Dwayne Haskins Benched, Kyle Allen to Start

The Washington Football Team has benched Dwayne Haskins after four games and inserted Kyle Allen as the starter for this Sunday against the Los Angeles Rams.

Kyle Allen’s familiarity with the system Washington is using goes back to the #Panthers. WFT has a window where it thinks it can do some damage. Now it’ll be Kyle Allen under center for it. https://t.co/iqTY2Zflxy
— Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) October 7, 2020

The move was expected at some point but not necessarily at this point after just four games with no preseason.

A couple of factors are in play here:

1. As we've discussed over the last week - the tone changed from Ron Rivera about possibly winning the division.

2. Haskins was not selected by Rivera and his staff.

3. Kyle Smith, Rivera's top personnel man, as we've mentioned a number of times was philosophically aligned with Jay Gruden and his staff, which wanted nothing to do with Haskins.

4. This decision was as much about a terrible sack on first down for a loss of 18 yards in the red zone, as it was about the failed fourth-down test that Rivera talked about Sunday.

5. The fact that Haskins is not even reportedly going to be the backup Sunday tells you how down they are on him.

6. Sources have been telling me for several weeks behind the scenes that the Washington Football Team was already studying first-round quarterbacks in the 2021 NFL Draft hard. Trevor Lawrence, Justin Fields and Trey Lance.

The organization was represented in person at North Dakota State for Lance's only game this year before he turned pro.

Chris Russell is the Publisher of this site, a part of SI.com. He can be heard on 106.7 The FAN in the Washington D.C. area and world-wide on Radio.com. Chris also hosts the "Locked on Washington Football Team" Podcast and can be read via subscription to Warpath Magazine. You can e-mail Chris at russellmania09@Gmail.com or follow him on Twitter at @Russellmania621