First Half Review - Washington Commanders 2025 Season

By: Sam Myer 10/29/2025

Through the first two months of the season, the Commanders sit at an uninspiring 3-5 with multiple tough matchups still to come. Washington has lost their last three games in a row in disappointing fashion and now faces the daunting reality of an uphill battle to stay in playoff contention. There were lots of positive elements from the first month of the season that seemed to have faded in these three losses. Washington had the number one rushing attack in the NFL, leading the league in yards per carry and rushing yards per game. They were still the leaders in yards per carry before Monday night but will likely lose this spot after the loss to Kansas City. The lack of ability to run the ball in the last three games has significantly impacted their offensive efficiency with the injuries at wide receiver. Until Monday, Jayden Daniels and Terry McLaurin hadn’t shared the field together since week two causing the ceiling of their offensive potential to be limited.

Injuries have been a major plague on the potential of this roster as they’ve had 12 players who were active in week 1 miss time due to injury. Six of these twelve players are currently on the Injured Reserve list and at least three of them will be out for the season. As previously mentioned, Jayden Daniels and Terry McLaurin did not share the field together for five consecutive games. Noah Brown has also been out since halftime of their week two game in Green Bay, meaning Washington has not had their top three receivers on the field with Jayden Daniels for the last six games. The injuries don’t end there for the offense either as week 1 starting RB Austin Ekeler tore his Achilles in week two and Noah Brown has landed on Injured Reserve and won’t play again until at least after their bye in week 12. Jayden Daniels sat out in week eight and may not play in week nine against the Seahawks. To make matters worse, Terry McLaurin reaggravated his quad injury on a diving catch and Laremy Tunsil missed the entire second half with a hamstring injury.

While all the offensive injuries seem to be back breakers for the team, the losses on the defensive side of the ball are much more significant. Washington has already lost three defensive linemen for the season in Dorance Armstrong, Deatrich Wise, and Javonte Jean-Bapiste. Their remaining edge rushers are now Von Miller, Jacob Martin, Preston Smith, and Jalyn Holmes. This could prove to be a major issue for the remainder of the season as this was already considered Washington’s weakest unit heading into 2025. Unfortunately, it’s unclear how much help will be coming from the interior of their defensive line as both Daron Payne and Javon Kinlaw are playing through injuries right now. Safety Will Harris is also injured right now and will likely not return until after the bye week. While Washington had one of its best performances in the first half against Kansas City, it will be difficult to produce those results on a consistent basis while shorthanded.

All the injuries have made it difficult to establish an identity or a rhythm on either side of the ball, but there has been one consistent theme in all of Washington’s eight games. If the Commanders can win the line of scrimmage on offense and on defense, they have won the game. If they’re unable to win either of these, then they have lost every game so far this season. This also translates towards two other facts about all of Washington’s games with the first being that if they’ve able to rush the passer consistently they’ll win the game. Secondly, when Washington can run the ball consistently, they can balance their offense and move the ball with efficiency. Whenever Washington is struggling to establish a run game, they’ve lost every game in 2025. Obviously, the inconsistency with injuries has been a significant contributing factor to these; however, the Commanders will look to reestablish their ground dominance once Jayden Daniels returns.

The last thing that the first eight weeks of the season have revealed is that this team is very clearly still in rebuilding phase despite having a franchise quarterback on a rookie contract. Adam Peters understandably attempted to make moves to put the Commanders in position for a Super Bowl run after appearing in the NFC Championship game in 2024. Unfortunately, it has left this team with less young talent than necessary to build a yearly contender for Jayden Daniels and Dan Quinn. The two biggest deals Washington made in the offseason were Javon Kinlaw and extending Terry McLaurin. Other than these two signings, Washington mostly signed veterans and made their splash acquisitions through trades. The trades have certainly paid off through the first eight weeks of the season as Deebo Samuel has unquestionably been their best offensive player and Laremy Tunsil has made a huge impact on the offensive line. Moving forward, Adam Peters will need to resort to splash acquisitions such as this through the trade market and higher-profile free agent signings.

As for the remainder of this season, it seems to be that their health will be the main concern for Washington. Even though the trade deadline is looming, Adam Peters will likely be rather quiet this year. The Commanders don’t have many assets that they’d be likely to move on from due all of the injuries they’ve sustained this season, and they don’t have the draft capital to afford an impact player on the trade market. Even if they were to make a big move for an edge rusher or wide receiver, the rest of the roster is so injury-riddled that it likely wouldn’t be enough to get them over the hump to the playoffs. If they can get their full complement of available players back and healthy for the remainder of the season, then they have an outside chance at sneaking into the postseason. The biggest factor in this equation is certainly going to be Jayden Daniels, as they’ll need their signal caller to be the difference maker in every game. Between the injuries to the receiver room and the defensive line, it is going to be an uphill battle to stay in contention. However, with Daniels behind center, Washington feels they can win every time they step on the field.