LANDOVER — Sunday was the Washington Commanders’ Fan Appreciation Game at FedEx Field, and the team invited a heck of a lot of people to share in the appreciation.
It was HCBU night out. It was Pride Night Out. There was an inaugural Jewish Heritage pregame event. But even after papering the house with a rainbow coalition of hometown fans, it still wasn’t enough to keep Miami Dolphins fans from taking over the stadium.
On its social media platform, the team had boasted of heading for another sellout at FedEx Field. Here’s a suggestion to new owner Josh Harris — if your sellouts are driven by a majority of opposing team fans, it’s nothing to brag about. That’s a Dan Snyder move.
Here’s who didn’t show up for Fan Appreciation Game — the football team.
The Commanders showed a decided lack of appreciation for the third straight week in a four-game losing streak in a 45-15 loss to the Dolphins. Add that to their 45-10 Thanksgiving Day loss to the Cowboys in Dallas and their 31-19 defeat the week before at home at the hands of a woeful New York Giants team with their backup rookie quarterback, and you must admit that appreciation is somewhat lacking.
Then again, maybe everyone needs to set their sights lower for appreciation.
Dan Snyder doesn’t own the team. That’s appreciation.
Like Tony Robbins once said, “Change your expectation for appreciation and the world changes instantly.”
You’ll have to forgive Commanders fans if they haven’t quite adjusted their appreciation sights to the new depth they have sunk to. They’ve been lowering expectations for more than two decades. But 121-44 in three straight games? Not even Jim Zorn lowered expectations that much.
This guy has — Ron Rivera, who, in his fourth year at the helm of this franchise, is in the process of turning in his worst season among zero winning seasons — a 4-9 record, with little chance of wins in sight.
They’ve got the week off, and then travel to Los Angeles to face the Rams and another former Washington assistant coach — Sean McVay, who, like Miami coach Mike McDaniel, was once in the building in Ashburn as an assistant.
There’s no McVays or McDaniels or Shanahans in that building now — not even defensive coordinator Jack Del Rio anymore, fired last week after a season of disappointment with a bottom-feeding defense anchored by six first-round picks on the field.
Rivera, a former defensive coordinator with the Chicago Bears and San Diego Chargers, took over the defensive duties and didn’t have any better answers than Del Rio did.
“I think there’s some opportunities, but we’ve missed those opportunities,” he said after the game.
He speaks about opportunities like it’s some sort of unreachable foreign substance instead of owning up to the truth — that it’s his job to create those opportunities for his players.
If he doesn’t have the players to take advantage of the opportunities he and his fellow coaches have created? Well, then, after four years of overseeing building this roster, he just might have the wrong players.
Rivera nearly admitted it after the game when he told reporters who asked about this roster, “There’s a little work to be done. But I think we have talent in spots.”
He was defenseless without his shield of deflection, quarterback Sam Howell, who Rivera will often use to deflect criticism as an example of growth and talent in that key position.
It would have sounded hollow Sunday even for Rivera to do so. Howell completed just 12 of 23 passes for 127 yards, three sacks (58 for the year), two touchdowns on the ground and one pick-six interception (his 14th interception of the season) to Miami edge rusher Andrew Van Ginkel for a 33-yard touchdown early in the second quarter – his third straight pick-six throw. He is one game away from tying former Houston quarterback Matt Schaub’s record of four straight.
With a 50.5 quarterback rating, there was no Howell growth propaganda from the head coach.
There was some fan appreciation talk, though. It came from Miami quarterback Tua Tagovailoa.
“I can’t remember an away game where we had that much support, that much love from our fans,” he said. “I mean none of that goes unnoticed and we really appreciate that as players.”
Of course he does. It was the Fan Appreciation Game.
⦁ You can hear Thom Loverro on The Kevin Sheehan Show podcast.
