Speaker 1: Welcome to the Command Center podcast. I'm Bram Weinstein. Commanders
Speaker 1: fell to the San Francisco forty nine ers thirty seven
Speaker 1: to twenty in their Christmas Eve trip to the Bay Area.
Speaker 1: Former Washington players Logan Paul Said and Fred Spot joined
Speaker 1: me to break down what happened in the Week sixteen matchup.
Speaker 1: All right, let's just start really here with the elephant
Speaker 1: in the room, which is a decision is going to
Speaker 1: be made this week whether to stick with Taylor heinekere
Speaker 1: go to Carson Wentz. What do you think so far here?
Speaker 1: I mean, I think this is this is kind of
Speaker 1: they've they've given us the answer to the test already,
Speaker 1: you know, Bram, Like, there's no question here, it's Carson
Speaker 1: Wentz will be the starter next week. I think they
Speaker 1: want to know. They want to finish their evaluation of them.
Speaker 1: Obviously started six weeks this year, not enough to kind
Speaker 1: of complete the evaluation. In my opinion, you want to
Speaker 1: see what we can do. Obviously, Taylor Heineken did an
Speaker 1: excellent job getting this team where they are today in
Speaker 1: terms of record, and I think I had an outstanding
Speaker 1: game yesterday for the most part, outside of those two turnovers.
Speaker 1: That he had at the start of the fourth quarter.
Speaker 1: But I think you got to see wins well. You
Speaker 1: know sometimes the saying your marriage, you need to change
Speaker 1: the environt Now you're going to think of about it.
Speaker 1: We know we could We've seen Carson Wentz inside this offense,
Speaker 1: but we was a pass happy offense at that time.
Speaker 1: Now with him back in the ham, do we continue
Speaker 1: to be a run first team. I want to see
Speaker 1: him in the end. I think they think he can
Speaker 1: push the ball down the field on play action, and
Speaker 1: I think that gives us a chance to be spending.
Speaker 1: There's one unusual caveat. Obviously, Heneke's very liked in the
Speaker 1: locker room. Playoffs are still very much emplayed for them.
Speaker 1: This isn't a we're playing out the string type of situation. No,
Speaker 1: I think that's it. That's exactly right. It's a great
Speaker 1: point because, like you know, Taylor, Heney's from the guy
Speaker 1: that's kind of gotten you this momentum, gotten you this
Speaker 1: kind of charisma within the team, and you know, can
Speaker 1: he kind of can is he the guy to kind
Speaker 1: of continue to make players? I don't know, But I
Speaker 1: really think the deciding factor here is they want to
Speaker 1: know what they have with Carson Wentz and whether he's
Speaker 1: there the answer quarterback movie forward. We all know Heneke
Speaker 1: has a rudy effect. I called him rudy, like you
Speaker 1: want to know, guys, he braves the best out of him.
Speaker 1: He's the guy that guys looked for at the end
Speaker 1: of the game to put him on his shoulder. He's
Speaker 1: that guy. But at the end of the day, we
Speaker 1: got two games to get in the playoffs, and I
Speaker 1: think they want to give cars in this chance to say,
Speaker 1: you know what, take us to the Promised Land. What
Speaker 1: did you make of the defense? There were times really
Speaker 1: look good. They stop the rush offense, and they give
Speaker 1: up way too many big plays. I mean, I think
Speaker 1: when you look at the defense, you gotta look at
Speaker 1: the offense like you're giving the ball back to that
Speaker 1: San Francisco offense, which is very, very potent in very
Speaker 1: advantageous situations. I think, multiple times inside the thirty like,
Speaker 1: that's just not a tenable solution. Obviously, there were some mistakes,
Speaker 1: some coverage bust, but I think when you look at
Speaker 1: the general scope of the game, you gotta say, offensively,
Speaker 1: they did not hold up their end of the bargain.
Speaker 1: They put the defense in a bad spot against a
Speaker 1: very very good football team. Average star in line for
Speaker 1: the forty nine is with the forty four of San Francisco.
Speaker 1: You cannot put your defense in those type of situations.
Speaker 1: But I could say this about the defense. They did
Speaker 1: stand up in their first half. They did go blow
Speaker 1: to blow with San Francisco, and Logan talked about this
Speaker 1: the one thing we could take out of this game.
Speaker 1: This was a measuring instate game. The forty nine is
Speaker 1: one of the best rosters in the best teams in
Speaker 1: the league right now, and you win blow for blow
Speaker 1: with them for the least three quarters. Some invisible yards
Speaker 1: lost in the return game too, would started inside their
Speaker 1: own twenty multiple times on Saturday. That's gonna be hard
Speaker 1: to get to the number one defense. Let's talk about
Speaker 1: shown for a minute. Played more than I think anybody
Speaker 1: thought you would, and he was effective at times too,
Speaker 1: So that was really good time to see him that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't think I was surprised that he played as
Speaker 1: much as he did. I think when you're up, you're
Speaker 1: gonna play in a big game, you're gonna play, And
Speaker 1: I think it was great to see his conditioning be
Speaker 1: in such a good spot in his physicality. F Yeah,
Speaker 1: like you just seemed for a guy whodn't played a
Speaker 1: lot of football, looked like he didn't really miss the beat,
Speaker 1: had some nice rushes against maybe the best left tackling football.
Speaker 1: I was really happy to see him out there. Totally
Speaker 1: exceeded my expectation. I used to be a big fan
Speaker 1: of tag team wrestling. You know, when you the wrestler
Speaker 1: just sitting there waiting to get tag, you just you
Speaker 1: just can't wait to get in there. And that's what
Speaker 1: I saw from from him. He just I need to
Speaker 1: get in I need to get in there. So it
Speaker 1: was good to see him out there. You know what
Speaker 1: I did enjoy it. I enjoy seeing this smile on
Speaker 1: his I'd enjoy seeing him having fun. And that's what
Speaker 1: he brings to his team. Not only does he bring
Speaker 1: a top, nice, deepense in he brings the attitude and
Speaker 1: a love for the game that can't be replaced. The
Speaker 1: playoffs are still in the picture for Washington. Two games
Speaker 1: remaining in the regular season, and we've talked about how
Speaker 1: the Commanders still control their own destiny. They got all
Speaker 1: the help that they needed again two games to go.
Speaker 1: Else can you ask for here, I mean, win out
Speaker 1: two games at home, you're in. I mean, that's exactly
Speaker 1: what you want, right Fred. I mean I don't know
Speaker 1: a lot about playoff football. You know, all the math
Speaker 1: of the charts and the astrology things, all that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff. But what I do like is that we
Speaker 1: control our own destiny. We win games we're in, And
Speaker 1: that's exactly what you want. If you're coaching this team,
Speaker 1: and if you're playing for him, Tom, that's when you
Speaker 1: look at everybody in the locker room and say, it's
Speaker 1: own us. The onus has owned us. We control everything.
Speaker 1: Do you want to get in the first round? Who
Speaker 1: we want to play? We set that up, and we
Speaker 1: set everything up by how we go out of here
Speaker 1: and play eight quarters eight quarters of football. Left pressures
Speaker 1: on them this weekend too, Cleveland is eliminated. So this
Speaker 1: is an AFC team at home, nothing to play for.
Speaker 1: Everything on the line for Washington this weekend. But you know,
Speaker 1: Cleveland's one of those teams. They've got some talented pieces,
Speaker 1: right they know Miles Garrett on the defensive defensive line,
Speaker 1: you can just break, break breaking offensive game plan. Chubb
Speaker 1: is one of the best running backs in the NFL,
Speaker 1: and Watson has slowly been kind of creeping back nowhere
Speaker 1: nearer it was a couple of years ago. But yeah,
Speaker 1: very very talented player, very dangerous team. And at the
Speaker 1: end of the day, these out of football games you
Speaker 1: live for, you live, but these four quarters that were
Speaker 1: and that not only do you live for these games,
Speaker 1: you got these games at home. So we gonna need watching.
Speaker 1: We gonna need the DMB to be in fitnex to
Speaker 1: hipless in these last eight quarts, all right, So if
Speaker 1: they were to make it would be likely as the
Speaker 1: seventh seed at this point, they need the Giants to
Speaker 1: lose out to win out to jump them as a six.
Speaker 1: Right now, they could play Philadelphia possibly if for some
Speaker 1: reason that went wrong. So that means Dallas is unlikely,
Speaker 1: but possibility Minnesota, San Francisco or the two that kind
Speaker 1: of sit there. You got what you want? Who do
Speaker 1: you want? Kirk? Obviously? I mean we all want And
Speaker 1: it's not because of Kirk. It's because Minnesota is not
Speaker 1: as good a team of San Francisco. We're not as
Speaker 1: good as team as Dallas. Like we want the team
Speaker 1: that we can beat, and I don't think we can
Speaker 1: beat them. Well, it'll be a tight game. And don't
Speaker 1: forget this. This team has won eleven one score games.
Speaker 1: So this team is gonna play you to the Wirior.
Speaker 1: But I got faith that we could go to Minnesota
Speaker 1: and come back with him after it did turn into
Speaker 1: Chicago here over the weekend. Yeah, going out to that
Speaker 1: sixty degree whether it's San Francisco, was it terrible? Yeah?
Speaker 1: But I like our chances against Minnesota if they were
Speaker 1: to play them, Yes, if they were to play them, yeah,
Speaker 1: as compared to San Francisco, who is. But we're not
Speaker 1: running away from any bad alright, get they right? We're
Speaker 1: not running away for anybody. You like that, you like,
Speaker 1: We're not running you like that. For all your news
Speaker 1: and analysis, be sure to tune into Command Center weeknights
Speaker 1: five and ten pm on NBC Sports Washington. You can
Speaker 1: also stream on YouTube and commanders dot Com. Hail to
Speaker 1: the Commanders.