When asked about his biggest takeaways from the Washington Commanders' 24-16 win over the Atlanta Falcons in Week 6, Ben Standing told Kevin Sheehan on Monday that there's a short-term answer and a long-term answer.
"The short-term to this, obviously, they needed a win badly," Standig said. "They lost three in a row, they lose another one that drops them to 2-4, that doesn't preclude anyone from saying they can't make another run to the Wild Card spot before, we've seen that before... but obviously this season is supposed to be more than just sneaking into the playoffs. Can they build on this? What ceiling can they get to here? And I think in that regard, that question still very much remains.
"Ron Rivera called it an ugly road win, I don't think he's wrong in that assessment. I think there's a lot to like, particularly on the defense. I think they played like 83 snaps and held Atlanta to 16 points. But Atlanta's offense easily put up way more stats than Washington's offense, which kinda went to sleep over the last four possessions, not getting any offense going when they were up 24-10. I also think this was the definition of a team win."
Jamison Crowder, Cornelius Lucas and Casey Toohill were a few of the players who stepped up and contributed to a win. But overall, Standig said this was a game between "two teams kinda stuck in the NFL's middle that week-to-week you don't quite know what you're going to get."
"Take the win, don't aplogize for it, move on, but at the same time I'm not gonna sit here and go, 'Ok, problems are solved. Here we go,'" Standig said.
Sheehan took a different view from Standig, calling Atlanta an evenly matched team with Washington, and that anytime you win the turnover battle 3-0 he would "take that win every week." And the Commanders not making any mistakes and forcing the Falcons into those big mistakes, adding he would take six or so more of those 'ugly' wins and the seven seed in the playoffs right now if it were on offer.
Standig said that is the short-term vs. long-term view. These types of games highlight a thin margin of error of the game. The question is what does this mean going forward, Standig added, is where the shine seems to lessen from this win as if all of these things need to happen for a win, then winning consistently and against quarterbacks who are better than Atlnata's Desmond Ridder (one of the bottom third QBs in the league) will be difficult.
To hear the full conversation including a more in-depth analysis of the game, what's up with Jahan Dotson and what comes next headed into a divisional matchup with the New York Giants, listen on the audio player above!
