Hogs Haven
Washington Post (paywall)
The Commanders beat the Eagles, 24-17, to finish 5-12. They will have the seventh pick in the draft and big decisions to make on free agents and coaches.
The Commanders beat the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday, 24-17, to finish 5-12 on the season — the mirror opposite of the regular season record that preceded their magical run to the NFC championship game here a year ago.
As a result of their victory and other results this weekend, they will hold the No. 7 pick in the NFL draft in April. What they do with that selection will be a significant part of an eventful offseason for Washington, with hopes of preventing another spiral such as this one in 2026.
Last season, these games between Washington and Philadelphia carried some weight. On Sunday, the starting quarterbacks were Tanner McKee and Josh Johnson. The Eagles rested many of their key starters ahead of the playoffs. The Commanders played without many of their own because of injuries.
For Washington, the resulting performance in Week 18 contained many of the same highs, lows and maddening inconsistency as Weeks 1 through 17. The offense strung together a 17-play drive on its first possession then later labored to punch it in from inside the 5. Kicker Jake Moody clanked a 24-yarder off the right upright but also drained a 56-yard field goal at the end of the first half. Both Johnson and McKee had woeful interceptions, and Johnson whiffed on a snap for a fumble.
The Athletic (paywall)
For Washington, numbers bubbled to the surface in the 24-17 win.
For Bobby Wagner, the number was 2,000 career tackles, making him the third player in NFL history — along with Ray Lewis and London Fletcher — to amass that many.
Von Miller’s number was $500,000, the bonus he reached late in Sunday’s game with his ninth sack of the season.
And, for Josh Johnson, the number was two — his second career victory as a starter, having played 10 NFL seasons for 14 teams since his rookie year in 2009.
Yes, this was a brutally bad season for the Commanders, and there are many questions and problems the organization will have to figure out and solve in the coming weeks. We will start to get some answers Monday, when Adam Peters speaks to the local media.
The Commanders will spend the next few months conducting an autopsy of this awful season. They will have to self-scout, unsentimentally, to determine what went wrong, and who is best equipped to fix it. They may find that getting better means moving on from all of Wagner, Miller and Johnson, and replacing each with younger men with longer runways.
Such is life in the NFL. For one last day, though, those three veterans, who’ve been on...
