The most important part of this blog post is that the Washington Commanders got the win on Sunday beating the Atlanta Falcons 24 to 16 at Mercedes-Benz Stadium. With that being said, let us look at a few takeaways I have from the game.
1. The defense was able to contain the Atlanta Falcons run game. Bijan Robinson and Tyler Allgeier ran the ball a combined 26 times for 88 yards and no touchdowns. There were a few decent rushes allowed to the two backs, but they were never allowed to consistently get the run game going. The defense did allow Desmond Ridder to gain 18 yards on 2 carries which brought the total rushing yards for Atlanta to 106 yards. It was also nice to see Khaleke Hudson and David Mayo get a few snaps this week. Overall, I am happy with the defense's performance in the run game.
2. Cody Barton played better this week. This point goes hand and hand with the first point I made. Although Cody Barton has not played up to the standards everyone has had for him this year, I feel like he played his first good game of the season against Atlanta. He was all over the field, just like Kam Curl, and racked up 14 tackles. My only hope now is that he can continue playing well for the remainder of the season.
3. TURNOVERS!! The Commander's defense was able to get not 1, not 2 but 3 turnovers against the Atlanta Falcons. Jamin Davis and Benjamin St. Juste got their first career interceptions in this game, and I feel as if St. Juste should have had a second interception. Nevertheless, if we want to continue to win this season our defense has to continue to force turnovers and that starts with the defensive line getting pressure on the QB and our LBs and DBs being in the correct spot. It’s just like I wrote before the game. Go back to the basics and the turnovers will come.
4. Sam Howell’s Performance. Yes, Howell got sacked 5 times against the Atlanta Falcons and he needs to continue to learn and improve when it comes to finding an incompletion and not taking sacks. With that being said, Howell did not have a turnover in the game and had his first career 3 passing touchdown performance. He now has 1,500 passing yards (9th in the NFL), 9 passing touchdowns (tied 9th in the NFL), 6 interceptions and a QBR of 90.1 (ranked 16th in the NFL). Now, he only had 151 pass yards in the game but remember he would have had more if Dotson and Dyami did not drop their only targets of the game. The fact of the matter is that Howell played well, did not turn the ball over and we got the win.
5. Cornelius Lucas’s performance at left tackle. First, I want to say how sorry I am for Charles Leno and his family. They went through a loss no parent should ever have to go through. With that being said, when Charles Leno was ruled out for the game due to personal reasons that meant that Lucas would get the start at LT, and he would not disappoint. He played 29 pass blocking snaps and allowed 0 pressures, 0 sacks and had a pass blocking grade of 89.2, which ranked 2nd in week 6. Now, with Leno set to return I think that his job should not be in jeopardy, but I do feel as if Lucas should get the opportunity to start at right tackle. He has to be an upgrade over Wylie, and I think he proved he is in the win over Atlanta.
The team’s overall performance against Atlanta has given me hope that they are starting to turn the corner when it comes to “putting it all together”. But we will still have to wait and see because there are still some things they need to work on. We cannot have the offense playing well one game and the defense another. Both sides of the ball need to be able to play their best football at the same time. We started to see that this past week and I hope to see the team continue to grow against the New York Giants this week. After all, this is normally when Ron Rivera’s teams go on a run.
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