Not Fair to Put 'Timetable' On Commanders' Offensive Growth, Says Ron Rivera
This past offseason, the Washington Commanders, on offense, went through a variety of changes. Eric Bieniemy was brought in as the offensive coordinator, and young quarterback Sam Howell was named the starter, not to mention the offensive line changes.
With Howell only having one regular season start to his name at the beginning of the season, coupled with learning a new offensive scheme under Bieniemy, naturally, there would be some missteps early on in the process.
And alas, that has turned out to be true as the Commanders, after starting the season 2-0, were handed a good, old-fashioned beat down in a 37-3 loss to the Buffalo Bills.
For Commanders head coach Ron Rivera, he doesn't think it's fair to put a timetable on when things between Howell and Bieniemy should start to click.
“The truth of the matter is there really isn't a timetable," Rivera said. "You work the things that you’re doing, you practice them, you get better at them, you continue to work, you're going to make mistakes. You're going to have moments where you're going to sit in there, go, oh, we've arrived. You have moments where you say, damn, we just took a step backwards. To say when you're going to get there, that's not fair."
While 2-1 isn't the end of the world by any means for the Commanders, there is still plenty of room for improvement as the players come to terms with the new offensive system.
There have been a lot of good things and also some bad things that have come out of the first three games, and no doubt Washington's coaching staff is working feverishly to close the gap between its best performances and its worst ones.
Washington Commanders offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy
Mandatory Credit: Brad Mills-USA TODAY Sports
For Rivera, he highlighted the numerous changes that have been done offensively so far.
“There's so many things that we've tried to put into play," Rivera said. "We revamped our offensive line. We've got a young quarterback, we've got a new coordinator. There's a lot that's going through right now that we've got to deal with and work on. But again, we're going to go out, and we're going to show up every Sunday. We're going to play our butts off.”
Sunday, Washington travels to Lincoln Financial Field to take on the Philadelphia Eagles, a place where last season, they handed the Eagles their first loss of the year.
Coming off such a poor performance against the Bills, there will no doubt be a want to rectify that effort against a talented Eagles team in their own building.
It will be Washington's first division game of the season, and they will want to get the series off to a winning start.
To do that, Howell and the offense need to be firing on all cylinders. They have shown flashes through the first three weeks; now would be the perfect time to put it all together.
