Ron Rivera confirmed on Thursday that quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick will enter training camp as Washington's No. 1 quarterback.
But, the head coach of the Football Team added the important distinction that he will hold a competition at the position, saying that whichever quarterback "gives us the best opportunity to win" will emerge as the Week 1 starter.
"He's going to come in as the No. 1, but there will be a competition," Rivera said of Fitzpatrick to reporters on Thursday. "We want to play the best football player obviously that gives us the best opportunity to win. We feel very comfortable and very confident in the guys that we have. Ryan gives us a completely different type of football player. We're excited about who we can become as a football team."
When Fitzpatrick signed a one-year deal with Washington in mid-March, the initial report from ESPN's Adam Schefter indicated that Fitzpatrick was "expected to head to camp as the starter, with competition from Taylor Heinicke." Rivera seemed to confirm as much on Thursday.
After the 2020 season, Rivera admitted to 106.7 The Fan's Grant Paulsen and Danny Rouhier that he "made a mistake" in not holding an open QB competition last training camp, instead electing to give since-released QB Dwayne Haskins the bulk of the No. 1 reps. He vowed to learn from that mistake going forward.
"I do think for the most part competition does create the opportunity to have guys go out there and really try to put it all out on the line," Rivera said Thursday. "As I said last year, one of the mistakes I made, obviously, was I didn't have the true competition. I felt going in the idea was to give Dwayne as many reps as possible to get him ready to play."
Listen to Ron Rivera's full press conference here:
"This time, I know who we have as the starter, but he's going to go in and he's going to compete with everybody else," he continued. "Like I said, I want to play the guy that's going to give us the best opportunity to win, the best opportunity to develop and grow as a football team."
With Fitzpatrick, Heinicke, Kyle Allen, and Steven Montez under contract for the coming season, Rivera wouldn't rule out potentially adding another QB to the mix in the upcoming draft, in which Washington holds the 19th overall pick, or otherwise.
"Well, we'll see. Again, I can't tell you how things are going to unfold once we get into the draft," he said. "We're going to react to what's going to happen in front of us. Picking where we're picking, there are a lot of things that can happen. We have targets, we have ideas, we have guys that we like, but that always changes, just because of the fact that everybody has a choice. You just never know what's going to happen at that point. Like I said, we will react to what happens in front of us."
Fitzpatrick was a part of their front office conversations from the early going this offseason, Rivera says, even as Washington was reportedly in on negotiations to trade for Matthew Stafford, who ended up being dealt to the Rams. Perhaps more telling, Rivera suggested the 16-year veteran has a leg up on the other quarterbacks on the roster as Washington looks to not only win, but also continue to develop the rest of its roster along the way.
"Ryan was part of the conversation from the beginning, and it's no secret, we tried to do a couple things early, but Ryan was always in that conversation," Rivera said. "When the whole [Matthew] Stafford deal went and a couple other things happened, we felt we wanted to get a guy in here that has the experience that can help us going forward and help us develop."
"Again, it's one of those things I talked about last season, was that it's not just about having a guy out there playing quarterback and trying to win, but also having a guy out there playing quarterback that helps everybody else develop," he continued. "We're still in that process. One season does not say we've arrived. All one season says is that we're learning how to play and do things the right way.
"I think one of the positive residuals out of last season more so than anything else is just the fact that our guys have been through it. They know what it's like. They know what it feels like. That's one of the benefits of playing a lot of young guys. But you play a lot of young guys with the right veterans in place, and you get an opportunity to develop and grow as a football team. That I think is one of the benefits."
"Again, we had that last year because of Alex Smith running the offense for us down the stretch the way he did," he said. "We saw the development and growth of our football team and that was very helpful for us as we go forward from here. I think it was also very important to the growth and development of this football team."
