Commanders fans feel good about the team’s deep CB group

Survey results!!

In this week’s Reacts survey, we asked readers to vote on the position groups that they felt most and least confident about, with the choices being linebacker, cornerback, and safety.

Judging from the comments that attended the article, a lot of survey respondents didn’t feel deep concern about any of the three position groups, though they were willing to rank them.

In the end, respondents expressed the greatest confidence in the cornerback group, with nearly half of all voters giving them the thumbs up.

The linebacker group, however, was not far behind, with 41% of voters expressing a lack of concern about the group.

It’s easy to see why.

Cornerback

Washington may be fielding its best and deepest cornerback group in many years. Marshon Lattimore, Jonathan Jones, Mikey Sainristil and Noah Igbinoghene were all starters in 2024. To supplement this group, Adam Peters drafted a consensus top-5 CB in Trey Amos, the 6’1”, 195 lb press corner from Ole Miss. With five quality players, three of whom have the ability to play slot, field or boundary corner positions, the Commanders are in a position to play a variety of coverages and to withstand an in-season injury or two.

Linebacker

At linebacker, the Commanders return both starters from last season — 11-time All Pro Bobby Wagner and 2024 All Pro Frankie Luvu — who each played at least 98% of the teams defensive snaps last season. Filling a key backup role is last year’s 5th round draft pick, Jordan Magee, who injured his knee in the ‘24 preseason and spent two months on injured reserve. Magee played only 15 defensive snaps as a rookie, though he tallied 146 special teams snaps. Reports about the young linebacker from coaches this offseason have been positive. Magee was a productive college player for Temple, recording back-to-back 80-tackle season with 223 stops for a loss in that span. His leadership and production led to him being given a single-digit number by Temple — one of the program’s highest honors for a player.

Safety was the biggest concern

The highest level of concern was at the safety position. There seemed to be two primary concerns.

Firstly, in a similar situation to last season when there was a lot of angst over the decision not to re-sign Kam Curl, commenters expressed concern over the decision to allow Curl’s replacement, Jeremy Chinn, to leave in free agency in March. Not everyone is convinced that Chinn can be adequately replaced by Will Harris (or Jeremy Reaves or Tyler Owen).

Secondly (and related) is the feeling that safety is not a deep group so it could be derailed by injury.

Even so, many commenters still felt good about the safety group.

National email survey

In addition to the poll that we run for readers here on Hogs Haven, SB Nation sends out polls via email to members across the nation who comprise fans of all 32 NFL teams.

Sign up here to participate in the weekly emailed surveys.

This week, the national survey asked fans which conference (AFC or NFC) was stronger in the 4 geographical divisions. In the question most related to the Commanders, the poll asked voters to choose between the AFC East and NFC East.

In the AFC East, the division appears to be dominated at the moment by the Buffalo Bills, the only AFCE team to make the playoffs last season. In 2024, the other three teams all had losing records, ranging from 4 to 8 wins per team. With a new head coach and a promising 2nd-year quarterback, the Patriots may be on the rise, but the Jets have just done a hard reboot with the hiring of Aaron Glenn as the head coach of a team quarterbacked by Justin Fields and Tyrod Taylor. The Dolphins looked promising in 2023, but took a step back in ‘24.

The NFC East, of course, boasts the super bowl champion, and the division’s top two teams played against each other in the NFC Championship game just 5 months ago. The top three teams have settled QB situations, with Washington boasting the best young signal caller in the league. The Giants seem to be in a bit of a muddle, with 2025 seen as a key season for the head coach and GM, who followed up a respectable playoff season in 2022 with a pair of stinkers. With respect to the Giants, having now moved on from Daniel Jones, New York will look to rely on a strong defensive front seven and a refreshed QB room to change the team’s fortunes, while Dallas will hope to rekindle success with a head coaching change.

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