Jayden Daniels struggles as Commanders fall to Eagles

Breaking down Jayden Daniels issues in the Commanders loss to the Eagles

Commanders rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels had one of the worst performances of his career to date as the Commanders fell to a 26-18 loss to the Eagles on Thursday Night Football. Daniels completed 22 of 32 passing attempts for 191 yards and a touchdown, along with one interception. He added seven rushes for just 18 yards on the ground. Daniels looked uncomfortable all night, struggling to get things going and being more impacted by the pressure up front than he typically has been this season. 

What stood out most was his misses on third downs. Daniels has been missing a few opportunities each game this year, but on third down he’s typically been sharper and able to convert, keeping drives alive and giving himself more chances to correct his mistakes and make up for those missed opportunities. But against the Eagles, many of Daniels’ missed opportunities came on third down. 

This was the opening third down of the game for the Commanders. They opt to run a dagger concept to the left with a spot and wheel combination to the right. The Eagles show a two deep safety look pre-snap and are known for playing a lot of quarters coverage under defensive coordinator Vic Fangio, so Daniels likely assumes it’s zone coverage and wants to work to the dagger concept. However, at the snap of the ball, you can see from the end zone replay angle that Daniels looks at the linebacker to the right of the offensive line to see if he’s blitzing. That linebacker immediately peels off to try and match Austin Ekeler on a wheel route. 

Daniels can see that the linebacker doesn't blitz, so feels more comfortable in his protection holding up and proceeds to work to the dagger concept on the other side. However, what didn’t click for him was that linebacker attaching to Ekeler. The spot and wheel combination to that side of the field is a man-beating concept and while the Eagles are actually in zone coverage, they match man-to-man on the back side. The corner follows tight end Zach Ertz inside while the linebacker looks to match Ekeler. The elite quarterbacks would intuitively recognize this and immediately look to the wheel route, knowing Ertz’s spot route will likely cause traffic for the linebacker in coverage. 

Daniels doesn’t do this though, which is a great shame because Ertz blocked off the linebacker (possibly illegally but it wasn’t called) and Ekeler was open. Instead, Daniels progressed back to his left where he worked the dagger concept. He spots Noah Brown working over the middle behind and underneath linebacker and I like the aggression to anticipate Brown coming open in a second window behind the linebacker. However, I’m not sure he saw the safety drive down on it, which could have led to a big hit or at least a contested catch. The underneath linebacker also does a terrific job here, reading Daniels and shifting across to break up the pass with a full stretch dive. 

It’s perhaps being harsh given Daniels is a rookie quarterback, but the level he’s played to at times this season is far beyond that of a rookie. This will be the kind of thing the coaches will be hoping Daniels would eventually learn and adjust to, so it’s worth looking at. Having taken the time to check the linebacker underneath to see if he was blitzing, Daniels could have noticed he was actually covering Ekeler and that should have set off an alarm in his head that the wheel route might be there, but it clearly didn’t. It’s a good mental note to make to see if Daniels learns from that miss later in the season. 

The next third down the Commanders faced, Daniels again had a missed opportunity. 

This time it’s third and six with the Commanders backed up near their own end zone. they look to run a variation of the dagger concept that we saw last time, but one designed to attack quarters coverage. Instead of just a clearing over route and a deep dig behind it, the Commanders add in a deep hook from tight end Zach Ertz. This, at least in theory, can put the back side safety in a bind. If he bites up on the hook, the deep over route could be open behind him, but if he stays back deeper, the hook should be open. 

As Daniels gets to the top of his drop, you can see that the back side safety actually stays deep and waits for the deep over route to come his way. In theory that should leave the middle hook open, but the linebacker in underneath coverage does a terrific job sinking back under it and taking it away. That forces Daniels to go off-script a little. He steps up to avoid some pressure in the pocket and begins to scramble to his right. 

Now at the start of the season, Daniels would immediately take off in these scenarios, but he improved as the season progressed and was doing a much better job of scrambling to pass instead of run. If he had done the same here, he would have been able to see that both Ekeler and Ertz were open as options to throw to for the conversion. Instead, he keeps it himself and tries to put a move on the linebacker in the open field. Unfortunately, that linebacker is more of a safety playing linebacker and he’s able to close on Daniels and make the tackle short of the first down marker, forcing a punt. 

Daniels' issues on third down continued throughout the first half.