The Washington Commanders had a desperate need at wide receiver. After drafting Terry McLaurin in the third round in 2019, they haven’t really had anybody outside of him that was consistent. Over the years they’ve attempted to fill that void. They signed Paul Richardson in free agency, last year they went after Curtis Samuel but he’s been injured, and now more recently, they just drafted Jahan Dotson out of Penn State in the first round.
Jahan Dotson runs incredible stems. His footwork and subtle head fakes to set up the top of his routes are the best parts of his game. He also has a really good catch radius for a guy his size. Dotson is 5’11” and weighs around 178 pounds. How he can fully extend his arms and bring in balls outside his frame makes him feel much bigger than he actually is. He’ll contort his body in the air. He has good awareness on the sideline to get his feet down in bounds. And he rarely drops a pass.
Looking at his advanced stats, Dotson ranked 12th in drop rate out of 250 wide receivers in college last season with over 50 targets. On top of that, he ranked 49th in yards created per route run looking at the same group. I think he has a lot of work to do to get better at beating press coverage – mainly improving his play strength and his hand fighting skills down the field – but I think he’s a really good wide receiver outside of that. Overall, I gave him a late first – early second round grade in the 2022 NFL Draft and I think he’s a great fit for the Washington Commander’s scheme run by Scott Turner.