams like that
who want to rush the passer.
Speaker 5 (32:45):
They want to get out of the quarterback. Just continue
to lead.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
On those guys, man, Let the batter around a continue
to do a thing. Let Bill Cross get married, get
going to you know you mentioned we've added elements to
our office that you know, hey, wasn't there at the
begin of the year, and that's been a good thing.
(33:10):
You've seen some guys start to establish roles for their sales,
bigger roles too.
Speaker 5 (33:15):
You know.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
Less thy real quick here before we go. So we
had the bye week. I'm watching the Cowboys play the Eagles.
I watched the Eagles blow this big lead and Dallas
beats them. And this is one of those it feels
like season defining type of moments where things could turn
for Philadelphia after losing who knows right, And I'm sitting
there going, had Washington just won that Miami game, held
onto the ball one that Chicago game, they'd be five
(33:35):
and six, all things being equally, you would and with
two shots at Philadelphia. That was the what if for
me watching that happen going if those two games went
the other way, we would be having a very different
conversation about what the second half of the season is
for this team.
Speaker 3 (33:51):
I mean one million percent.
Speaker 4 (33:53):
I think about it all the time, Like five and
six feels great at this point, you know, with all
this ahead of you, with all these divisional games in
front of you. Obviously you're still not Mathema eliminated, but
it does feel very different on things that were totally
within your control.
Speaker 1 (34:05):
That's right.
Speaker 5 (34:06):
Yeah, absolutely, yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:07):
You I mean, man, that's just football as football play here,
playing there, and you know you're riding a thick of things.
Speaker 1 (34:16):
Yep. I'm excited for Sunday night though. Denver. That'll be fun.
Great duo of defensive ends. They're gonna have to deal
with Benito and Cooper and bo Nicks. We'll get another
profile game of a prominent quarterbacks from the twenty twenty
four class. Jayde Well hopefully Jane Days, we'll see see
you later this week. But bon Nick's coming to town too.
It should be a good one. All right, guys, we'll
(34:36):
do this after the Denver game next week. See all
next time on the Booth Review. Booth Review was filmed
at the Big Bear AI Command Center Studio. Big Bear
AI offers mission ready AI for a rapidly evolving world,
proudly protecting the Washington Commanders and its fans.
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