NFL | Things are happening in Washington

There are transformations that work, and there are also transformations that don’t work at all.

In the mid-1990s, for example, KISS tried to play grunge for an album that no one ever wanted to listen to, including the members of KISS themselves. Closer to us, there is an outdoor soccer club that dismayed an entire generation by changing its name and logo.

The Washington Football Club has also undergone many transformations over the years, always with little success. But this is about to change.

Everything starts from the top, as we have already established, and for a very long time, management in Washington was mired in a mixture of mediocrity and involuntary humor, often because of owner Daniel Snyder, who could make Jeffrey Loria and David Samson look like good guys.

After we don’t know how many scandals, Snyder had to decide to sell the club in the summer of 2023. As luck would have it, the team has been doing a lot better since then, and by the way, here are the Commanders – we will eventually get used to this name – sit at the top of their division, with an astonishing 3-1 record.

Who could have predicted this? Nobody, among other things because this team has not done anything good since its last victory in the Super Bowl, in 1992. Since this coronation, the Redskins-Commanders have only taken part in the playoffs seven times, and their last victory in series dates back to 2005. Even the New York Jets found a way to be less bad than that.

If there’s finally some light out there, it’s firstly because the Commanders found a quarterback who knows how to throw a ball, which is always useful. Ladies and gentlemen, meet Jayden Daniels, a dapper 23-year-old who already looks like a rookie of the year.

In particular, there is this statistic that says it all: in four games, the Commanders have had to punt only four times. This is undoubtedly because Daniels, the second choice in the last draft, is capable of moving his troops forward, he who completes 82.1% of his passes this season.

Our legendary critical sense prevents us from getting carried away, and the most cynical will also say that the Commanders have not beaten anyone serious, and that will not change on Sunday because they will host the Cleveland Browns, a team that hasn’t been serious since 1964.

But no matter, because finally, things are happening in Washington, a club which, like the Cowboys or the Raiders or the Dolphins, has been trying for too long to rediscover the magic of yesteryear. Their fans can live on hope, and is there anything more beautiful than hope, except maybe love and pizza pockets?

There are only two undefeated teams left, the Kansas City Chiefs and the Minnesota Vikings. In the case of the Chiefs, it’s not so surprising, they who are the defending champions, but who will now have to face life without Rashee Rice, their best receiver, absent from the game for at least four weeks (and probably more ) due to a knee injury.

It’s a lot more surprising in the case of the Vikings, who are barely recovering from a 7-10 season.

The Vikings’ pre-season began with the kind of unbridled optimism that one only finds at a Canadian golf tournament in September, but quickly, the most enthusiastic ones were disillusioned when quarterback JJ McCarthy proven lost for the season due to a knee injury.

The Vikings therefore brought in Sam Darnold, and now this former Jets player already finds himself with 11 touchdown passes to his record, a record among NFL quarterbacks.

We could spend at least three hours trying to explain why Darnold suddenly became so good, but the only possible explanation is very simple: he no longer plays for the Jets.

You will of course have understood that the email box is overflowing, so let’s go straight away with these few verses of poetry, from JF Leclerc from Gatineau: “From the death of the Expos to the Raiders, the slow agony, I pay an annuity to Lady Melancholy. »

Another reader, this one anonymous, explains to us that the Canadian’s setbacks brought him here. “After 30 years of reconstruction, I am turning to football. »

Welcome among us.

We’re going to have another big football menu at the end of the week, and on that subject, it would probably be time to go make some predictions and stock the fridge, because there’s nothing worse in life than realizing at halftime that there is no salsa left for the nachos.

So, the Jets will go to London to make the English laugh and face the Vikings, the Bills will go to Houston to face the Texans, and then finally, THE game of the weekend, the one presented in the evening on Sunday, with the Cowboys who will visit the Steelers in Pittsburgh, a rivalry that we never get tired of.

It’s moments like this that make life worth living.