When the Washington Commanders released their final injury report for Week 17 on Friday, it featured multiple starters who were ruled out for the game.
Starting cornerbacks Kendall Fuller, Benjamin St-Juste, and safety Percy Butler are out for Sunday’s game against the San Francisco 49ers. They join Darrick Forrest, Washington’s starting safety who Butler replaced, on the shelf, leaving Kamren Curl as the only Week 1 starter in the lineup on Sunday.
Good luck.
Of course, things shouldn’t be this bad; after all, the Commanders spent a first-round pick on cornerback Emmanuel Forbes and a second-round pick on cornerback/safety Quan Martin.
Unfortunately, the Commanders have been afraid to even play Forbes after he struggled early in the season. Martin didn’t play a lot early but has shown promise throughout the second half of the season, playing all over Washington’s secondary.
Now, Forbes and Martin will likely need to play 100% of Washington’s defensive snaps Sunday against a potent 49ers offense that features wide receivers Brandon Aiyuk and Deebo Samuel and tight end George Kittle.
What did head coach Ron Rivera say about the secondary situation against San Francisco?
“Well, it’ll be a little bit makeshift. I mean, Quan will play both safety and nickel for us,” Rivera said. “[S Terrell] Burgess will play safety as well. We still have Kam Curl. On the outside, it’ll be [CB] Tariq [Castro-Fields] and Forbes, yeah. And Forbes is on the other side. So those would be our defensive backs. It’ll be the mix of those five guys. It’s taken out a couple of the other packages we’ve had, so for the most part, those will be the five DBs that’ll rotate. And like I said, it’s taking us out of some other sub packages.”
Remember, the Commanders cut reliable veteran Danny Johnson a few weeks ago to sign Kyu Blu Kelly, who has yet to play.
Rivera didn’t even mention Kelly as an option for Sunday’s game. The Commanders should probably give Johnson another call.
Winning against anyone with a depleted secondary is difficult enough in the NFL, but when you already own the NFL’s worst pass defense, and you’re without three starters against one of the league’s best teams, you have no chance.
Sunday is probably a good day to own multiple 49ers in fantasy football.