LANDOVER, Md. — Washington Commanders quarterback Jayden Daniels suffered a dislocated left elbow with just under eight minutes left in the fourth quarter of his team’s blowout loss to the Seattle Seahawks on Sunday night, a league source said. Daniels will undergo further testing Monday to determine the extent of the injury and his expected recovery time.
Daniels’ left (non-throwing) arm bent backward severely at the elbow as he landed with his full body weight while being sacked near Seattle’s goal line. He writhed in pain as the Commanders’ medical staff rushed to his side and teammates dropped to one knee. Daniels’ left arm was put in a large air cast as the entire Washington bench came to his side and a cart pulled up to take him to the locker room.
“Gut-wrenching,” right guard Sam Cosmi said of the moment. “You could just hear the air being taken out of everybody in the stadium.”
Daniels declined the ride, however, choosing instead to walk back to the locker room on his own as team athletic trainers held his arm steady.
The Commanders kneel as medical staffers tend to injured quarterback Jayden Daniels. (Scott Taetsch / Getty Images)
The moment unofficially sealed the Commanders’ 38-14 defeat and appears to be the dagger in a disappointing season that already had flickering hopes entering this game. Losing Daniels — and losing him the way the Commanders did, in garbage time of a blowout loss — was a brutal coda, the lowest of low points for a team that experienced almost nothing but highs a year ago.
That Daniels was in the game at all at that point was questionable — and many of the fans who remained at Northwest Stadium raised the question loudly.
Asked whether he considered turning to backup Marcus Mariota at that point, Washington coach Dan Quinn said: “Yeah, not in that space. Obviously, the hindsight, you don’t want to think that way where an injury could take place. We were more conservative in that spot to run and hand off and not have reads to go. But just the end result, obviously, I’m bummed.”
Quinn continued: “I’m just gutted by it. I’m just bummed. We have read plays on it, and the one he was injured on is usually a runner or a throw to the flat. It’s not a scramble. It wasn’t a designed read or play into that spot. If we run it 50 times, it’s usually a handoff or a throw, I’d say, 50 times. It’s a bummer, man. In a big way.”
Jayden Daniels was helped off the field after suffering an apparent arm injury.
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The Commanders trailed 38-7 when Daniels was hurt and had already lost starting cornerback Marshon Lattimore (knee) and receiver/returner Luke McCaffrey (shoulder) to injuries in the game. They joined a lengthy list of players who have missed time for Washington because of injuries, including three starting defensive ends, the team’s top two receivers — Terry McLaurin (quad) and Noah Brown (groin) — running back Austin Ekeler (Achilles) and safety Will Harris (fibula).
This injury is Daniels’ third of the season, after suffering knee and hamstring injuries that caused him to miss three starts, including a loss last week to the Kansas City Chiefs.
Mariota said multiple teammates, including himself, spent time with Daniels after the game and that the second-year QB was in “good spirits.”
“He’s an incredible person in that sense,” Mariota said. “I think, for us, we all kind of just went in there and checked in on him. … Right now it’s just making sure that he’s OK mentally. … It sucks. I mean, there’s no way around it.”
The Commanders, now 3-6, have another eight games in a season that has already almost certainly been lost. Included is a weeklong trip to Madrid to face the reeling Miami Dolphins, and a season-ending gantlet against divisional opponents.
And they’ll likely face it all without their star quarterback, the one player who kept a shred of hope alive amid injuries and defeat.
