Speaker 1: Welcome to the Command Center Podcast. I'm Julie Donaldson. We
Speaker 1: are two days away from Washington's primetime matchup with the
Speaker 1: New York Giants. For our players, Santana Masson, Logan Poston
Speaker 1: shared their matchups they will be paying special attention to.
Speaker 1: So let's talk about some of what matchups are going
Speaker 1: to be playing out that will determine how much success
Speaker 1: Washington has here on Sunday Night Football. And I kind
Speaker 1: of want to start with the offensive line once again.
Speaker 1: I feel like this is kind of like a broken
Speaker 1: record coaching the season, and it's one of the reasons
Speaker 1: they preach so much about flex positions. They have to
Speaker 1: make a change at center. Wes Schweitzer is coming in now.
Speaker 1: He has some experience there, He has some experience with
Speaker 1: Taylor being in that position. But look, it's not a
Speaker 1: change that you really want to make at this point
Speaker 1: in the season. Logan, Yes, that ideal, and I think,
Speaker 1: you know, obviously West is it kind of making the
Speaker 1: best the best of a bad situation, right, Obviously, Tyl
Speaker 1: Larson g hurt is not what you want. That's we
Speaker 1: feel really bad for him, obviously, but you know, West
Speaker 1: played center this entire offseason, he worked with no he
Speaker 1: work with Trade Turner, so he does have a level
Speaker 1: of chemistry with them. Obviously he's more of a natural guard,
Speaker 1: but he kind of fits this offensive philosophy. Big body,
Speaker 1: three to thirty five pounds, can move people off the spot,
Speaker 1: fits this downhill approach. Show not perfect, but again, this
Speaker 1: is a tough week to be coming in jury because
Speaker 1: he's playing against the best pier of nose guard in
Speaker 1: the NFL and dextra Lawrence, right, and he's the guy
Speaker 1: who's big, he's powerful, he's quick, he's athletic, and the
Speaker 1: last time West had to go against a true nose
Speaker 1: guard was Jordan Davis. He had a tough time of it.
Speaker 1: So that's gonna be an interesting MATCHUPI keeping, Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: the wrong time to see us, you know, happen to
Speaker 1: you know, count on those guys that we have that
Speaker 1: we can call interchangeable pieces. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: that's why we play the game. And I think that
Speaker 1: having office a line coach that we have, having the
Speaker 1: office a line that we have, these guys are ready
Speaker 1: in their prime for this, these these moments, and West
Speaker 1: got to go out there and put us big, big
Speaker 1: boy short then play the game. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: last out and against the Giants, they had five sex
Speaker 1: against us. Last week, these guys had four sex. They're
Speaker 1: coming into this week. They was embarrassed a little bit
Speaker 1: last week, so I know they're gonna be, you know,
Speaker 1: chopping at the bits a little bit. So we just
Speaker 1: have to go out there and play the kind of
Speaker 1: game that we know we can play. And that's a
Speaker 1: great point to Santana because when you bring those new
Speaker 1: pieces in, especially against a team the blizzerest time, it's
Speaker 1: very very challenging, right because it's the communication between those guys.
Speaker 1: How does we see it? How does you guys do
Speaker 1: the front? So that's gonna be a huge element this
Speaker 1: week as well. And Dexter Lawrence leads to the Giants
Speaker 1: with six sacks, so you know they're going to be
Speaker 1: coming and of course, you know Wake Martindale, he brings
Speaker 1: that pressure. Yeah, I mean the Giants are one of
Speaker 1: the top in the league at blitzing and getting after
Speaker 1: the quarterback, and we saw that that kind of caused
Speaker 1: some problems last time out Santana. So really it's going
Speaker 1: to be what does Scott Turner do to adjust and
Speaker 1: plan against that. And that's one of the things about
Speaker 1: seeing guys twice in the year, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: You have a chance to adjust. So now we can't
Speaker 1: sit there and say, oh, we wasn't ready. You know,
Speaker 1: I talk about so much of not being ready. One
Speaker 1: of my old high school coaches used to talk about
Speaker 1: it all the time, and you laughed about the last time.
Speaker 1: I said, But Coach, say, if someone had come up
Speaker 1: to you and ask you, hey, you want Hawaiian punch,
Speaker 1: you got suck a punt the first time, and you
Speaker 1: said yes the second time, then you deserve it. So
Speaker 1: this time, Manta, we can't get sucker punt. So I'm
Speaker 1: sure that Scott Turner will be ready for whatever these
Speaker 1: guys have have have brewing for us, and um, I
Speaker 1: think it's our time. Plus London caught up with defensive
Speaker 1: tackle John Allen to recap how he's preparing for the
Speaker 1: commander's second meeting with the gymon. John, appreciate you joining me.
Speaker 1: How are you feeling out to the boy week. I'm
Speaker 1: feeling pretty good. I feel fresh mentally, I'll recover and
Speaker 1: I'm ready to get back to it. What'd you do? Uh?
Speaker 1: How you how'd you spend your time off. I did
Speaker 1: absolutely nothing. I just been at the house, hanging out
Speaker 1: with the wife and dogs, just literally just relaxing, playing
Speaker 1: a lot of videos us of course, of course. Yeah.
Speaker 1: You know, as you look at this situation, you guys
Speaker 1: are playing the Giants for in consecutive games. Does it
Speaker 1: Does that make it any easier or different? You know,
Speaker 1: preparing for them, knowing that you just played them two
Speaker 1: weeks ago. I want to say it makes it easier
Speaker 1: or harder? You know, every week is a beast within itself,
Speaker 1: and they've seen us two weeks ago, We've seen them
Speaker 1: two weeks go. We're coming off a boss, so we're
Speaker 1: a little bit more first than there. But at the
Speaker 1: end of the day, you still got to execute. Um.
Speaker 1: They're in the NFL too, so I'm sure they're gonna
Speaker 1: be right and be ready to go, and we have
Speaker 1: to go out there and meant more plays than they do.
Speaker 1: You guys have faced plenty of mobile quarterbacks this season.
Speaker 1: Daniel Jones, one of the most mobile quarterbacks, was able
Speaker 1: to make some things happen with his legs in a
Speaker 1: bed last ball game. Kind of what makes it so
Speaker 1: difficult when dealing with Jones in his ability to run.
Speaker 1: When you got a guy like Jones, you know, we
Speaker 1: feel like a lot of quarterbacks in this league can run,
Speaker 1: but Jones is one of the guys who's more willing
Speaker 1: to do it. You know what I mean. If his
Speaker 1: reads aren't there, he's taken off full speed and he
Speaker 1: runs like a four four or four five as opposed
Speaker 1: to most quarterbacks who can run but really want to
Speaker 1: look to throw the ball more. You know, I just
Speaker 1: like he's more willing to do it on a consecutive basis.
Speaker 1: So we got to do a better job of pazzlers
Speaker 1: lanes and when he runs, all eleven guys got to
Speaker 1: be there. In the first meeting, that score obviously end
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty tie, But there were some positives that you,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm sure you take away from that game.
Speaker 1: What are some of the things that you look at
Speaker 1: as a defense saying, hey, these are things we can
Speaker 1: build on and continue to do better going into this
Speaker 1: next game. I would say, as a teller two halves,
Speaker 1: the first half we didn't play as well as we
Speaker 1: wanted to when we let up thirteen points. The second
Speaker 1: half were really honed it on what we had to
Speaker 1: do and played three quarters and know only let up seven.
Speaker 1: So when we look at when we did the little
Speaker 1: things right, we have success, as opposed when we didn't
Speaker 1: do the little things right, we didn't have success. So
Speaker 1: there's a lot to build on, but there's a lot
Speaker 1: of things we have to correct as well. You got
Speaker 1: a battle for the team leader in sacks right now
Speaker 1: between yourself, Matez and Dern. You know, first of all,
Speaker 1: who's going what's if the leader? Who what's the leader
Speaker 1: gonna get? Y'all y'all figured out that yet something more
Speaker 1: valuable money pride. To have someone's pride, that's that's the
Speaker 1: best thing you could take from somebody. But it's all
Speaker 1: love and you know, friendly competition from one another. And
Speaker 1: I can tell you one thing. They definitely made me
Speaker 1: a better player and a better person. I appreciate. I
Speaker 1: can't wait to see you guys get out to the
Speaker 1: quarterback on Sunday Night football. Yes, I appreciate it. For
Speaker 1: all your news and analysis, be sure to tune into
Speaker 1: Command Center Wig nights at five and ten pm on
Speaker 1: NBC Sports Washington. You can also stream on YouTube and
Speaker 1: Commanders dot Com.