Jay Gruden thrilled the Commanders listened to him with moving Terry McLaurin around vs. Titans
Jay Gruden was a huge proponent of moving Terry McLaurin around the offensive formations some more when he visited both Chris Russell and Grant & Danny last week – and lo and hbehold, the Commanders did that on Sunday, got Terry involved early and often with 10 snaps on the right side, and he had eight grabs and two TDs in a rout of Tennessee.
Hey, sometimes, the ol’ coach still got it.
“I like the fact they came out firing the first two plays too, with passes,” Gruden said to Rooster Monday. “It’s a big deal and I think it's important, especially if you're gonna feature the right side of the formation in your first progression, I think he needs to be over there and give him the opportunity to be the number one target. If it's a pure progression play, if they just flip the formation and make Terry that number one guy, I think you get your best player as the number one. He might not always get the ball, but at least he's the go to guy in the first progression.”
Gruden discussed what the offense did well as a whole, which you can read about from his visit with G&D on Monday as well, and suffice to say that keeping their third downs to short yardage was huge, and getting out to the quick start buried any chance the Titans had.
“Tennessee had the ball for 10 plays and was down 28-0 – I’ve never seen anything like that in my life!” Gruden laughed. “I mean the first play of the game was a false start, and they ran a play for a loss of four, and then another false start and a screen for a loss of two. That’s not a great first 15 to start with, but they offered no resistance against the Commanders.”
And beyond the featuring of McLaurin, we got to see Jayden Daniels’ running on display again – and even if his total was low, he looked crisp when he did run, and found paydirt once, too.
“The whole thing about Jayden is they had an RPO on that play where he chose the pass, and Ertz was in the flat, but Harold Landry was right in his face, so he pulled it down and cut in front of Landry and made a hell of a run for touchdown,” Gruden said. “That’s the RPO-R option, so they have another letter to their RPO. So that's what makes him so exciting; I think he made a great decision there, because if he tried to throw it to Ertz, Landry might have tipped and intercepted it, but he pulled it down and made a hell of a play.”
Take a listen to Gruden’s entire visit above, as he also discusses Frankie Luvu’s strong game, the shaky kicking situation, and more!
