Washington fans woke up Monday morning in pain.
A feeling of football-induced pain had become a near-weekly occurrence for the fans of a franchise that had done nothing over the past three decades other than fail on the field and be a source of utter embarrassment off of it. But this time it was a bit different.
This was not their usual feeling of football heartburn – the stinging sensation in your chest as stomach acid bubbles up from the realization that there is no hope that the losing and embarrassment will stop because of management's incompetence.
No, on this morning, this was the feeling of football heartbreak.
And believe it or not, even after a comprehensive defeat to the Philadelphia Eagles in the NFC Championship Game, 55-23, this is the best kind of pain a fan can feel.
This is the pain of having loved – truly loved a football team even with all of their flaws on full display – and backed them to the hilt, only to witness them fall short. And fall short hard.
For a fanbase that has had so little recent experience down this road, this pain will sting. And sting intensely as this is football whiplash suffered from having the rug pulled out from underneath you. In years past, this fanbase experienced the sad indignity of a slow death march of a pointless, fruitless losing season.
This is the opposite: a quick end as you are ejected from the magic carpet ride of the 2024 season for the Commanders. A season of special moments – Cincinnati on Monday night, a prayer answered against Chicago, a run of five straight weeks of wins on the final play – ending in a whimper at the expense of a division foe’s bang.
Life will return to normal. You’ll be back at work when suddenly there will be a moment and you are right back in the moment – Ah, Bobby Wagner had to be a step slow on that first big run. Oh, Dyami Brown stop fighting for extra yards. Ugh, Jeremy McNichols hang on to the ball. Austin Ekeler two hands! – and suddenly the pain all comes back as if the game was still going on.
In the end, the pain will linger and then recede into the depths of every fan’s soul, always lurking there under the surface until the demons from failing to achieve what felt like a football birthright for fans of this franchise are exercised and that dream is realized once again.
But here comes the good news: This is the best position the franchise has been entering an offseason since a loss at Candlestick Park 34 years ago this month.
The ownership group led by Josh Harris – entering just their second offseason – has their focus trained on what matters most and the common sense not to get in the way.
The football brain trust the Harris group hired – general manager Adam Peters and head coach Dan Quinn – who extracted more from less than what anybody could imagine has proof of concept for their ideas (aggressiveness on both sides of the ball and playing four-down offense) and plenty of draft capital and salary cap space to fill out the roster.
And, perhaps, most importantly of all, the quarterback has demonstrated he will be a force to be reckoned with across the NFL.
Jayden Daniels papered over all of the cracks of a shaky Washington foundation and led a team predicted to struggle within a win of a Super Bowl in his rookie season.
The sum was not greater than the parts. But the key cogs in the machine – especially the QB under center – could not have been more impressive.
And the fans, whose loyalty was taken advantage of as they were mistreated and neglected, have been reignited with a sense of swaggering self-confidence.
Of course, there have been some missteps in that in the form of 'taking over' a chain restaurant in downtown Philadelphia before the title game, but it is hard not to notice a renewed sense of pride. Next comes losing any ounce of feeling like a football victim. A fanbase that won three Super Bowls over 10 years should remember that legacy and act like NFL royalty, not traffic in poor-me conspiracies about referees.
A return to their homeland on the RFK Stadium site – another benefit of new stewards in charge of the franchise – could be in the works and that might just be the next step in all of this, too.
But now comes the waiting.
Waiting for the NFL combine. Waiting for legal tampering and free agency. Waiting for the draft. Waiting for minicamp. Waiting for the summer heat to begin and training camp to begin. And then, waiting for the season to return.
But this time the waiting is done with bated breath. With anticipation. With honest hope that comes from having expectations.
In seven months – some 220 days and nights from now – the march begins again.