Taylor Heinicke Back Up at QB for Season Finale
It was announced on Wednesday morning that the Washington Commanders would be turning back to Taylor Heinicke as the starting quarterback for Sunday's season finale versus the Cowboys. The team is also broke the news that they expect to play rookie backup QB Sam Howell, which will be the NFL career debut of the fifth-round pick. Barring any "change of plans," this will be the setup.
Heinicke's 2022 Up to this Point
Posting a 0-2-1 record over the previous three games had the Commanders reeling ahead of Week 17, and head coach Ron Rivera decided to return to his Week 1 starter, Carson Wentz, over Taylor Heinicke. The experiment to right the ship at the witching hour went miserably, as Wentz did what he does so often and collapsed. He would throw three interceptions to the Browns while completing 57.1% of his passes with 5.1 yards per attempt; surprisingly, the latter two marks weren't even his worst stats for a game in the season.
Though Wentz delivered a number of stinkers in his first (and possibly last) season with the Commanders, the Taylor Heinicke stats don't paint an incredible picture, and there was at least some onus for Rivera to try to mix things up in the team's must-win game against Cleveland. As the franchise looks back on a lost year, they're going to have to come up with a plan to better feature two of the best young receivers in the game. Despite having Terry McLaurin and rookie Jahan Dotson —who really started blossoming as the season went on— the team finished the fantasy football season ranked 25th in EPA per play, 24th in passing EPA per play, and 23rd in explosive pass%, leaving plenty of meat on the bone.
Heinicke will wrap up the season as fantasy's QB40 in points per game (12.9) and finish 32nd out of 38 qualifying quarterbacks in Sports Info Solutions' IQR (82.6). Through his nine-game stretch of starts, he didn't support much of anything outside of McLaurin, who averaged eight targets, 5.6 receptions, 50 receiving yards, and 0.33 touchdowns. Those are basically WR3 numbers. The options behind him didn't fare much better, as Jahan Dotson (4.7 targets/gm), Curtis Samuel (4.3), and Logan Thomas (4.3) couldn't get their footing in Heinicke's starts either.
The Season Finale's Outlook
It's going to be difficult to trust in any Commanders fantasy pieces this week against the Cowboys, whether you play in a season-long league with a late Week 18 championship or if you're playing in DFS this weekend. We've already gone over how Heinicke caps the ceiling of Washington's fantasy pieces, but there's also the thinly-veiled threat that Sam Howell is "expected to play," which is a very vague claim.
With neither quarterback in a great spot to get in rhythm with any of the Washington pass-catching options and Antonio Gibson expected to miss the game Sunday, the best way to attack this Dallas defense may be rookie Brian Robinson, who could be in for a showcase game with all the moving pieces around him.
If fifth-round selection Sam Howell doesn't prove that he's the answer in his limited opportunity this week, let's hope this team makes a conscious effort to get these skill position players a good quarterback in the offseason.
