Jayden Daniels gives the Commanders actual, bonafide, post-Dan Snyder hope

Jayden Daniels has as many playoff wins as Kirk Cousins.

Kirk Cousins is a 13 year NFL veteran who has made nearly $300 million in his career. Jayden Daniels is not yet finished with his rookie season.

The Washington Commanders know both well. They let Cousins twist in the wind after rising from fourth round draft pick to Pro Bowl quarterback. His 26 regular season wins are the most any starting QB has had since Mark Rypien left the team in 1993. But that wasn't enough for former owner Dan Snyder, who refused to sign him to a long-term extension and ensured the franchise would wander in the desert until he sold the team amid a mounting tsunami of bad press in 2023.

Success didn't come easily to a team so dysfunctional that even Jerry Jones publicly side-eyed it. But new owner Josh Harris can tie Snyder's playoff win total next week against the Detroit Lions if Daniels can be great once more.

Based on what we saw Sunday night, it's a genuine possibility, even against a defense that locked Sam Darnold in a torture chamber in Week 18.

That's Daniels's final meaningful play of a 23-20 wild card win, on the road, over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. In need of a first down to gain leverage to attempt a game-winning field goal with no time on the clock, offensive coordinator Kliff Kingsbury dialed up a fake-handoff quarterback sweep for the passer whose 891 rushing yards ranked second only to Lamar Jackson in 2024.

Bucs defensive tackle Calijah Kancey, a thorn in Washington's side all night who'd previously blown up a short-yardage play at the goal line that ultimately cost the Commanders seven points, snuffed it out immediately. For a moment, it looked like Tampa Bay would get the chance to tie or win the game with a harried two-minute drill to wrap up regulation.

And then:

Daniels stiff-armed the 280-pound lineman, leaving him with nothing but a towel to cling to on what was the final non-kneeldown snap of his season. It was stunning. And at the same time it wasn't, because at no point did Daniels look like a rookie playoff debutante.

While fellow first year quarterback Bo Nix and the Denver Broncos went scoreless over the final 57 minutes of their wild card game against the Buffalo Bills, Daniels rose to each challenge Tampa Bay threw his way. He avoided negative plays with aplomb, sacked only once and even that happened at the line of scrimmage. He didn't force plays over the middle of the field or throw across his body, taking the easy-to-intercept tosses you might expect from a young quarterback (ahem, Jordan Love) off the table.

When pressed to make a play, he defaulted to the guy he trusts most in the best possible way.

When Terry McLaurin was bracketed, he progressed quickly and made Dyami Brown a devastating weapon. Dyami Brown. The wideout with exactly one game where he had more than 57 receiving yards in four years as a pro exploded for a career high five catches and 86 yards. That included the kind of entirely-too-open touchdown only possible when you've only had one game with more than 57 receiving yards in four years as a pro.

Baker Mayfield was in the midst of his finest season in the NFL and Daniels went out and nearly doubled his expected points added (EPA) for the game, out-dueling the veteran 13.9 EPA to 7.1. The rookie threw nine passes that traveled at least 10 yards downfield. He completed eight of them for 135 yards, two touchdowns and a perfect 158.3 passer rating.

This was, in a word, remarkable. The moment did not swallow Daniels whole or even take a chunk out of him. He suggested his best is still yet to come in the kind of anxiety inducing situation that turns most rookie quarterbacks into something less. The degree of difficulty wasn't the highest he'll face in the postseason -- Tampa Bay's depleted secondary created the opportunities he was eager to exploit -- but this is still a big deal.

Unlike years past in the nation's capital, it feels sustainable.

Washington had glimmers of light in the Snyder era. Each was summarily snuffed out like candles after a sparsely attended mass. Clinton Portis and a cast of talented targets pushed Jason Campbell to a postseason start. Robert Griffin III, another former Heisman Trophy winner drafted second overall, took his team to the playoffs as a rookie. Cousins maximized his potential. Taylor Heinicke looked competent after a 7-9 team won the NFC East.

None of these relative high points, the NFL equivalent of the tallest building in Wyoming, lasted. Griffin's career was cut short by injury on terrible turf and with a coaching staff unwilling to pull him out of the game for his own sake. Cousins was antagonized with franchise tags until he left, signing an $84 million, fully guaranteed contract with a Minnesota Vikings franchise desperate to reverse its own agony. Heinicke's unlikely emergence didn't last and Snyder's inability to find a quarterback capable of maximizing Portis, Santana Moss and a defense led by a rising Sean Taylor paved the way for nearly two decades without a playoff win.

Finally, hope has returned to Washington in the form of a dual threat quarterback capable of rising to the moment. The Commanders may not be a Super Bowl threat this winter -- that thin playmaking corps behind McLaurin and a below average defense suggest Daniels will have to be super human to get there. But a franchise that could easily be hand waved away for the better part of 20 years is surging, its rebuild way ahead of schedule and with three years to maximize a rookie contract that will make the young QB one of the NFL's biggest bargains.

A player with the composure, 18 starts into his pro career, to stand in the pocket with his season on the line and put the ball exactly where it needs to be.

There was no panic to Daniels's game, no sense of the impending doom that hung over the Snyder era like a dangling anvil of karma. Things are different in Washington. While that may not manifest in anything more than a divisional round appearance this winter, it's terrible news for the rest of the NFC going forward.

This article originally appeared on For The Win: Jayden Daniels gives the Commanders actual, bonafide, post-Dan Snyder hope